Author Topic: what crops (Read 4424 times)

johnbhoy · « **on:** October 08, 2009, 08:03:35 pm »

hi there i have a pig pen which is being well churned up and fertilised
next year i am reckoning on moving it and wondered what crops would do well in it
thanks for looking

oink · « **Reply #1 on:** November 03, 2009, 05:03:41 pm »

beans, leeks, lettuce, marrow, onions, peas, spinach, sweetcorn, tomato.

Leafy greens ( broccoli, cabbage etc ) may be OK too.

NO root veg (carrots, beetroot etc)

Let us know what you decide on and how they do.

doganjo · « **Reply #2 on:** November 03, 2009, 06:01:30 pm »

Plant what you enjoy eating, not what looks pretty on the packet - I made that mistake last spring and ended up feeding a load of stuff to the chickens

Elissian · « **Reply #3 on:** January 19, 2010, 09:35:41 pm »

We had a fantastic crop of potatoes, beetroot, onions and garlic on our pig dug paddock, i think pumkins and squashes would be good too

Sylvia · « **Reply #4 on:** January 20, 2010, 12:12:18 pm »

I plan to grow spuds, squashes, pumpkins, onions, shallots and leeks in the pig pen this year with spring cabbage and broad beans to follow on.

northfifeduckling · « **Reply #5 on:** January 23, 2010, 09:46:17 pm »

that's not a bad thing to feed the chickens, Annie! Mine seem to be so much hungrier than the ducks that I'm now taking deliveries in kitchen scraps from neighbours...I was thinking of devoting a plot with greens just to the birds, lol

(apologies for highjacking your thread, JB)

doganjo · « **Reply #6 on:** January 23, 2010, 11:38:39 pm »

I have a friend who brings plenty of scraps of veg and bread, as well as my daughter (her veg box is about to be cancelled as they send her the same stuff every week and ignore any requests to change), so I'm just going to grow stuff I will eat, and what I don't grow but fancy a wee taste of Sellickboy will provide in his 'mylocal5aday' van

Jackie · « **Reply #7 on:** January 24, 2010, 06:10:28 am »

Pig poo is classed as a 'hot' manure meaning it has loads of acid plus you have pig urine in it so you may need to add lime to the soil, but not for spuds they hate lime but brassica love it.

As stated dont try to grow carrots or parsnip as too much fertilizer for those gives weird shaped veg (forked) but spuds and beetroot should be ok. Besides carrots get carrot fly problems unless you cover the crop or grow them 18 inches from the ground in a tub.

The way i firgured out what I was going to grow was to work out what veg we ate in one year (and how much ie cabbage 3 times per week times 52 weeks etc), plus 1 or 2 crops I fancied eatng or trying. It still added up to a heck of a lot.lol
A tip for growing, grow 4 times more peas than you think you will need cos they dont crop as much as you may think and if you are like me you eat as you pick.

Try looking at companion planting flowers, especially for broad beans this helps with blackfly which can decimate the crop. Besides some flowers have the added advantage that you can eat them ie nasturtium seeds can be pickled as a cheats caper and the flowers can be added to a salad and they are peppery and delish.
Open faced flowers (daisy faced) encourages insects to polinate your crops and can be picked for the house.

Oh and btw I dont waste ground by planting white onions as they are so cheap to buy I only grow red onions, I plant spuds in tyre stacks so planting up rather than out plus you get a bigger crop that way. I have been known to get over 60lbs of spuds from 1 stack of 6 high tyres, lol I was giving away pink fir apple spuds to anyone who happened to be passing last year.

And make sure you have plenty of freezer space for the veg.

PS Spuds can be frozen if they are parboiled (salad spuds)or mashed.

Hope this helps

Jackie

northfifeduckling · « **Reply #8 on:** January 24, 2010, 01:13:56 pm »

is all animal manure acid then or just pigs'?

I just didn't get round to harvesting from all the containers in the autumn, Jackie. I was surprised that some did survive the heavy frost so well in the soil. Your harvest sounds absolutely fantastic! How did you get them so tall? I only managed to stack 2 tyres, it sort of seemed sufficient (maybe could have done 3 , but never 6). did you add anything to the soil for the tatties to get them so strong?

Jackie · « **Reply #9 on:** January 24, 2010, 04:01:04 pm »

Most animal poo is acid but some is worse than others, chicken manure is horrendous unless its matured for over a year.

I managed to get the tyres so high for 2 reasons I think;

1 PFA are very tall, slow growing spuds

2. I layer my compost in the tyres like this;

Thick cardboard (Wetted) only have the carboard in the first tyre.
3 or 4 inch layer of straw (soaked)
3 inches old spent compost
2 or 3 layers of newspaper (wetted and/or shredded)
1 or 2 good shovels full of well rotted horse manure
6 inches new compost or topsoil, soak really well then plant the tubers in this layer.

That should fill 1 tyre depth, just about. Then when the leaves grow above that I repeat the above mix. Remember the straw rots down quickly so the whole level settles down.

This mix isnt heavy so it doesnt squash the potato stems as just pure compost would. I also sometimes place a peice of wood over the tyre to darken them and force the shoots, but you must be really carefull doing this or the stems get too weak.

Every now and then I also add slug pellets.

I have done this with several varieties of potato and got great poundage of spuds and along the way I have converted most of my fellow allotmenteers to this way of growing them.

I also grow pumpkins and squashes in tyres full of well rotted horse manure.

Dig a hole about 6 or 8 inches down, put in several layers of wetted/shredded newspaper (these help retain water) place a tyre over the hole, fill with well rotted horse manure, make a mound of the topsoil you have removed on top so its higher than the tyre edge then plant your plant.
This has the added advantages of you always knowing where to water the crown of the plant and you dont waste manure by spreading it where you are not actually going to plant plus I get the best crop I have ever got.

Hope this helps

Jackie