Growing your own - is it worth it?

[doversoul1]

I roasted the last pumpkin from last year yesterday; not those pale, oblong squashes but blue-green skinned, squatty variety. They had been just sitting on a kitchen shelf for all these months and even the last one was in perfect condition. Amazing vegetable although it almost needs an axe to cut it open.

I have scraped the last shoots of the purple sprouting and the curly kale, the Swiss chard is nice and fresh at the moment but it will shoot up soon. The summer cabbages and broad beans won’t be ready for awhile. We are in for hungry gap.

Has anyone managed to grow ‘spring green’, those un-hearted cabbages sold in shops? I imagine they are just ordinary cabbages grown packed tightly but I don’t think they’ll be ready to eat any earlier than the normal cabbages if I try in my garden.

[gradus]

Not this year but have in the past, they're spring cabbages picked before hearting-up. Almost any cabbage family green leaf will do but this early there is, as you say,abit of a gap. I especially like sprout tops later in the season rather more than the sprouts themselves.
Switching veg, have you tried Douce de Provence peas? I sowed them in Jan and the pods are beginning to carry peas now and should be picking in a couple of weeks. They're worth a go and apparently can be sown all season long.

[doversoul1]

I find that my summer cabbages are not quite eatable before they heart up, and they are never green. As for sprouts top, I have no chance, as the pigeons finish them off while we are busy eating sprouts. But just so that I can say I have tried, this year I ate sprouted sprouts (i.e. the sprouts that started shooting up). They were quite eatable but that was as much as I could say.

I have given up any overwintering crops as they don’t survive in my garden. It is too cold and windy, and too many predators (mice, slugs, birds, squirrels, or leatherjackets etc.).

It has been very cold but the potatoes are growing well enough and needing to be earthed up soon.

[umslopogaas]

Strawberries are flowering and promise well. Just been out and removed some old bedsheets I spread over them last night to protect from frost (which I dont think we actually had, but there was a definite threat). This year I have overdosed on peas, to the extent that they have swallowed all the ground I allocated for french beans, so those are going to have to grow in pots: which is not a problem, except that they need watering every day in hot weather, which means I can never go away for even a day during the summer. Onions are coming along fine, this thing about the "man who knows his onions" is a bit of a myth, onions are easy enough to grow, the tricky bit is getting really big onions that win prizes in shows. Pink Fir Apple salad spuds are coming along. I never bother to earth them up, do people think it is really necessary?

[gurnemanz]

I find that my summer cabbages are not quite eatable before they heart up, and they are never green. As for sprouts top, I have no chance, as the pigeons finish them off while we are busy eating sprouts. But just so that I can say I have tried, this year I ate sprouted sprouts (i.e. the sprouts that started shooting up). They were quite eatable but that was as much as I could say.

I have given up any overwintering crops as they don’t survive in my garden. It is too cold and windy, and too many predators (mice, slugs, birds, squirrels, or leatherjackets etc.).

It has been very cold but the potatoes are growing well enough and needing to be earthed up soon.

The only sown "crop" which overwinters with me is biennial parsley. I am always slightly amazed that you can even go out in deep snow and pick fresh parsley. Parsley is essential in the garden and I always grow plenty of plants (10-20) to allow for some falling by the wayside. The roots sometimes seem to be prone to rotting or getting eaten. This year, two brave specimens have made it through the winter and are still providing ample fresh leaves, though just turning to seed. This year's lot are just about ready to go in.

[gradus]

I'm all for minimum effort methods in the veg garden and earthing-up spuds is not always needed imv, some bulk up deeper in the ground than others eg Red King Edward I find goes deep, but if the spuds push through the level ground they'll green and be wasted. I guess it depends on how much time and energy you're willing to invest. I find Earlies can be covered with a spade full of earth and that suffices because they are dug when small. For later crops where spuds are getting sizeable its best to earth up. It needn't be too much of a chore as it only takes a few minutes to throw earth on to the row. I have seen people spend ages on this in order to get symmetrical mounds of earth but I don't think it makes ablind bit of difference as long as the potatoes don't get exposed to the light

[clive heath]

First strawberries from the allotment today, gooseberries almost full sized, plums like grapes on the branches and apples abundant, will need thinning. Peaches useless again, they'll have to go! At home the garden is a riot of colour, white froth from the pyrocanthus , the fading spiraea and next doors invading roses, deep blue from the ceonothus, bright yellow from the cistus, purple leaves from the spiky berberis, purple from the flowering sage, dull purple-brown from the peach-leaf-curl on the almond, white woolly aphis on the apple......Is it worth it? well it has to be or what am I doing?

[umslopogaas]

Clive, is it worth it? Yes of course it is. We are talking about plants, and they dont care about us, but we depend on them. I have lots and lots of pea vines maturing at the moment, give them another couple of weeks and there will be peas to give away. But you have first strawberries, what did you do to force them on so quick? Mine are flowering, but no prospect of a fruit for at least another three weeks.

I can relate to the pyracanthus, spiraea, ceanothus, cistus, sage, but no peach leaf curl here, the trees are under glass and its too dry for Taphrina. Woolly aphis on the apples? Probably, but I havent looked.

[gradus]

Clive re peaches, have you tried hand-pollinating them, I find it works a treat ditto all other stone fruit.

[umslopogaas]

I have two peach trees (literally, one peach and one nectarine) in my conservatory and I have tried hand pollinating them with a paintbrush and all seemed well, lots of young fruit set and started to swell. Then, about a month after the great fertilisation, all the young fruit dropped off. A friend suggested it might be the dry air, which I doubt, given that the air in the Mediterranean is also dry and they grow lots of peaches, but I havent any better explanation, so am throwing water around every where in an attempt to raise the humidity.

[clive heath]

Nothing special with the strawberries. West London alluvial soil, a mini-plateau or two above the Thames is extremely sandy and gravelly which means it warms up easily. The warm April and suburban location has done the rest. Of course we pay the price with having to water a lot in spite of decades of working in compost from the heaps etc. My father-in-law had a mature Peach tree just by Craven Cottage so we know it can be done in this sort of area... and yes I have tried to hand pollinate with a paint-brush ! but not this year.

[gradus]

A paint brush is I agree too time-consuming on anything other than patio trees. A friend ran a soft floor brush over the flowers on a greengage and it has seemed to work with a good set.

[doversoul1]

I have been pulling radishes (French Breakfast) for a week now. Every spring I ask myself ‘why do I bother?’ They are not much use as vegetable other than to nibble a few with bread and cheese for lunch. They are really only worth eating for the first few days before they become stringy and hot. But I still grow them. I suppose it is a habit leftover from the days when there were no supermarkets and radishes from my own garden were the first fresh vegetable we could taste in spring.

My peas have reached the height that stated on the packet but there is no sign of any flowers. The broad beans are flowering but look thoroughly battered by the wind. Do we still have flaming June?

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Be patient.

[umslopogaas]

No sign of any flames down here in the west, we have gale warnings for today and tomorrow, but a promise it will get warmer towards the end of the week. My peas are looking good, first pods are appearing and I should get a crop in a couple of weeks, if they dont all blow away.