Mamta's Kitchen - A Family Cookbook
How is your kitchen garden?
Hello all
Just planted my seed potatoes, coriander seeds, lettuce, spinach, turnips, beet etc. today. Some beans are also in.
Conservatory is full of small pots of other plants that need to grow inside first; tomatoes, corn, courgettes, chilli, sweet peppers, bottle gourd, aubergines, basil etc. etc. How is your garden growing?
Mamta,
You must live in a warmer area than I do. All we have managed to plant outside are broad beans and garlic. I also have parsley, which keeps seeding itself in a large planter, and thyme and oregano which have overwintered outside. I have started off tomatoes, capsicums, chillis, and coriander in the heat, and will be starting beans and lettuces indoors next week. I hope the weather will be a bit warmer by then and I can use the greenhouse which is unheated.
I live in south Bedfordshire. I have a walled garden, so it is a heat trap. I have decided to convert my South facing bed, which is quite wwide, to vegetables this year. I have been growing a lot of things in pots, but it becomes very difficult to cope with when I have to leave home for a few days in summer. Most of the tender plants are in my conservatory, wich is a work room, with washing machine, dryer, storage etc. So I have a lot of work top that I can use.
haven't started anything yet, they still keep threatening snow between the storm forecasts up here !
Did notice that someone has marketed the hanging tomato baskets though, might look at using some this year... keep the slugs away... last year was a losing battle..
(ps saw a programme last night showing how slugs move and they float on a bed of slime so don't actually touch the surface they are on. This means they can move over the edge of a razor blade and not get cut !)
Steve
https://www.topsyturvy.com/
http://www.topsygardening.com/
I did the up-side-down tomatoes last year. They grew okay but it was hard to find a hook strong enough to carry the weight.
I put egg shells around the vulnerable plants and use some bird friendly slug pallets.
So far I have planted some tomatillos, epazote, milk thistle, fenugreek, coriander and various varieties of chillies. All seem to be doing well but not as well as I would have liked, I've been too pre-occupied with other things lately to be bothered to tell the truth.
In a few weeks I'm going to plant some carrots, beetroot and a few other vegetables outside.
Apart from herbs in the windowbox, I've done nowt, since conditions here are so hostile to growing anything. You don't really grow much here: you just try to stop things from dying (poor clay/chalk soil, north wind, scorching summers).
However, inspired by Nigel Slater on the BBC, I'm going to try planting some veg in huge plastic pots that two mulberry trees were delivered in. If I keep them in the shade, near a hosepipe, the veg might stand a chance of surviving the Mediterranean summer.
We'll see.
Phil
Seedlings planted so far, started off in heated propagator, moved to unheated and starting to harden off gently without lid of propagor on and next to open back door: 3 varieties of tomatoes, sweetcorn, lettuce, chillis, peppers, gherkins.
Potatoes chitting, probably plant out soon.
Newly acquired apple tree planted out couple of weeks ago.
As were raspberry canes plus one tayberry, one red gooseberry and a rhubarb plant.
Seeds still to plant include courgettes, leeks, carrots, parsnips, cabbage...
AskCy
They may be able to go over a razor blade but they refuse to cross a inch thick border of broken egg shells surrounding a small plot of vegetables!
Kav, I never thought of sorrounduing the hole vegetable plot with egg shells, will do it this time.
Ma
Ma, yes, instead of surrounding each individual plant, we make a border around each group of plants and it seems to work pretty well. If there's slugs do find their way in, we might scatter few egg shells within that patch, but usually don't need to.