Grow Your Own Needs Your Tips

[wellie]

With Recycling in mind, I'm saving all the empty foil seed packets from within the bought seed packets that I've sown. And after I've sown the contents I can then re-use those 'empties' to store my own saved seed.
Upstairs for Thinking, Downstairs for Dancing.....

[The Doctor]

I had never knowing eaten a Kohl Rabi until we got our plot 2 and a half years ago, because I had never seen them in a supermarket and never had the chance.

Now I grow as many as I can because it's luvverly!! White ones, purple ones, big and small!!! We eat it raw, cooked, roasted, baked and stewed.

My tip :- Being able to grow stuff I can't cheaply or easily buy is one of the attractions of having an allotment to me, so don't be afraid to grow something you might have disregarded or decided you don't like in the past.

Believe me, supermarket veg products are generally NOT a good marker of what something (anything!) really tastes like!

[dexterdoglancashire]

Having only grown my own for the last two years, I would say the easiest veg to grow would be courgettes. The first year the weather was extremely hot and I had lots of courgettes from my two plants. Last year, the weather was horrible and wet, and yet I still managed to get a really good crop from my plants. Sorry, Im not sure what variety they were, but they were the green ones, not yellow! Bernie aka DDL

[Herbgardener]

For an unforgettable taste sensation it has to be sweetcorn, picked fresh from the plant and put straight in a pan of boiling water. Requires quite a bit of ground but well worth it if you have a sunny plot, you can plant it closer together than the packets suggest as well.

[JO,JO]

growing spuds in an old plastic dustbin
its sooo easy got a bumper crop last year,and you can take out as many as you want just need to forage around in the earth and pull them out grew saladin.no blight etc and no snails.or slugs as they cant get up the sides of the dustbin due to tesco value vaseline lol

[wellie]

Oh, and now I've gone and put my two most recently posted Growing Tips on the Let's Grow Veg Growing Tips thread, when I meant to put them on here.
Damn and Bugger....
Still, just in case the same peeps don't read both magazines, perhaps you could use the tips twice when you have A Slow News Month?

[Sunbeam]

Home grown raspberries are my fave - can't recall the variety I have at the mo- but if you don't have a lot of space in the garden you can grow them in long troughs up against a sunny wall - and they taste like nothing on earth!!! Looking forward to getting the lottie up and running, then I'll be planting lots and lots and lots and... you get the picture!

[seasprout]

Tips.

Sow a few extra seeds and give the plants to Friends and Neighbours or sell a few at work, then you can buy more seeds, or another treat of your choice.

[seasprout]

Use an old potato as a eye protector for the top of canes.

[dexterdoglancashire]

Use empty, washed out pop bottles or those mini yoghurt drinks as covers for the end of canes, use the very large water containers as mini cloches, use the scoops you get in washing powder boxes as a useful mini scoop when putting compost onto seedlings, use carefully washed out plastic meat or veg trays as trays to put pots etc in the greenhouse, and use the clear plastic food containers as mini cloches for seedlings. Bernie aka Dexterdoglancashire

[Finedon.Dandy]

When planting up baskets and containers, sink a plant pot into the soil as deep as you can without the soil going in over the rim. This is easier to water into and the water goes down deeper, quicker and to the roots where it is most needed.

[The Doctor]

If you have a mole problem, stick loads of canes about 4 or 5 feet long into the ground round your plot, and put large plastic bottles on the top.

When the wind blows they rattle, and apparently the vibrations keep moley away.

I didn't believe it, but my dad is currently trying it on his plot and it seems to be working!

[Tam]

I always thought that the best tasting vegetable was winter purple sprouting broccoli and, although it has a wonderful flavour, I think it has been put into second place by calabrese romanesco. Just like the aforementioned broccoli it takes a long time to reach maurity, but it certainly is well worth the wait - SUPERB.

[kentvegplot]

I wouldn't be without a few home-grown tomatoes (well, in my case, 5 different varieties and at least 4 plants of each). Pretty easy, and in a decent year will grow outside.

[madasahatter]

For an unforgettable taste sensation it has to be sweetcorn, picked fresh from the plant and put straight in a pan of boiling water. Requires quite a bit of ground but well worth it if you have a sunny plot, you can plant it closer together than the packets suggest as well.

There is an old adage which tells you to walk to the sweetcorn plot, then RUN to the cooking pot!

My favourite planting is edible flowers to put into salads. Plants we all know like nasturtium and dandelion (the leaves are better blanched), but also try mallow, marigolds and pansies, not forgetting violets and lavender. My salads are so colourful, tasty too