Square Footing - Growing Vegetables in my Garden

Getting a bit too busy around here!

2009-06-03T13:14:00.000-07:00

I know I was planning to get things ready for around the middle of May (last frosts around here), but it's all started to get a bit too busy!

Last week, I managed to plant my:

Tomatoes (Gardeners' delight and Roma)
Aubergine (micro patio type)
Sugar snap peas
French beans (purple teepee and Speedy)

And I'm currently 'hardening off' my chili peppers and some more lettuce and spinach. I'll have some photos of everything coming soon.

My mini-greenhouse was bulging under the weight of that lot, but a one week staggered hardening off process managed to get things out the door (so to speak) quite quickly.

If you're interested, my hardening off process is as follows:

start off for about 3 or 4 days with a couple of hours a day (I get mine out at lunchtime, and put them back in after dinner).
for the rest of the week, I leave them out all day, but put them away at night.
for the next week, leave them out all day and night. Makes for a fortnightly process.
if you want to run 2 weeks in parallel, you can start a new routine after point 2.

Three bags of potatoes please

2009-05-28T12:42:00.000-07:00

Having had limited success with growing potatoes last year inside my raised veg patch, but with more success with growing spuds in pots, I decided to order some potato sacks to grow my potatoes in this year. I got as pack of three nice Gro-sacks from Marshalls Seeds.

They also sent me 15 Swift seed potatoes too. These were chitted from February and planted out in mid March. I followed the instructions on the pack, so placed about 10cms of compost in the bottom of the bag. I then put 5 tubers in each bag, and covered this to about half way up the bag in more compost.

I copied a tip that I got from Alys from Gardeners' World with regard to growing in pots, and that was to supplement the compost with shredded paper. This helps, as the bags are quite large, and require a lot of compost!

The growth so far has been amazing. I've had to fill the bags up with compost twice now, and the plants are already growing outside of the bags. Hope we don't get a late frost, or I'm going to be in trouble?

I've since moved the sacks into their final growing position, which is quite close to the house. I'm using the bags almost as a hedge to hide a wall next to my patio. I think the effect is quite appealing.

I'm now on my second bag of compost for these sacks, so have spent £10 on compost, plus there was also quite a lot of my own home made compost. This has amounted to quite an investment in terms of compost, so I hope the reward (harvest) is enough to make this worth trying again next year?

Horray, my Internet's back, but where's all my time gone?

2009-05-09T13:45:00.000-07:00

It seems the fix to my Internet problem was easy: I had to buy a new router from TalkTalk (one that they could support), and this has seemed to be more reliable than the other two (that I got off eBay). Seems routers aren't as comptible to ISP's as you might think?

Anyway, I have blog postings ready to come on here, but as of Thursday night, we have a rather early addition to the family, which wasn't due for another month. So doubt I'll be having much time for blogging for the next couple of months :-(

But Lauren is a delight all the same. She was 6lb 0.5oz when born, and doing well so far. I'll try to finish up some half done postings soon, but will need the camera back, and that's in the hospital at the moment!

Cheers.

Where's my Internet gone?

2009-04-09T03:48:00.000-07:00

Hi guys,

sorry for not posting anything for ages, but I'm having a huge problem with my Internet at home. Seems my ISP wants nothing to do with helping me, so I'm stuck on my own! Well, I could pay them £1 a minute for support (or whatever rip-off charge it is), but that just isn't right!

I have posts in the pipeline, so will try to get them here as soon as I can

Enjoy the spring, I certainly am.

A special visitor

2009-02-24T00:20:00.000-08:00

Seems the winter must have been pretty bad this year, as we were visited by a female Fieldfare. They are usually found in Scotland, but if the winter is bad, will move south into England. Well how bad must it have been this year then, for it to have moved all the way into Oxfordshire? Quite a rare find by all accounts.

We see her now again in the neighbour's apple tree. She's yet to come into our garden, but we're hoping the neighbourhood blackbird will encourage her in?

New year. Now what?

2009-01-12T12:31:00.000-08:00

So I've had my square foot garden for one year now. So how was it, and what have I learnt?

My main problem was environmental and one that seems will bother me forever: Cats! Seems they just love the fluffy soil I've filled my raised bed with, so I will need to use my netting more often than I'd hoped for. It's not so pretty having your bed covered in netting, especially when the bed is so visible from the house.

One other problem I think I've found is that the claim from Mel Bartholomew, that you don't need to fertilise your bed, as a single scoop of homemade compost is sufficient. I've found this to be inaccurate, as my first half season was more successful than this full season. This might be due to weather, but I suspect it's a fertiliser problem? So next year, as well as adding a handful of my own compost, I'll also supplement this with some fertiliser (growmore?)

And one other thing I've learnt is that when you're gowing things inside a bed 6 foot by 4 foot, it's best not to try to grow big plants. Unfortunately, this has proved quite tricky. For example, I've grown parsnips this year. I grew carrots the year before, and I discovered that a carrot produces a small fluffy 'top' of leaves. But a parsnip (or mine, at least) produces a huge amount of leaves above ground. This caused me problems, as I'd squeezed the parsnips in around other smaller plants, and they just grew too bif and caused shade for everythig else!

These would seem to be things you need to learn, as the seed catalogues give no indication as to how tall a vegetable plant grows to. They do for ornamentals (flowers), but not for veg. very strange, and quite important for people growing with space in mind. I guess I should Google these plants a bit more next year?

So what's my plan for next year?

Well, in accordance with my self imposed crop rotation, I'm due for a season of legumes (peas and beans). However, crop rotation is slightly less important in square foot gardening, as I actually drow a mix of other types within my main type. So although this year was mostly roots, I also grew some legumes and brassicas also. Because of this, I'm going to be growing:

Spring Cabbage (already in place)
Jerusalem Artichoke (although might actually be replaced with cucumbers, due to space limitations)
Peas
Sugar Snap
Garlic
Tomatoes (feeling brave here, as have lost my past two crops due to blight!)
Aubergine (?)
Spinach
French Beans
Lettuce
Salad Leaves
Chilli Pepper (Jalapeno)
Onion
Leek (for 2010)

So I might also replace the Aubegine with some more French Beans. We do like our beans, so this might be a good idea.

There's not much going on at the moment, other than to keep an eye on the fleece sheet on top of my bed, as it keeps getting blown around! But once seens start to get sown, and things get planted, I'll be sure to keep you all up to date.

I'm back!!!!

2008-11-16T09:06:00.000-08:00

Hello all,

sorry that I haven't been around for ages, been a little bit too busy at work, so haven't had any time left to do any gardening, let alone blog about it!

But I had a chance a couple of days ago to see my 'plot', and saw that my parsnip's were looking a bit big. So thought I'd have a quick poke around, and see what the roots were feeling like. Felt the first one I came across, and was a bit shocked by what my fingers were telling me. It felt as though the root was about 10cm's+ in diameter. I thought this couldn't be right, so decided to pull it up to have a look.

And I found this!

It was about a foot long (with a twist in the middle), and really chunky at the top. The picture has a standard size mug used for reference! Now, it's clearly too big, and the wrong shape, for roasting. So I didn't know what to do with. Ran a quick search on google for "parsnip recipe", and found this: http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/honeyroastedparsnips_5334.shtml.

Took a while to cut the parsnip up into roastable sized chunks, but once done, the recipe was quite easy to follow, and this was the end result:

The recipe made four bowls full of a delicious sweet soup, with a lovely honey taste. We had two bowls for lunch today (and we both loved it, which was quite a surprise from my wife, who doesn't even like parsnip!). The other servings have gone in the freezer for another day.

Stairway to heaven?

2008-09-29T08:57:00.000-07:00

Well, if your a frog, and your looking for somewhere to raise your young, then lets hope so? As a follow up from my Everyone has room for a pond post, this is my attempt at dealing with the issue of access into my pond.

So my aim was to turn this rough mess of breeze block, rocks and wood, into something respectable and not too wobbly. My aim here being that flogs and other water based invertebrate's will use the slope/steps to access my mini-pond.

So first off, I constructed a very simple framework to rest the logs on. The purpose of this was to raise the logs off the ground, because I had three tubes placed on the ground. These being for shelter.

This frame was given three 'legs' of timber, and these were hammered into the ground. The frame is now secured.

I added the first sawn piece of log in place. As you can see, I have also drilled holes into the ends of some of the larger logs, to provide insect homes too.

if all goes well, this will be my own little eco-terminator habitat!

Next I added further logs in place. These were a mix of sizes, to allow proper stacking of the logs. You can't see it in the photo, but I have also drilled holes into the logs and the frame, and secured the logs in place with wooden dowels (pegs).

This will hopefully give the structure more rigidity than just gravity alone?

And here we are, almost finished! As you can see, the logs are all stacked on top of each, providing a stepped slope to the pond.

Lets just hope that when spring comes, and frogs/toads are looking for somewhere to call home, that they find my pond?

Oh yeah, and that my cat, Jacob, lets them find it!!!

The logs, by the way, were from a building site that I pass everyday on my way to work. I saw them cutting down these trees, and just went up to them and asked if I could have some logs. They were more than happy to help. Think they wanted me to take the lot, but I could only manage 5 logs!

My vegetable growing empire expands...

2008-08-14T12:40:00.000-07:00

It would seem my diplomacy has earned me an extra 15 square feet of gardening space!

So when I proposed to my wife that I could grow enough curly kale for the guinea pigs, which just happens to be their favourite nibble, I was surprised to be allowed to extract a small strip of border from the precious lawn!

In reality, it's not that great an achievement, just a small strip along the side of the front garden, next to the Euonymus 'hedge'.

I do, however, now have 6 curly kale plants in it (inter-planted with my Agapanthus seedlings), which the pigs are slowly eating their way through. Trouble is, I think the caterpillars are getting through it quicker!

Still, as a bag of kale leaves from our local supermarket is over a pound, I should be able to make some savings from this: And there's always next year?

I guess we'll never know?

2008-08-08T12:23:00.000-07:00

It would seem my unknown cucurbit will remain a mystery forever. As was briefly hinted at "Down on the Allotment" in the A Pumpkin Dilemma post, the seeds from a pumpkin aren't necessarily going to grow into a pumpkin plant. And sometimes, the resulting plant isn't always that clever, and so won't pollinate properly.

Well, after about 15 failed pollination's, I decided my cucurbit was not a good one, so decided to hack it down and compost it instead! Should provide enough 'green' to get the heap going again at least.

Not a complete failure though, as I now know I have just about enough space to try a pack of seeds next year, and grow a true pumpkin (or butternut squash, as I love those!) That one might just work?

Everyone has room for a pond.

2008-08-04T12:47:00.000-07:00

Having been inspired by Spring Watch, my sons favourite programme of last month, we have invested in a small 'water feature'.

It's a small wooden half barrel. It's only 50cm in diameter, and only 40cm deep, so not much to look at. We have lined it with a butyl liner (quite a process to make this fit), and have tacked this to the barrel around the rim. We pretty much followed the instructions inside the RHS Water in a small garden book.

I have made a shelf using two quite large rocks from the garden centre (about £2.50 each) to enable creature access in and out. We didn't have much room for plants, but have planted one oxygenator, one tall(ish) reed, and a large leaved plant for cover (a bog bean: what a great name).

I have also attempted to build some steps up to the edge, as my intention is that frogs will populate my pond, and so help me in my slug control programme. I need to rethink the access steps, as they're a bit precarious at the moment.

The steps are essentially some breeze blocks cut into small pieces, and mounted on top of each other. I have also cut a drain-pipe into three tubes, as I hope to provide a place of shelter also. I have built these into the steps.

But as it's all very loose, and a bit ugly to look at, I'm thinking of building something out of wood. If I can get hold of some fairly decent sized planks, I can turn the steps into a wildlife habitat, by drilling holes into the wood for insects to live in?

If anyone has any suggestions as to how I should go about this, I'd appreciate any tips?

Look what I made mummy

2008-07-22T13:14:00.000-07:00

So as a follow up to my Pots of pots post last month, thought I'd report on how the initial planting of a Charlotte potato in a plastic plant pot succeeded.

I was letting the plant grow large enough before harvesting from it. It had just stopped flowering, so I left it for a bit longer while I went on holiday.

When I came back, I noticed one of the leaves had gone a little brown at the edges. Not sure if this was the onset of blight, I decided to see what crop I could achieve.

So I turned it upside down and scooped all of these out of the pot. Quite a turn-up from an emergency fix from an original plan that went horribly wrong!

Attack of the killer cucurbit?

2008-07-04T10:23:00.000-07:00

As I've been producing a lot of my own compost, I've had quite a lot spare to use as a mulch and/or a soil additive (which is what, after all, it should be used for!). So I threw a large quantity down where I was going to grow my sweetcorn, and I noticed a large cucurbit seedling coming through: Obviously a seedling that hadn't got killed off in my lukewarm compost heap!

So I let it grow to see what it might turn into. After all, it had to be something I put in there, so was most likely going to be:

A pumpkin (the one from Halloween)

A butternut squash (of which we have many)

A melon (Occasionally)

A cucumber

A courgette.

The seedling started off quite large, so I suspect it must most likely be one of the top three. Only now it's starting to outgrow my garden. It's already 7 foot long, and has started climbing up into a Buddleia, which is planted against my fence!

Hopefully someone might be able to identify it from these picture and tell me what I might be expecting to harvest from this (and of course any special growing instructions that go with it)?

Sony Ericsson W810i used for size reference, and Gratuitous photo of veg bed, as it looks so good at the moment :-)

A new season begins

2008-07-04T10:04:00.000-07:00

And this post has nothing to do with football, cricket or motor racing. With all the growing activity that's going on, I thought it was time to think about a bit of decomposing. Or more specifically, composting!

So over the weekend, I decided to:

Empty the contents of my black council compost bin into four large plastic bags for storage. (this took me a few hours, as the bin in question is a right nuisance to empty, serious design flaw!)
Transfer the contents of my self made wooden bin into the aforementioned council bin (this also took a while, as access is quite limited, and the black bin is also a nuisance to fill)
Prune my Verbena bush, shred the cuttings, and add this into my wooden bin.

The above was all done over two days, and quite a lot of sweat was wasted! Still, I now have 4 very large (and heavy) bags of home made compost, one refilled 250 litre plastic compost bin, and one restarted cold heap. I have since put the cuttings from my Prunus laurocerasus Rotundifolia (Laurel) and my Euonymus, which has already nearly filled the bin by a third!

This is starting to break down already, so I don't suspect will take it too long to turn into compost! And it all starts over again...

Pots of pots

2008-06-04T13:16:00.000-07:00

As a quick follow up from my Results of the Great "Potato Poll" blog, thought I'd report my successes of growing pots in pots.

It would seem that growing potatoes in pots with drainage holes is a good thing.

But, trying to grow potatoes in pots WITHOUT drainage is a big problem! Especially with all the rain we've had of late. I have just decided to give up on the idea, and try to save what I could. I found a reasonable sized plastic pot that looks big enough for one potato.

So I tried to see if there was anything usable from the bog pot! Luckily, one of the potatoes was still attached to the haulm, so I removed it from the stinky pot and transplanted it into the replacement. The smell was horrific, so hopefully it's not too late? Won't be doing that again. And if you ever feel you have to plant something into a pot without any drainage holes, think again! You have been warned.

Boxes of Potatoes anyone?

2008-06-02T05:11:00.001-07:00

Not an offer for free potatoes I'm afraid! For those who don't know the square foot gardening methodology, I'll give you a brief background. The basic tenets are that you should be able to reach the middle of the box from all sides (so basically a box should be no more than 4 foot wide, or only 2 foot if only accessible from one side), and that the box only needs 6 inches of soil.

The theory being that if you have 6 inches of top quality soil (and the soil in my box is 1 third vermiculite, 1 third compost, and 1 third peat (or alternative)), then you will not need any more than this.

However, some plants just really need some extra soil, and potatoes are one of those plants. So to compensate for this, I have built some square foot boxes out of plywood, to act as high-rise homes for them. They are only 4 inches high, but this gives me a net height of 10 inches in which to grow my potatoes. Hopefully this will be enough?

Here's a quick snap of the boxes freshly made in my garage.

And here they are in position. I've covered one plant with each, and then filled them with a mix of vermiculite and home made compost. My plan being that when the potatoes are harvested, the extra compost will help raise the level of the soil in my box, as it's a bit low.

Sowing the seeds of...

2008-05-25T13:41:00.000-07:00

So what were the remaining words of this 1989 song by Tears for Fears: Glory; Hope; Love? Well in my case, it's French Parsley (Petroselinum Crispum French).

I collected the seeds from a rather sorry looking plant last year. I just snipped off some browning flower heads and placed them into a brown paper bag (mushroom bag from Tesco). I placed the bag in my garage all winter, and decided to try my luck with them last week.

I just emptied the contents onto a sheet of paper, and collected all the bits that looked like seeds. I sowed them onto the top of some potting compost and covered this with vermiculite. I had little faith in my seed collecting skills, so wasn't expecting too much!

But, a week later, I have......

Seedlings!

So it looks like collecting your own seed isn't that hard after all :-) And providing the plants grow big and strong, I might be able to try this again next year? And maybe with my new found enthusiasm, I might try this with some more things at the end of this season!

It's gone a bit fruity in here

2008-05-23T12:44:00.000-07:00

With all this talk about vegetables, thought I'd better not neglect all my fruit.

Bearing in mind that my garden is only 10m², I have an Apple tree (Katy), a Pear tree (Conference), and Plum tree (Czar), a Blackberry bush (Oregon Thornless) -- planted behind my vegetable box, a Blueberry bush (unknown origin) -- in a large pot of ericaceous compost, and a small Olive tree (Olea Europea) -- in a small terracotta pot.

I even have plans for a Raspberry, or Blackberry derivative (Loganberry?) for next year to go against another fence where my Clematis failed.

So hopefully we'll be having a very fruit-filled Autumn?

Where's it all gone?

2008-05-21T13:31:00.000-07:00

So my seeds are all grown up now, and most have moved out of home*. So thought I'd give a brief breakdown of where everything has gone:

The sweetcorn have been planted out. I've planted 9 of them into my back border, while I'm waiting for my Rudbeckia Glodsturm, my Berlandiera lyrata and my Lysimachia atropurpurea all grow big enough to be planted out, and hopefully flower? I've planted them in a 3 x 3 grid, but had to stagger the middle row as I had to plant around some Euphorbia. The arrangement is sort of diagonal, and quite pleasing to the eye!

My runner beans have gone into a pot with some Ipomoea purpurea Star Of Yelta. The pot is about 35 x 35 x 40 cm, so thought it was only big enough for 3 beans and 3 morning glories. I've made a simple tripod structure from bamboo, and planted the beans up the canes. I've also made a simple trellis from twine, and have grown the Ipomoea between the canes, and up the twine. It's all growing nicely, so should produce some flowers soon?

* And by that, I of course mean the greenhouse.

So that still leaves the tomotoes, the celeriac, and the mini-pop sweetcorn in the greenhouse. I'm hardening them off at the moment for planting out next week.

Expanding greenhouses

2008-05-10T12:39:00.000-07:00

As my sweetcorn have now outgrown my windowsill, and my runner beans and guara lindheimeri have grown too large for my greenhouse, I was forced to rectify the problem. My solution was to convert a large plastic bag into a simple greenhouse :-)

I used the planter that will eventually take my mini-pop popcorn, and added four bamboo canes to keep the bag off the plants. The bag was something I found in the garage, that used to hold the straw for the guinea pigs. I'm hoping that it will function in the same way as the greenhouse next to it?

I'm using this temporarily, as I'm hardening off the beans and guara. I'm about a week into this now, so the bag is only going on at night, and perhaps for only a few more days at most? But I'm sure the plants will appreciate the effort, as they were both touching the roof of the old greenhouse, and the beans were being forced into a bend.

Results of the Great "Potato Poll"

2008-05-08T09:28:00.000-07:00

For the two people who found my poll, and consequently voted on it, I'm sure the outcome is on your minds.

The decision as to what to do with my left over potatoes was heavily split, and involved either: planting them in a spare container; or giving them away.

Well, I couldn't decide how to call this one, so had to get in an independent adjudicator (the wife). She was of the same mind as VegMonkey, and insisted that I plant them up!

So I went on the lookout for a spare container for some of the tubers, and found this:

It was just large enough for one 'Rocket' tuber, so I made up a mix of loam (scraped from the garden) and some of my own compost, and part filled the tub. I also added a layer of paper shreddings to the base, to help with water retention, apparently a must for potatoes!

And then I was going to admit defeat, when I found......

This. It's the bucket from the Christmas tree, and is large enough (I hope) to take the three remaining tubers. It doesn't have any drainage holes, so I have loaded the bottom with stones, and then added a generous layer of paper again. I've filled this with the same compost/loam mix, and also added in some spare potting compost.

Again I only part filled this tub, as I'm going on the idea that once the leaves have poked through the surface, I will cover them with more compost to encourage more tubers! Lets hope my plans work?

How's it all Growing

2008-04-27T13:05:00.000-07:00

As everything is all growing away quite happily in its pot or direct outside, I thought I'd just give a quick update on how it's all going.

Celeriac [sown 09/03/2008]
Having been quite slow to get started, the celeriac has started to put on a few leaves, and it certainly appreciating being moved outside (into the greenhouse), as was getting quite leggy on the windowsill. The growth had halted for a while as it got used to the move, but with the increase in temperature, has seemed to forgiven me.

Runner Beans [sown 05/04/2008]
These were started off inside (out of sun) until the germinated (only took them a couple of days), and were then placed in sun, as according to the instructions I was following. This didn't seem to be a good idea, as they started to shoot off out of control. As a few had germinated quicker than others, I decided to move them outside into better light (again into my mini greenhouse) to see if this would calm their growth down.

Seemed to work, but I decided to remove the two very tall ones, which has left with three strong looking beans. I'll be mixing these up with some purple Ipomoea in a pot, so hope three will be enough?

Tomatoes (moneymakers) [sown 23/03/2008]
These have been out in the greenhouse for quite a few weeks now, and have now made their second set of true leaves. They're not very tall, but seem strong. I'll be keeping an eye on them for their first flush of flowers, so I'll know I'll be close to hardening them off and getting them out (aiming for mid-late May, so nearly there!).

Leeks [sown 12/03/2008]
As I don't have a nursery bed, or anywhere else free to sow these, I had to opt for a largish pot. They don't seem to be minding so far, as growing straight and strong, so all being well, I'll be able to get these out end of June or beginning of July, depending on of course, whether the lettuce's currently occupying their soil have been harvested?

Sweetcorn [sown 22/04/2008]
These have only gone in, but as were three year old kernels/seed, thought I might not be successful? But they have popped their heads out no problem, and are growing on very nicely indeed. I can almost taste those sweet husks already.

Carrots [sown 30/03/2008]
Seemed to take a little longer than the 17 days promised by my 'vegetable expert' book, but they are starting to come up, so I'm relieved about that. Thought they would be another failed sowing; And talking of which:

Onions (red baron) [sown 02/03/2008]
I usually have very good luck with onions, but not so this year! I tried with seeds (saved from last year) but nothing turned up after over a month (and 21 days promised by my usually reliable book). So I tried again with some bargain seedlings found at Homebase. These were in a bit of a sorry state when I bought them, but hoped they would transplant well? These have also failed on me (apart from one), so I presume I will not be eating red onions this year. What a shame. I've just sown some osteospermum to fill the gap. Not edible, but might look nice.

Onions (Cambridge white) [sown 02/03/2008]
I also appeared to fail with my sowing of these - only these were three year old seeds, so perhaps my luck was a bit thin anyway? I also picked up some cheap seedlings from Homebase at the same time, and these transplants appear to be more successful. And while planting the seedlings, I noticed a couple of germination's coming through, so will let these grow on and see if they are better?

Peas/Mangetout [sown 30/03/2008]
Again a total success with these, even though a cat seemed to get into my seemingly well protected bed, and dug over this area quite heavily. Most of them came up where I'd put them originally, but some were disturbed, so I've had to resow in the gaps! At least I'll have a staggered harvest, so guess thanks to the cat for this????

Parsnips [sown 16/02/2008]
Only six of my original either chitted seedlings have come through, so I've had to sow some spares into the gaps. These have not yet shown themselves, so I presume these have failed? But the six that came through are looking very nice indeed, and I'm hoping for big tasty things from these?

R.I.P Beloved P.S.B

2008-04-21T12:46:00.000-07:00

So there I was the other day, sitting in my garden observing all that was growing. I was taking a well earned rest having spent the past 6 hours digging and building a new addition to the garden. No, nothing horticultural, but a platform for my sons new playhouse!

When I noticed that my Purple Sprouting Broccoli had fallen over and almost uprooted itself from my SFG soil. So I set about giving it an emergency harvest. I took about a handful of spears for us, and a bucket full of young leaves for the guinea pigs.

I then performed a couple of intricate dissections, and removed some of the side shoots to try and reduce its size. This was partly successful, but on inspection of my harvest, I decided to get a bit harsh with it, as it wasn't providing enough crop to sustain itself.

So I literally pulled it out of the soil, and after removing most of the compost from its roots (waste not, want not as my mum always said), and got it ready for shredding. I got my shredder out (and old Flymo mower) and set about chopping it up into lots of small pieces. These were then added to the compost heap to help that get started (too much brown at the moment).

And then cleaned up the square foot I'd taken it from, and sowed some carrots in its place. All this while the sun was out (made a change from the cold and rain that I had to work through in the morning), so quite a pleasant few minutes spent in my garden. And a lesson learnt: You need at least three PSB plants, and about 4 foot x 1.5 foot of ground to support them for a small family. No good if you only have a 6'x4' raised bed!!!!

Tulips in the Snow

2008-04-14T12:55:00.001-07:00

I know this is a bit late, but this is what we found last weekend. The forecast did mention something about snow, but I'm always a little uncertain of weather forecasts, they're not that accurate most of the time! So was a little surprised to find they were spot on.

You might be able to see my vegetable bed to the right of my little boy. The hoops are holding up the netting, which is in turn supporting a lot of snow. I had to get out there pretty quick after this picture was taken to sweep the snow off the top.

One of the plastic tubes didn't stand up to the weight put on it, so has bent under the pressure. But I'm hoping I can persuade it back to shape soon.

But as luck would have it, everything seems to have come through this unusual shock, and still seems to be growing. I think it even helped my purple sprouting broccoli, as I was able to harvest it a couple of days after the snow. And there was nothing around before the snow.

And it wasn't all bad. Someone managed to have some fun. Not sure which one is the coldest though from this picture? And the shortly followed snow-ball fight was fantastic fun. The snow was lovely and soft, that even a face full of the stuff was worthy of a laugh.

First 'Harvest' of the Year

2008-03-27T13:55:00.001-07:00

OK, so it's not too much to look at, but this is the first of my spring cabbages to come out. I had to harvest this one right now as it was producing flower bugs at the leaf terminals, so was about to 'bolt' (love that word).

I had to pull the leaves off individually as the cabbage wasn't as tight as it should be, something I'm sure to do with my fluffy mix of soil in my bed. The mixture, as recommended by Mel Bartholomew, is a third peat moss, a third mixed compost, and a third vermiculite.

I decided to go peat free for my mix, but this left me looking for coir fibres. Proved impossible in my local garden centres, so opted to use horse manure instead. As such, I have a mostly compost
based filling for my bed, and I'm not too sure my brassica's are happy with this? They've grown, but they've got a bit long in the stem.

Still, the cabbage was lovely to eat, and had a nice irony taste to it. And the guinea pigs loved the bits we left, so a partial success. Here's hoping the rest of the season goes this well :-)

Third time not so lucky

2008-03-23T07:37:00.000-07:00

Well it seems the illusive Himalayan Blue Poppy (Meconopsis betonicifolia) has beaten me again!

This is my third attempt at growing these plants, and I guess when they state that they are 'challenging', they weren't joking.

I've found some great guides on growing these from seeds, but all a little too late for this time round. If I try again, I'll make sure I do so according to instructions from the 'experts', and not just the back of the seed packet.

I think this might be my last attempt, but you never know with gardening, do you?

Chit chit chitting along...

2008-03-05T11:32:00.000-08:00

So here they are, my first early potatoes, chitting quite happily in a recycled container from Tesco (green beans probably. Yes, the ones from Kenya!), and sitting on a bed of sawdust.

I was clearly short of any egg boxes this week, but think this works just aswell? The potatoes are Charlottes (on the left) and Rocket (on the right).

The Rocket have started a bit quicker, so I guess I'll be planting these into the first free squares, and will put the Charlotte's in behind once they are ready, and their squares have been vacated by the Spring cabbages.

I actually only need two of each for my squares, so wondering if I should find space for them in my garden, or get hold of some large planters to grow them in? Failing that, they'll be going into the compost heap! So help me out here, and tell me what to do? I've added a little poll to the right ->

I hate having to buy extra, just in case, but it always seems like a sensible approach at the time. Now I have excess that I don't know what to do with, and I also do hate waste...

10 days and counting...

2008-02-26T13:14:00.000-08:00

I thought it would never happen, but my parsnip seeds have started to germinate!!!!! I've had them lovingly wrapped up in a plastic bag, sitting on a damp sheet of toilet paper, and in good lighting for the past 10 days, and finally one of them has decided to break dormancy, and start to grow. About time. Hopefully the remaining 45 will follow suit, and I'll be able to 'plant' them in my square foot garden.

I just love this time of year. I think growing plants from seed is one of the most exciting things about gardening. So many people miss out on this, as they think it's hard. How hard is it to drop some tiny pellets into some damp soil, and leave them for a couple of weeks in good light (usually a windowsill if nothing else is to hand)? I find it so rewarding.

Sitting on my windowsill at the moment, I have: Agapanthus (collected the seed from my parents house); Guara lindheimeri (T&M); Stipa tennuissima (T&M); Berlandiera lyrata - chocolate daisy (T&M). All growing very nicely, and looking forward until they're big enough to go into the garden (or is that just me?!!!)

Stipa tennuissima

Guara lindheimeri & Berlandiera lyrata

Remembering Jasmine

2008-02-26T12:26:00.000-08:00

Slightly off topic here (but with a gardening twist). A couple of weeks ago now, we discovered that one of our cats was going off her food, something very rare for her! So we had her down our local vets straight away to get her checked out. All looked OK, but an X-ray was taken, just in case. All seemed well, except for a slight 'grey' area that couldn't be seen so well, so a biopsy was done just to be safe.

A few days later, it was revealed to us that Jasmine had an Adeno-carcinoma, a very aggressive form of cancer, and seemingly very rare in a cat of her age (6 years).

So a few tough decisions later, and we only had one option as medicine was not a viable option. So on the 6th of February, we had our Jasmine's pain ended.

To remember her, we bought a very nice pot to keep her ashes in, and also as a feature in the garden.

Our plan is to keep it filled with orange/yellow seasonal flowers to remind us of our little ginger one, who we'll always love, and never forget. God bless you Jasmine.

My Planting Guide (2008)

2008-02-19T13:25:00.000-08:00

So you can see how inspired/mad I am, I'll reveal my planting guide for this year.

Hopefully the plan is clear enough for you to see what I'm planning? The four beds are not indicating four beds, but one for each season!! And you'll notice I still have space spare for autumn/winter planting. What can I put in those empty squares?

You might be able to see that this year is a mostly root based year. Even though my bed is only 6x4', I am still trying to adopt a crop rotation plan. Apparently this is not quite so fundamental in SFG as per normal row based planting, as there is always a mixture of crops planted close to each other (as you'll see from my plan, at least one of each group), but I still thought I'd try to go down the crop rotation route. It gives me a chance to try out new stuff each year anyway.

And so it begins (nearly)

2008-02-13T13:02:00.000-08:00

Well, isn't this exciting, my own BLOG!

I was just reading the events from the "Fresh as a Daisy - The Veggie Garden Experience" blog, and thought that all looked so good, I'd try it out for myself.

For those who don't know, Square Foot Gardening is a concept invented by Mel Bartholomew. It is an alternative form of raised bed gardening that allows for very intensive gardening. All sounds good, so I decided to give it a go.

For me, I've built a 6x4 foot bed, and placed this at the back of my north facing garden. This should give it enough sunlight to succeed? The bed has been built into my flower border, as space is at a bit of a premium.

This gives me 24 square foot of growing space, enough for 24 cabbages, or 96 Parsnips, or 384 carrots! And with the potential of three distinct harvests from a single growing season, this all sounds good.

My plan for this years is to grow:

Peas
Mangetout
Tomatoes
Spring cabbages (already in place)
Potatoes
Parsnips
Carrots
Lettuce
Garlic
Onion
Leek
Beetroot
Cerleriac

Sounds a lot, but all being well with length of time to harvest, and weather, it should all fit in? This is my first full year with the SFG, so I'll try to keep you up to date with how it's going.

Here's a quick picture of my SFG in situ. It's a bit of a mess at the moment. I've only just managed to get the cage set-up. Before that, my plot was the neighbourhood cat litter box! So all spare soil was getting covered up with whatever I had lying around.

The cage is made from some plastic tubing I found in Homebase. I went looking for plumbers pipe (alkathene), but couldn't find any/ or wasn't looking in the right place, so grabbed whatever I could find. Think it looks quite good though.

Here's a shot of my current activity. My savoy cabbage is bulking up very nicely, and should be ready for eating some time soon? I have a 'row' of spring cabbages as well, and that's my purple sprouting broccoli in the foreground. It's nearly pushing it's way out of the cage.

This final picture shows how I've seperated each of my square feet. Mel recommended using a solid grid to maintain the squares. I wasn't able to come across enough spare wood to use for this purpose, so I decided to mark out my grid using blue nylon string. Might not be as smart looking as a painted wooden grid, but I like it. The bottom left corner has my garlic in it. I only put the bulbs in in November, and they've already put on a fair bit of growth. here's looking forward to some more fresh bulbs straight from the garden!

Going to log off now, but should be back soon to report on my parsnip sowing, my potato chitting, and a whole bunch of seed germination going on in my spare room!!!