Autumn and early winter food gluts

 No matter how well I think I have planned, sown in succession and planted, Mother Nature always has her own ideas, which usually means more of something than we can manage. 

This year it was courgettes and various types of climbing bean (not runners, we don't much like them), so I went in search of recipes and came across a brilliant site, with not just recipes, but many resources and advice for gardeners, it's well worth sharing, so here it is: Allotment and gardens

A potato picture, in November?

 

Well, that was in May this year, I have been growing potatoes successfully in containers for a few years now, but I picked this one just as a sign of growth and hope - and don't we need quite a bit more of that these days? I do have next year's seed potatoes on order already from Pennard Plants

Life here is very different, I now have a new little helper in the garden as we are now happy grandparents. Many of the things we used to think important, or found time to do fell by the wayside - this blog included.

Now that I have found it again, I shall make no promises, but looking back at old posts, I can see what a useful record it has been for me, so who knows.

Detailed growing information

I was sorting through my seed order, which arrived today from the Organic Gardening Catalogue and stumbled across a brilliant website that most gardeners in the UK could benefit from, so I thought I'd share it.
It is called Garden Focus and you can find it here.

There are 2 great benefits, the first is being given the option to select your nearest town,  to take into account latest frost, then select the vegetables you intend growing; the second is that having confirmed the selection, a week by week list is created (and a suggested rotation if you need it). Clicking any of the crop weekly entries then brings up detailed information for sowing and cultivation.

Well done to the website author David Marks.

A little pictorial catch up.

Here are a few pictures of the veggie patch from this year.

Sunflower by the raspberries, now gone and the birds have eaten its seeds

Markies potatoes, tipped out of container yesterday (24.Nov.16)

First Earlies from container (June 2016)

Garlic (elephant and other) plus shallots and onions (April 2016)

Nets over the brassicas (June 2016)

Climbing courgettes in foreground, potatoes in containers behind (11.June.16)

Some carrots and spring onions in a container 

Strawberries on the left, some garlic looking unhappy to the right

Greenhouse tomatoes with companion plants of marigold, borage and chives

Cabbages healthily coming along under the net

Peas to left, climbing beans middle, broad beans behind

Excellent suggestion from Bere Regis for gathering comfrey juice

Plans and Problems

Plans.

Potato Day

This is the time of year when I send out information about the Potato Day, a busy time in the village and an occasion which we hope helps and encourages people to grow potatoes, vegetables and much more.
See The Potato Days list for ours (on 6th February, and many more) here.
Worth Knowing: Orders can be placed in advance with the excellent nursery helping put on the day: Pennard Plants.

Problems.

Flooding, what can gardeners do to help?

This year, so far, the south west of England has not been subjected to flooding on the scale of that which struck the Somerset Levels in 2013 and 2014. That is not to say that other parts of the country have got off so lightly, far from it. This time around it is the north west of the UK which has suffered an endless battering of storms and daily we see, on our televisions, scenes of flooding to homes, businesses, fields and gardens. Even before this latest storm ("Frank") people in Somerset were wondering how they could help (see Western Gazette).

All of which sets me to wondering, what can we as gardeners do to help fellow gardeners in areas which have been affected by flooding?

The RHS offers some advice, but it seems (sorry about the pun) a drop in the ocean.

Here is just a little taste of the effect on one property (albeit the National Trust, with rather more resources than the average gardener): Wordsworth House and Garden.

So, what can we fellow gardeners do to help?

Did I say Final Potatoes?

Today I turned out more of the container grown potatoes, that leaves just one container (the largest one) to give us, hopefully, some new potato treats into the new year.

So, when I previously posted under the heading of Final Potatoes, I got that wrong didn't I; they just keep coming!

This is probably a good time to say Merry Christmas and a Peaceful New Year - happy growing!

Compost from potato containers around brassica plants

Lovely looking Charlotte potatoes

Emptying container

Something different

Different to me anyway.

I have a friend who buys plug plants quite regularly, whilst I have generally grown from seed (except for onion and garlic sets). Recently though I was looking in the Organic Gardening Catalogue and saw under Autumn Sowing and Planting, some collections of plug plants and decided to give them a go, so I decided to follow Roger's example.

The supplier for the Organic Gardening Catalogue turned out to be Rocket Gardens. I found everything very well packaged and the plants, when revealed, were good and healthy and clear growing advice was provided.

(By the way, I decided to post about this for interest, I haven't been approached by The Organic Catalogue, nor by Rocket Gardens, this is just me, and not any kind of advertisement).

I kept some photographs through the process and here they are.

Packaging

Growing advice

Lettuce plants under first layer of straw

Lettuce plants revealed (coin for scale)

First layer removed

Plugs in water prior to planting

Most plants in beds. Salads went mainly into greenhouse.

That was a few days less than a month ago, and now they are all growing quite healthily (except for some of the lettuce leaves which we have already enjoyed eating).

Final Chapter of Potato Experiment

If you have visited previously, you will know that I planted 6 varieties of potato in bags and containers, and gathered potatoes from under the plants, disturbing the roots as little as possible, and leaving the top growth flourishing.

Now that the plants (they were all first earlies) have died back, I tipped the containers and bags out, gathering the last of each variety, as hoped, they all produced a second crop, but not uniformly, see photograph below...

Well worth doing again.

Abbot, Dunluce, Sherine, Accent, Rocket

Here are the containers, now cleaned and planted up with (chitted) Charlotte potatoes, which I bought from Little Groves, Beaminster. Hopefully they should give new potatoes for Christmas (they'll go into a greenhouse when frost is in the air).

Containers of Charlotte potatoes planted today for Christmas

In the foreground is the cut-back green manure, soon to be dug in.

More Potatoes

The container-grown potatoes have now moved out of the greenhouse, but we are continuing to get plenty from the plants.

Here are the ones I brought in today, again by putting my hand down into the soil and pulling out potatoes, to (hopefully) have the plants carry on producing.

Dunluce (left) and Winston (right)

More information on the potatoes:

Dunluce
Winston

Potatoes in the greenhouse

Well, the previous post showed the potato bags and pots in the greenhouse, and that has been a most successful experiment, one to be followed again next year.

I have taken potatoes from three of the bags so far, each time putting my hand down into the soil, in the hope that the plants may carry on, though having grown in the greenhouse they are quite leggy and one issue is that the greater heat in the greenhouse means they do dry out more quickly.

Here is a picture of the produce of the rummage I just did in one bag.

Container Potatoes - Rocket