Grow Your Own Magazine

Chitting is the term for producing small sprouts on your seed potatoes prior to planting them out.
Ideally place your seed potatoes rose end up (this is the end of the tattie with most eyes) in an egg trey or similar, and place in a light cool place til small sprouts appear from the eyes.
This is a very simplistic version of chitting - for full details, look at the chitting potatoes section of the thread "How to by Geordie" - he explains the techie side of things very well.

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Rat

British by birth
Scottish by the Grace of God

Blog updated Wednesday November 13th

Hi GDB, no question is ever silly. Just ask and a Grape will try to answer.
Chitting is where you place a seed potato in a cool but light place and allow the eyes on it to sprout. You probably have seen chits on potatoes when you have been cooking and the potatoes you are going to peal have developed eye shoots.
These eye shoots or chits as they are called when you wish to grow more potatoes in your garden or allotment are the plant shoots that grow up out of the earth and form leaves then flowers.
The process of allowing your seed potatoes to form shoots of an inch or two prior to planting is what people do in January each year in preparation for planting in March or April.
There is a lot of debate about the pros and cons of chitting but most of us still do it each year to ease our impatience to start growing to beat the winter blues and get a jump up come spring.
Jax

Sorry Rat didn't spot that you had posted an answer

Finally planted out my first earlies (Saxon) and salad (Charlotte) in bags. Still got my second earlies to go - my new patch of ground still not capable of digging yet! I followed LJ's advice and earthed up while I was planting. Still nothing coming up yet from the sowing session on Tuesday, except the leaves of a few radishes, but at least it is something. Harvested a good sized leek from the polytunnel and a rather poorly looking cabbage from outside.

Weather today quite unreal. Warm wind (about a Force 6), blue skies and sunshine. Still needed a fleece in the garden though. Hit 35 degrees in the plytunnel before I opened the doors. Had both doors opened - first time this year. Even got some tulips out. Most of the daffs still not out yet, but tulips ??

Tentatively thinking of sowing some tomato seeds tomorrow. Hmmm....... I see we have a Force 8! A noisy polytunnel day.

Came home from Job No 3 and watered pots and trays and buckets and guttering in greenhouse (first day that automatic vent has opened itself). Sowed Spring Onion "White Lisbon" and Pickling Onion "Paris Silverskin" - 2 small rows of each.

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Rat

British by birth
Scottish by the Grace of God

Blog updated Wednesday November 13th

Had a lovely cup of tea to celebrate St George's Day. ......Not as much fun as St Patrick's Day!!

Hi Poltrychat, i'm in the same boat. Started buying kids toys a few years ago for the grandchildren. The house is now over-run with them as the parents don't want them cluttering up their houses so i am left with them. ( the toys i mean, not the kids) although they leave them as well

I have been mostly digging more potato trenches as I decided 4 wasn't enough! As I work down my plot the bind weed and couch grass is getting more severe. I spent an hour per tranch removing it on my knees. Still, the weather on Saturday was gorgeous and I could have sat there all day! Oh and I went on the second part of the allotment training over at Spa Hill in SE London yesterday, a great day out.

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just dug over a couple of beds that have been under black plastic till now. seem in quite good nick, not too many weeds, but loads and loads of ants! what should I do now, cover them back up again til I'm ready to plant in there?

If you can see the ants' nest FVV I'd pour some boiling water on it to kill the eggs. I hate killing anything but am always getting stung by ants in the garden & come up in awful lumps which itch & last for weeks. The ants will probably have tilled the soil nicely for you though! I found some when I investigated some dying plants in a little alpine bed, they had completely undermined the plants with their nest & so had to go. The boiling water must have germinated some dormant cerinthe seeds in there though as they sprouted & I hadn't had cerinthes for years!

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Into every life a little rain must fall.

I've potted up 105 impatiens plugs which I received from T&M Young Plants but I think they had been in the plug trays too long as they had miniature flower buds on them, I picked them all off & will see how they go.I've sown some aubergine, butternut squash, radish & forget-me-not seeds as well.

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Into every life a little rain must fall.

Yesterday I pricked out some Busy Lizzies, Fiberous rooted Begonia's & Trailing lobelia before brekkers then My son joined me on the lottie, as it was his birthday (16 so nearly a man) I let him dig the trench for the 2nd earlies which we duly planted.

Dug up some leeks for lunch (wifes cousinf from Swansea was coming so had to give him leeks look you (sorry Jax) & found out it was the AGM of our lottie site. Like a fool I went to see what the comotion was and I think I've been set up as Chairman!!! Bugger, last time I nod of at one of their meetings But I'm told you get 2 rows of gold braid on your flat cap & have a flag with whippets rampant

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ntg

Never be afraid to try something new.
Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark.
A large group of professionals built the Titanic

http://grief-encounters.blogspot.com/

Potatoes are up.
Spent the afternoon in garden. Potatoes starting to show through (Sharps Express) lots of buds on the red currents and black currents in full leaf now. Sowed two rows of carrots and dug another bit of the wilderness which is a part of the garden that was'nt dug for the past fifteen years or so. Am beginning to see a difference and think i might just be winning the war with the weeds. If there was a market for dandolines i would probably be a millionaire.

Watered greenhouse again - everything bar chillies and beans germinated now. Checked potato buckets - Arran Pilot definitely out in front in the speedy shoots handicap race.

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Rat

British by birth
Scottish by the Grace of God

Blog updated Wednesday November 13th

Planted the beans I germinated in damp kitchen paper. Pricked out more tomato seedlings. Planted out the pots of sweet peas and put the wigwams up for them. Admired all the current bush flowers. Took time to enjoy my Tulips, Daffs, Forget-me-nots and hyacinths. Deadheaded loads of Daffs in the front garden. Seeded the lawns bare patches. Gave all my new trees good water and transplanted a bush in a neighbour’s garden.
Picked Rhubarb and cooked a crumble.
Jax

Bramble, don't forget dandelion is edible and has a number of uses.

Salad, leaves, nice addition as bitter bite .

Wine, yellow parts of the flower, you will need two pints of yellow per gallon of wine, have done this one & its quite good.

Coffee, roasted root I think ?

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My peppers are in flower, so potted into bigger pots, watered greenhouse and polytunnel. Finally potted up some new dahlias and took some cuttings to increase my stock.

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Kindest regards, David.

http://pigletsplots.blogspot.com/
updated - Sunday 19th at 2100hrs

many congrats nick - dont forget, delegation is the key!!!
am on a mission against weeds at the moment - creeping buttercups and speedwell are very happy with life here, and that stuff that explodes everywhere is starting to appear - cant even dig it out, am going to go round selectively with handheld weedspray, and see if I can zap at least some of it.

Sowed some tagetes, swiss chard & brussel sprout seeds, dead-headed the daffs,topped up the birdfeeders & compost bins & put Buddha outside for the summer( I bring him in during winter in case he's too cold & lonely in the garden!).One of my cucumber seedlings has keeled over & died so might sow a couple more.Last night I was collecting slugs & snails by torchlight & was practically mugged by an enormous hedgehog whose supper I was obviously nicking - so I came in & left him to it! My OH says if it was as big as I claimed it must have been a porcupine not a hedgehog.

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Into every life a little rain must fall.

The only speedy shoots i'm getting are on my chitting potatoes still sitting in teh bedroom. Weather so awful cant get them out. The chits are now about 4 inches long !

Hi All,

I have been quiet lately, have been quite unwell. But on the mend now I hope. I have managed to plant out 36 red cabbage plants which I grew from seed. Have potted on Brussel sprouts, 40 tomato plants various and a few summer cabbages and chilli peppers. I am having difficulty with slugs on the new allotment. We didn't think this one would be as bad as our first as it is more open and dry but!!! They come in force and have eaten all the caulis. So it looks like we must invest in more nemaslug fpr this one. The results are outstanding on our first allotment. We used it last october to prevent eggs overwintering and have started the summer program a few weeks ago. The brassicas are untouched and doing really well. Even the neighbours are noticing. So thumbs up for Nemaslug.

Struth Looloo, if thats what you do when your on the mend, can you tackle my plot when your fit
Today I missed the postman, so I don't know what the parcel is that's waiting for me.
Watered everything in the greenhouse & found 2 more spuds that haven't been planted (think they are Nadine) so they'll be in bags tomorrow night. Crimson Broad beans are still a picture & smell great, I thought of bringing them into the house !!!

I can thouroughly reccommend these for any one who wants beauty & food (Jax - ideal for your sq foot)

FOund out I won an auction on e-bay & now have a book on greenhouses for 50p +75p P&P !!! Thats what I call a bargain

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ntg

Never be afraid to try something new.
Remember that a lone amateur built the Ark.
A large group of professionals built the Titanic

http://grief-encounters.blogspot.com/

all my early spuds are up. some mains starting to show. and -woohooo! the asparagus is on its way!! 7 out of 10 crowns are well through. sadly though I shall just have to admire this year, as they only went in at the very end of March - speedy though?! spinach is not doing so well, I dont seem good at sowing seeds in the ground, maybe I dont rake it enough or something. in contrast, lettuce, carrots and strawbs are all doing well in pots and am onto second lot of lettuce and carrots - successional sowing donchaknow!!.
spent a LOT of time yesterday digging out spanish bluebells and trying to weed out creeping buttercup from a patch of michaelmas daisies and lemon balm. have decided to let the balm get on with it, as it seems to survive anything, but with the daisies I eventually just picked off as much buttercup foliage as I could without picking off the daisy stalks. have to go back and dig through it with a small handfork now.