Growing Stuff
My enthusiasm for growing stuff has returned just in time for spring, and armed with my gardening magazine and the Suttons Plant Catalogue, I'm ready for action. This weekend I bought a blueberry plant, but now I need another one (they fruit better in pairs) and some ericaceous compost to grow them in. I am also going to send off my my strawberry runners (JUST SEND P&P FOR FREE PLANTS!) but to be honest, I already have quite a few which have dug themselves into the cracks on my patio.
Last year's success came from my hanging baskets of tomatoes, plus the aforementioned strawbs, and the most unlikiest one, my cucumber, which produced three fruits. I also did well with a courgette plant that grew fruits like little balls, but might try my luck with a different shape this year. The biggest failures were anything I tried to grow from seed. The tomatoes were all growing fine, but the fruit never ripened in time. Maybe the most disappointing thing was my aubergine, which never grew anything except leaves. DAMN YOU. So, this year I am going to order lots of plug plants and hope for the best, leaving out the damn aubergine.
So far on my wish list is a six pack of hundreds and thousands tomatoes, the patio veg collection (cape gooseberry, courgette midnight, sweet pepper (never really worked for me last year), chilli and tomato Maskotka), another blueberry, maybe a blackcurrant and definitely the potato starter kit. I tried this halfheartedly last year but this time I think I'll give it a proper go, and this one comes with 3 potato buckets and three varieties of potato. I've seen over kits which come with bags and I'd rather have a pot to be honest, but we'll see how well they go! Plus, refilling it with tubers costs £4.95, which isn't all that bad.
At the garden centre I also bought some more flat seed trays and some seeds for growing lettuce and herbs, which worked out much better for me last year than growing big plants from seed. I've started a pot of curley parsley which has survived the winter beautifully, so it'll be joined by two kinds of basil and some flat leaf parsley. I haven't decided yet whether or not to grow the lettuce on the windowsill. Stay tuned for more exciting updates on this story!
I managed to do all this last year with no actual research beyond the odd gardening magazine, so this time I've ordered a book (Kitchen Harvest: A Cook's Guide to Growing Organic Fruit, Vegetables and Herbs in Containers) and have a few others in my wishlist (Crops in Pots is a particular one I'm after!). After payday, I'm getting me some VEGGIES!
Incidentally, watch this space to find out if the title is a cunning clue as to some cool news, or just a random title.
Last year's success came from my hanging baskets of tomatoes, plus the aforementioned strawbs, and the most unlikiest one, my cucumber, which produced three fruits. I also did well with a courgette plant that grew fruits like little balls, but might try my luck with a different shape this year. The biggest failures were anything I tried to grow from seed. The tomatoes were all growing fine, but the fruit never ripened in time. Maybe the most disappointing thing was my aubergine, which never grew anything except leaves. DAMN YOU. So, this year I am going to order lots of plug plants and hope for the best, leaving out the damn aubergine.
So far on my wish list is a six pack of hundreds and thousands tomatoes, the patio veg collection (cape gooseberry, courgette midnight, sweet pepper (never really worked for me last year), chilli and tomato Maskotka), another blueberry, maybe a blackcurrant and definitely the potato starter kit. I tried this halfheartedly last year but this time I think I'll give it a proper go, and this one comes with 3 potato buckets and three varieties of potato. I've seen over kits which come with bags and I'd rather have a pot to be honest, but we'll see how well they go! Plus, refilling it with tubers costs £4.95, which isn't all that bad.
At the garden centre I also bought some more flat seed trays and some seeds for growing lettuce and herbs, which worked out much better for me last year than growing big plants from seed. I've started a pot of curley parsley which has survived the winter beautifully, so it'll be joined by two kinds of basil and some flat leaf parsley. I haven't decided yet whether or not to grow the lettuce on the windowsill. Stay tuned for more exciting updates on this story!
I managed to do all this last year with no actual research beyond the odd gardening magazine, so this time I've ordered a book (Kitchen Harvest: A Cook's Guide to Growing Organic Fruit, Vegetables and Herbs in Containers) and have a few others in my wishlist (Crops in Pots is a particular one I'm after!). After payday, I'm getting me some VEGGIES!
Incidentally, watch this space to find out if the title is a cunning clue as to some cool news, or just a random title.