Allotment / Gardeners

[Walker570]

Broad beans and French beans harvested and already frozen for the winter. Pulling a few leaks and do they taste good. Picking runners as fast as the two of us and our neighbours can eat them. Will put in another row of Swiss chard this week for winter, the early row is producing nicely and will supply right through till March next year as long as we keep pulling the leaves. Far better than spinach. Big job at the moment is coping with Victorias, split and froze a whole bucketful this morning. TIP. split the plums and remove stones , place them on a baking tray/s and put them in the freezer, when frozen bring them out and quickly either pack them loose in a plastic bag or box or as I do lay them flat in a bag and suck the air out. You can then bring them straight from the freezer into the bowl and crumble on top and in the oven ..DO NOT let them thaw out first !!

Only a week or so before we are inundated with apples and pears as well. Purchased one of those fancy peelers from Lakeland ... brilliant!! ... peels apples and pears no problem. It will de core the apples and spiral cut them in seconds. The pears I split in half and remove the centre with a melon baller. Again freeze the pears flat on a tray, then transfer to bags when frozen. They don't all stick together and easier to get in the pie dish before they thaw. of course then the walnuts will start dropping along with cob nuts, damsons and wild fruits from the hedgerow ...... it is a busy time , the next three or four weeks.

[BaconBoy]

I have clubroot on my cabbages,red and green.

My brussels plants have all but a couple died.

Tried for 3 years to grow peas,tried different types and places on the plot,all unsuccessful

We do have good

Strawberries

Spuds

Leeks

Beetroot

Runners

Onions

Garlic

Tom's

Cucumbers

And loads of salad food,so not a bad year

I have a few jalapeño chilli plants in the green house fruiting and a pumpkin for the kids at Halloween.

Does anybody know how to treat and get rid of clubroot please,I've been told that i will get it every year.

Thanks

[Walker570]

Club root powder, if the EU haven't banned it with everything else useful. Dip the roots in it before planting should solve the problem and yes, once you have it in the ground not easy to clear out. If you grow from seed then do so in clean soil in pots. Plant brassicas in a different place every year in rotation.

I did some garlic this year and was surprised how well it did. Hanging in the garden room now to ripen along with the shallots.

[DoolinDalton]

Hi everyone...I have had a good year with spuds...Charlotte variety...this I put down to the seaweed, under and over the seed potatoes...apparently, it keeps the slugs away and obviously feeds the plants also! Not one slug hole! Tomatoes in the greenhouse were a 99% failure...lots of new varieties to try and was so excited about the potential harvest! I can only put it down to my basic stupidity...my friend asked if I opened the greenhouse door every day? I said '' No, I can't always get up to the garden every day, due to work''. She reckons that the flowers weren't pollinated (enough) and she's no doubt correct, in that I only had a few plants with fruit on! However, I put lots of the plants outside, mainly a variety called 'Sub Arctic' and they have done well, a decent amount of fruit, even from the other varieties. Purple broccoli was/ is eaten by caterpillars...(I initially blamed wood pigeons and was prepared to exact my revenge!)...but I managed to squash dozens of them a few days ago so maybe the plants will recover. Looking forward to next season...will live and learn from my mistakes this year and intend to grow lots more stuff.

[lord_seagrave]

For clubroot, the established methods are to lime the soil and and rotate your brassicas.

 

If your soil isn't very well-draining, then some sharp sand to loosen it up is said to improve things.

 

If you don't already start your brassicas in sterile compost, then I would recommend you do this too.

 

Good luck.

 

LS

[Aled]

Similar problem here with my tomatoes DoolinDaltion. Cucumbers have been OK though. Spuds got blight, but I cut everything down and managed a reasonable crop. Runner beans been good, radishes too good, carrots so so, beetroot and onions about to be harvested. Grown my first butternut squash.

Could of been a better summer but could of been a lot worse, a nice but of sun would help the last lap now.

Cheers

Aled

[cwmmawr]

My old man used to give the tomato plants a good shake every morning to help the tomatoes pollinate am I right in thinking the bees vibrate to help them pollinate and you can mimic this by shaking or tapping above the flower?

[Aled]

yes I've been told tapping the tomato flowers help.

Cheers

Aled

[DoolinDalton]

''My old man used to give the tomato plants a good shake every morning to help the tomatoes pollinate am I right in thinking the bees vibrate to help them pollinate and you can mimic this by shaking or tapping above the flower?''

 

Excellent tip, cwmmawr...will definitely try this next year. I have just harvested the outside tomatoes and managed to get a large plastic bag full...although they are still green! Half of them are now in a drawer to ripen them asap! I have an idea for next seasons outside tomatoes. Using some type of frame...this could be a closely woven net (scaffolding safety net) or plastic conservatory roofing sheet (ask your local window co. for some scrap sheets)...fill the frame with straw to a depth of approx. 15 cm. Then put your tomato plants in the ground and stake up. The straw will (hopefully) stop any slugs/ mice, etc from eating the toms and will also keep any heat in the ground. Also, if any trusses fall down or you don't stake the toms up, the straw will 'support' the fruits and keep them of the bare soil. Just a crazy idea of mine!

[Aled]

Well I've more or less given up on this years growing season, its not been very good. Need to give the soil a good airing pile in some good old fashioned muck, and its been suggested (its clay soil) a bit of sand would help.

Cheers

Aled

[cwmmawr]

Yes I have used sand a lot of the years helps with drainage very good if growing carrots.

 

Do you cover the muck with plastic or anything Aled or just leave on top?

[Walker570]

French beans and broad beans are well frozen in packs in the freezer. Cannot keep up with five courgette plants(how the do you spell that?) anyway not only feeding ourselves but half the village as well. I am halving the size of my veg garden this year and put half down to grass where I can just run the Kubota round it when I do the orchard. Just sown two packets of Swiss Chard to see if it grows and matures for greens over the autumn and winter. Last year the early sown crop provided eating material right through to Feb. Far better than spinach. Harvested and froze Victoria plums already. The Damsons are almost ready, along with three varieties of pears. Bramley is laden and I may ask my local cider maker if he wants half of them at least. James Greeve we are already using for crumbles. Czar plums are just ripening. Downey crab apples are falling so ripe for making apple jelly and I have probably the best crop of Russet apples ever. Found out what a good apple they are for cooking last year as we had sufficient to freeze and use of the winter for pies. There must be easily 1000 walnuts on my big walnut tree and whacked another squirrel that had evil intent this week :-) so I think we might have a bumper crop.

 

Only two of us and I am not far from a commercial potato farmer who grows some excellent produce and has a farm shop, so cheaper and easier to buy what we need.