[lazybee]

I'm not going to bother with onions, as they are cheaper than cheap to buy in a sack. I'm growing shallots again instead. I find they do everything onions do and then some. I will probably grow something a bit different again. I just stand and look at the rows of seeds in the shop and then decide Last year it was scorzonera, I won't do them again they were 18" long and took too long to dig up. I want to get Nine star perennial broccoli but can't find the seeds in France.

[suziequeue]

We just started growing veg this year. My aunt has been banging on about "square foot gardening " for years so we thought we would give it a go.

Spent a fortune on making the raised beds and the netting and compost and everything but hopefully now that it's all set up and I am composting regularly I can just add to the soil bit by bit each year. One thing I can virtually guarantee is that it is squirrel, rabbit and bird proof.

We have been quite strict about only growing stuff that we like to eat. Paul says he only likes peas and mashed potato but I've fed him all sorts in the past. He seemed unaware that I had been feeding him parsnips and cabbage over the winter javascript:void(0);

We put red and white onions, garlic, spring onions and radishes in straight away. We've got broccoli, savoy cabbage, sunflowers for the chickens (taken from the bird mix!), sweet peppers, jalepeno and chilli peppers, Alicante tomatoes and salad mix going on in trays on the windowsill.

DH has done a trench of potatoes, one of carrots and one of peas round the side. I am awaiting hanging baskets of strawberries and cherry tomatoes and we have relocated our fantastic autumn raspberries from the pig-pen area to a little plot at the front of the house.

I am also awaiting some plugs impregnated with mushroom spawn that you "plant" in decaying wood and get shitake and oyster mushrooms cropping on the dead wood for five years..... we shall see - it's probably all  load of marketing bo****ks but I couldn't resist giving it a try. In future I am thinking of growing "normal" mushrooms in my "maturing stage" compost bin. Anybody got any experience of this?

Oooh just writing about it is making my mouth water. I do hope it's not too disappointing.  I'm not sure that I've got particularly green fingers.

Susanna

[Hermit]

This year
Onions, potatoes,carrots,parsnips, red and white cabbage,caulies, red and white kohl rabi,pickle onions and salad onions,florence fennel, sweetcorn,beetroot x2 types, rainbow chard, broccolli, french and broad beans,rhubarb, blackcurrants, gooseberries, strawbs,leeks and lettuce, radish, endive and chickory, brussel sprouts, I think thats it for outside.....then inside.....courgettes, plum, beef and salad tomatoes,cucumbers,french beans, sweet peppers,melons and indoor strawbs, indoor salads, courgettes x 2 types and then about 10 types of herbs.
Dont grow turnips or swede, squashes etc.
I am a registered veg business though Hermit

[Olly398]

@ Suziequeue  - hiya, your plans sound great! Interesting reading your post, not sure where you sourced your shitaake mushrooms but not many people do them in the UK so my guess is from a Scottish farm? I met the lady that runs this outfit the other day, she is very knowledgable and passionate and I'm sure you will find it a great product. Good luck 

[Fluffywelshsheep]

What are the essential veg , Am missing out tatties to much to get them going for me at the moment, and am getting (hopefully) seedling from lids/aldi on Thursday.

What else do people think are good to grow as essentials?

[Helencus]

In total out doors I am growing 2 lots of spuds, peas, French beans, broad beans, runner beans, White onions, and red onions, shallots, cabbage, broccoli, kale, leeks, carrots, beetroot, sweetcorn, courgettes, squash, pumpkins, parsnips and chard. In the greenhouse toms, cucumber, peppers, melon and chillies.

[dizzy1pig]

  i tried mushrooms 3 years ago from the plugs...mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm. got absolutely nowt
and that was following instructions .. ordinary ones are not a problem though. i just bought a mushroom kit and off they went.

have planted jerusalem artichokes, broad beans ready to go out tomorrow, coriander looking good. mmm curry in couple of weeks.
 

[Sharondp]

I've already planted my 'first early'potatoes - 'swift'. Got some MAris peer and King eds to go in later. Have tomatoes on the go, plus leeks, onion, red cabbage, parsnips, beetroot, peppers (sweet & hot), need to sow runner beans, broad beans, and peas. Have dug a square plot for my sweetcorn. Cucumber, courgettes, chard, plus soft fruits and later on a pumpkin / squash patch.

Most of my seeds were free with magazines! Potatoes were from B&Q!

[Wizard]

Hello you Lassies I think you know I only garden in boxes these days.I have 6 Red Duke of York 6 White 6 Accord and 4 Lady Crystl Brian gave me there were no Lady Crystl in the Gy garden centers this year The chief in Pennells(The most expensive garden center for miles)told me "Were not getting any" no explanation.I grow them in pressure washed 5 gallon spray drums they are just right I grew some in 1 tonne fertiliser bag necks last season a great success.Main crop potatoes I don't bother with I can have a ride down Boston way and farming friends will give me a bag or two of Esteema or Desiree Main crop ones in October.If you Know how to drive You tube I have put some pictures of the boxes on but don't ask where L O L I grow shallots for pickles a couple of gherkins and lots of toms alsorts of toms to can (in Kilner jars)I also grow herbs to dry sage very important.parsley and thyme basil and coriander.Carrots Parmex and Autumn King. Capsicums.and a Chili peppermainly to dry.As many Scarlet Emperor as I can find room for and a box of broad beans as close together as I dare and feed them with liquid sheep s**t water out of the dolly tub.Don't grow flowers other than Marigolds in the tomato's Then I grow as many leeks as will grow in a 6ft x 4ft box.Its more than half full deep ways of 10 year old horse muck and I collect the rain water that comes out the drain hole and water it down to fertilise the plants.I am going to do an experiment with a 10 gallon drum and some small bore hose plugged into a piece of overflow pipe and see if I can make a drippig feed system to water my Green house Toms they will be Shirley one side and Gardeners Delight the other.Time will tell us if the idea works I can buy a system but £50 comes to mind only to mind though

[juliag]

We have been really slow to get going this year, when I look in the notebook at what we had the girls sowing last year (starting in jan in the polytunnel) this year we are a bit of a disgrace, However one thing we will definitley be repeating is potatos grown in old plastic feed sacks. We put holes around the bottom for drainage, wound the top of the sack down to about a third high, in goes the compost and the seed potatos, covering with bit more compost. As the plants started to grow we just uncurled the bag a bit chucking more compost in until the bag was fully opened and full up. Then we forgot about them! As we started to have a end of summer clean up we tipped the sacks of what I thought was forgotton about potatos and therefore no good by that point straight into a wheelbarrow to go and throw straight into a heap, when on looking down it was like finding treasure. pounds and pounds of the little darlings!!!
What a result and a great use for old feed sacks! now I am sure there will be plenty on here who say plastic sacks are no good for growing potatos in but my word they worked for us!! 

[oink]

Broccoli - green and purple
Onions (red + white), sweetcorn and runner beans
Potatoes (1st + mains), carrots and beetroot
Garlic, tomato and salads

I've cut down quite a bit this year as I'm fed up growing veg only to be told "... but you've always known I don't like them"!  very frustrating

Interested by the mushroom stories though so maybe I'll give them a try

[Helencus]

Sounds like a darn good use for them to me Julia.. Top tip thanks 

[Wizard]

Hello Helen I'm off to Brockelsby today to get some mole hills.As I told you earlier this box gardening is good but if I use all grow bag and compost it is cost prohibitive,even if I use that Erin rubbish compost.Like I said before I use top and bottom of 1 tonne fertilizer bags but I only get 2 out of a bag of Westland compost.Thats why I go to get some mole hills to mix in with it.The early tatties seem to like the mix judging by the results last year.I was in Range in Scunthorpe on Tuesday and they had some Blueberry Bushes in pots ready to plant out about a good foot tall and nice and bushy Lady Yarborough's Gardener has six in tubs they are prolific croppers Kath is very fond of the fruit and I was tempted to get 2 and Brian bought a 6ft tall Victoria Plum tree for £19:99p its a good sturdy sapling we think but Like a lot more things where do I put them? Some thing would have to go.Its no good I shall have to win the Lotto and have a larger place Then it would be There's to much for us to do we cannot manage it. I shall have to down size never happy is me .

[juliag]

mole hills..........I have plenty , we complain like mad about them but obviously we have overlooked a use for the soil, we also have mole runs, almost like a very long hill where the mole has gone across the field pushing the soil up as it goes!

[Wizard]

Hello J yes I stumbled on it by accident the mole catcher was busy at Boundary Farm and he was spreading the hills with his foot I thought my word ready riddled and soft muck So I asked Carl can I have some "If you can beat im to em yis" So I do every season And some fresh manure to put in the bottom of the cool frame it warms as it rots Put my seed pans on top of the fresh manure.