IT’S harvesting time, and our resident gardening expert JOA GROWER has some top tips to keep the produce growing in your gardens for sometime yet.
WELL, I would imagine that a lot of you are now busy harvesting, eating and enjoying all the lovely crops that you have grown through out the season. But don’t forget that early autumn is still a great time to keep on sowing or planting salads regularly, as they will keep going right up to the first frosts and sometimes beyond. August is still okay for a late sowing of main crop peas and mangetouts seeds (or better still plant some small transplants to give you a head start – available from Growers Organics either at our nursery in Yealmpton or our stall at Totnes market Fridays). To prepare your bed add some goodness to the soil, that could be by using homemade compost or maybe a bag of bought soil improver compost, and a small amount of fertilizer. Don’t forget that mangetouts and peas are just like sweet peas, the more you pick the more you get. Keep harvesting them and you could be getting fresh peas right up until October or early November. Now is also a good time to talk about winter and in particular what to plant for those winter months. Although there isn’t the full range of vegetable varieties as there are in the summer months, there is still something for everyone. Start preparing your beds for the winter brassicas. That includes any plants that are in the cabbage family, i.e. brussels, purple sprouting broccoli and kales. The ground will probably benefit from a bit of a feed. Use a general fertilizer such as seaweed meal or chicken manure pellets, taking care to follow the manufactures instructions. Give the plants a good distance between each one – approximately 30-44cm (12-18”) for the larger varieties and 25-30cm (10-12”) for cabbages. Now this might seem quite a distance but when fully grown they will need it! I like to interplant so that the space isn’t wasted, lettuces and quick growing salad leaves are always good for this. Now is also a good time to get a few leeks in the ground. Use a dibber to make several holes, about 10-15cm deep and 15-20cm apart. This can be done using a piece of old broom handle or something similar. Before dropping the plants down the holes, trim the roots on the leeks to 1-2cm. This encourages new growth and makes the leeks easier to drop down into each hole. Fill each hole up to the top with water. It’s as simple as that! Harvest from December to February. Just quickly going back to harvesting, please don’t forget that any damaged crops such as potatoes that accidentally get impaled with the fork when digging up, should be used up first as they will not store and can cause the rest of your spud crop to rot over time.
Watering and more watering
IT’S late summer already, and what a long hot summer it has been. I have had to spend many an hour watering (but then I do have a whole nursery to look after). At home we always try and use our grey water, which means emptying the bath with a bucket and using it on the garden. Luckily the bathroom is downstairs and near the back door! Do you know what the benefits of regular watering are? Apart from the obvious, keeping your plants alive. Irregular watering can lead to problems with blossom and rot in tomatoes, and cause root vegetables to split, and flowers to drop off your french and runner beans. You can prevent this by watering well during dry spells. It’s especially useful if this can be done either last thing at night, or early morning, before the sun gets into full swing. When feeding your container grown plants, don’t forget to give them a really good soaking before you apply your liquid feed. This will save you wasting it. As you know when watering a very dry plant the majority of the water just runs straight through the pot and ends up on the floor. By allowing the compost to soak most of this up first, your liquid feed/ fertilizer should remain in the compost. We will still be at Totnes market until early October on Fridays but will be finishing Saturdays at the end of August. Happy gardening!