(A cauliflower on the day I should have picked it!)

 

It's so long since I last blogged and so much has happened on the growing front that I can't hope to cover it all, but here's a few thoughts...at the Woodberry Down community garden, where we are growing in large bags, my "three sisters" sweetcorn/squash/French bean bag looks impressive, but I'm worried that the tassles on the cobs may not have all been pollinated (each silky thread is attached to a grain of corn, and each one needs to be fertilized by pollen from the flowers at the top). I planted eight but one got destroyed by a squirrel, leaving seven. I planted them in a block as they rely on wind to blow the pollen from the flowers to the tassles...but is there a minimum number that works? Perhaps seven is not enough to ensure full pollination...anyone have experience of this? Or anyone tried doing it with a paint brush?

 (The Three Sisters -- sweetcorn, squash and French beans)

 

My squash is going mad but although there are loads of female flowers with swollen fruit, the fruit dont seem to be getting any bigger. They may end up a weird hybrid anyway, as I had saved the seed from a squash I had eaten, which could have been pollinated by a cucumber or another winter squash (they are all the same species, cucurbit pepo, so can cross pollinate).

(Parsnips and carrots at the Woodberry Down garden)

 

In the Lordship North edible garden things are growing well despite the frequent strong winds. My first attempt at growing cauliflower was a modest success...the first one I harvested was small and full of mealy cabbage aphids, which I spent an hour digging out with a toothpick! The other two were bigger (a pound each), but they had turned a bit yellow. Should I have protected them from the sun I wonder, or did I just harvest them a bit late (the day before they looked perfect though)? One also had loads of aphids but this time I decided not to be squeamish -- I just boiled them up and pretended the little black specs were ground pepper!

 (a common frog living between the bags in our edible garden)

 

That's all for now...I would love to hear other people's growing experiences, advice etc, if you want to comment, or write your own blog...?

(below: a solitary mason bee has layed eggs in our bug hotel, using mud to stop the holes) 

 

Fourth instalment of my blog about growing in bags on a housing estate in Hackney -- I'm hoping other growers will add comments, answer some of my questions, add other questions of their own, and we can start a dialogue about urban food growing on the website.

April has been so busy on the seedling front that I am writing this blog in May!

A new thing I tried in April was making liquid feeds out of nettles and comfrey. I put half a kilo of nettles in a 5 litre water bottle, filled with water (it should be 1kg to 10litres water), then left for two weeks. Draining the liquid through a seive into a bucket was a smelly, messy business...I put the gunge in the compost bin, and diluted the "nettle tea" 1:10. As far as I know it should be used immediately.

With the comfrey I tried the concentrated method: I cut the bottom off a big water bottle (7l?), inverted it over a jug, and made some holes in the lid. I then stuffed the comfrey leaves into the bottle, put a plastic bag and then some bricks on top. The books say to leave for a month, but already after two weeks 400ml of dark brown liquid had dripped into the jug. This can be stored for a month apparently, and should be diluted 1:10-20.

I did this in April because I was told the young leaves are at their most nutritious then...the problem was, although I can store the comfrey liquid, I had to use the nettle tea before I really needed it. So I ended up using it in my brassica bag even though it didn't really need it. The nettle tea was also very stinky, so I'm not sure I will try it again. The concentrated comfrey is much less smelly. I will use it on my tomatoes (Garden Pearl), which are flowering....

In fact they had already started flowering by the end of April, even though I didn't sow them till 18th March (next year I will wait till the end of March). I had put the small seedlings in the light reflector I made from a cardboard box and kitchen foil, and of course there has been loads of sun. I am now hardening them off on the balcony, along with French beans (Aiguillon, a dwarf variety sown at beginning of April, already flowering, and in fact I have one small bean!) and sweetcorn.

I dug in the grazing rye on 6th April -- that was a difficult job! I have since been shown how to do it with a hoe, which I will try next time. Will transplant tomatoes and beans there in a week or so.

(Tomato, French beans and coriander in home-made light reflector on windowill, but beware sawdust mulch...)

I was very chuft with an idea I had to use sawdust as a mulch to deter fungus gnats (sciarid flies) -- they are small and black, like fruit flies, and you might notice them walking on the surface of the soil. They lay their eggs on the damp soil and the maggots eat the roots of your seedlings. They seem to particularly love basil. But I have since discovered that sawdust leaches nutrients from your soil unless it is a couple of years old, so I have had to scrape it all off! At Hawkwood nursery they use sand. Another way to deter the flies, apparently, is to water from below so the surface is not so damp.

I haven't really got my head around "companion planting" but I have made one small attempt at it, by planting dill among my brassicas...it is meant to deter something or other... The second batch of sprouts and cauliflower which I sowed in late February (I had to abandon the first batch sown at the beginning of the month because got too leggy) and planted out on 11th April are looking big and strong.

I have been harvesting radishes, kale, spring cabbage, winter lettuce and spinach -- although the spinach is now succumbing to leaf miners, so not sure how much longer it will last.

I hope this has been helpful -- I welcome any tips or comments.

How to make a windowsill light reflector

Well my February sowings did not do well: not enough light, even on my southwest facing windowsill. Brussels sprouts, summer cabbage and cauliflower, spinach and lettuce -- all leggy and pale. So I abandoned them and sowed new brassica seeds a couple of weeks later, and this time put them in a plastic propagator (big tray with clear plastic lid and ventilation slots, unheated) outside on the balcony -- at first I brought it in at night, but then I kept forgetting, so it stays out all night now. Seedlings much shorter, sturdier and darker green from the increased light, but growing slowly due to the cold. I have also now been given a tip about making a light reflector out of cardboard and silver foil, which I will try on the windowsill (see top of this blog for link to instructions "how to make a windowsill light reflector).

That top tip was given to me when I became a Garden Organic volunteer "Master Gardener" in Islington last weekend. The idea is that we support and encourage others in our community to grow fruit and vegetables. I aim to help ten households grow food over the course of a year, and also spread the word more generally in the community at local events etc. If you would like free advice or support growing food, you can contact me on this blog, or visit the Master Gardener website: www.islington.mastergardeners.org.uk (don't be put off by the fact it's Islington -- several of us are based in Hackney) where there are details of all your local Master Gardeners.

So far I've helped one of my neighbours put compost on his bag in our edible garden, ready for sowing/planting in a month or so (the organic way is not to compost in the autumn, but in the spring). Later this month I hope to get our gardeners together to sow tomato seeds in pots for transplanting in May/June.

In terms of my garden....I read that I should feed the crops that have been growing over winter to give them a growing boost for the spring, so I forked in some poultry manure around my overwintering onions, garlic, winter lettuce (growing better since I covered with plastic water bottles), spinach, spring cabbage and kale.

Hungarian grazing rye (green manure -- see this month's photo) is growing well after a slow start. Apparently you should dig it in six weeks before sowing a new crop, because otherwise the roots can hamper seed germination. I plan to transplant my tomatoes into that bag at the end of May / early June, so I will wait until at least mid April to dig it in (but must dig in before it flowers...whenever that is).

Sowed parsnips and radishes together in another bag. Apparently it's good to sow them together as the parsnips are very slow to germinate and you can forget where you sowed them, but the radishes come up very quickly and so mark the area.

 

　

 

　

　

　

 

Second instalment of my blog about growing in bags on a housing estate in Hackney -- I'm hoping other growers will add comments, answer some of my questions, add other questions of their own, and we can start a dialogue about urban food growing on the website.

This month -- kale is growing back after being ravaged ( I think now it was probably pigeons, not squirrels, as apparently pigeons are very partial to brassicas). Spinach, spring cabbage, lamb's lettuce and winter lettuce growing slowly but ok. I removed cloches from cabbage as they were restricting growth and causing leaves to buckle and break, and I have decided they can cope with frost and don't need protection anyway.

Garlic and onions -- we had very strong winds a couple of weeks ago and I noticed the onions were half exposed -- the wind must have blown the top soil away. Luckily I spotted it and added more soil/mulch -- a lesson to keep an eye on things even when I dont think anything much is happening in the garden!

The main development this month though, is sowing seeds indoors:

I am experimenting with a range of different containers: I bought some biodegradable pots, made of grey cardboard, a bit like egg boxes. You just plant out the whole box, and I thought they would be good for lettuce which does not like to be disturbed. I also got some "Grow pots" and "Grow tubes" (from Garden Organic) which are also biodegradable. They are made of black flexible material. Again good for things that dont like to be disturbed. The tubes are quite deep so meant to be good for beans and things with a tap root. Apparently the roots start to grow out of the sides of the pots, and then you just plant the whole thing.

I also have some seed trays, and some plastic modules. A friend recommended to me "root trainers" which are quite expensive but reusable, and very good for beans etc. I might invest in some but haven't done so yet.

Meanwhile, in the grey biodegradable pots I planted lettuce (Belize, a loose leafed variety; and Little Gem) and an early spinach (Early Prickly Seeded) that is supposed not to bolt (last year my spinach bolted).

In the grow pots I planted Brussels sprouts (Early Half Tall) and cauliflower (All Year Round) -- with some seeds of bird's foot trefoil among them. Apparently it is a good companion plant for brassicas -- attracts beneficial insects, or repels bad ones, can't remember which.

In the seed tray I planted lavender, and in the modules I planted more lavender, dill and curly and flat leafed parsley.

I used multi purpose compost because that's what I had, rather than seed compost. Most of the seeds I sowed were very small and I wondered whether to cover them with soil or not -- some books say to sieve a fine layer of soil over the top, but multi purpose stuff is quite lumpy and fibrous, while another book says not to cover fine seeds at all. A friend recommended vermiculite, so I sprinkled a layer of that over the top instead.

Everything has now germinated except the parsley (which is notoriously slow to germinate) and the spinach. However I am worried about everything getting too leggy -- my sprouts seedlings are about two inches tall, as they desperately try to find the sunlight! It is still quite cold, and I dont put the heating on when I am out, and there is not that much sun. However the books said to sow indoors from February.....so we'll see. Last year I planted lettuce and spinach directly outside, but this year I thought I would try with growing indoors first. If it doesn't work I'll go back to just sowing them outside later in the year.

That’s all for now. Look forward to hearing from other growers....

 

 

 

This is going to be a regular blog about my experience of growing food in bags, on a disused part of my housing estate. I am learning as I go along, so keen to share knowledge and experience with other HEN users.

 

This week I was very excited to see garlic poking up out of one of my bags. I planted the cloves on 30th September, from the biggest bulb I grew last year. But there was some squirrel activity afterwards in the bag, and I thought the cloves had been dislodged, so I was pleasantly surprised to count 8 spears (not technical term) poking up today.

 

Talking of squirrels -- they are my worst pest. Growing in bags which are about three feet high, sitting on tarmac, I do not have a big problem with snails or slugs like other gardeners. But the bags are oases of soft soil in a hard environment, and the squirrels love to dig holes in them, trashing the plants around in the process. The frustrating thing is they are not even eating my produce, just flattening it, digging it up or burying it in earth as they dig their holes. Last year I put netting over one bag, held down with clothes pegs, to keep birds off: squirrels pulled off the pegs, snapping some of them in two! Anyone have any ideas about deterring squirrels?

 

The garlic are little spears of hope in an otherwise forlorn scene. My spinach and chard, which never really took off, went limp in the snow and frost, although the spinach is beginning to perk up again. I occasionally manage to harvest some very baby leaves. The kale (cavalo nero) I planted mid August was growing well until it got trashed during the winter. The nearby hole suggested squirrels, although they had also been nibbled, so perhaps it was pigeons. One or two are beginning to grow back.

 

On the upside, the overwintering onions I planted at the end of September seem to be doing ok, as is the spring cabbage (planted mid August). I covered three with cloches made from 5-litre water bottles with the bottoms cut off. I'm not sure if it was necessary as the one I left bare is ok, and I have now removed them in case they prohibit growth...but if frost returns I will be tempted to put them on again. How hardy are spring cabbages meant to be?

 

I had success last year with a lot of what I planted (tomatoes, beans, carrots, celeriac etc), but many of the things I have tried to grow over winter have been less successful:

 

winter lettuce (lattughino) and lamb's lettuce, both planted mid September are tiny, and the Hungarian grazing rye, sown mid October as a green manure, is a few inches tall but not big and bushy as I expected. Perhaps I planted them too late, or perhaps the problem was that I didn't feed the soil after harvesting what I had grown there over the summer?

 

I am excited about growing new things this year: I am going to try brussels sprouts, calabrese and parsnips, along with some things from last year. I will sow some seeds next month indoors, which means my dining table will be covered in seed trays, and I will have to eat off a tray on my lap for several months! For the first time I will also be planting some seeds I have saved: rocket, parsley and kabocha squash (from one grown at the Tree Nursery). Meanwhile I have to wash off last year's earth that is caked on to my seed trays, pots, gloves, trowel: a big, dirty job.

 

See also Sara Davies from Growing Communities blog: http://growingtales.wordpress.com/

 

I live on a fairly friendly housing estate, but there are still many neighbours I haven't met. Sometimes you need mechanisms, and activities, to bring people together. We have started up a project to grow food in dumpy bags on an unused drying area on the estate. The soil and manure arrived early on Friday morning, and I decided to get started filling the bags. When one of my neighbours saw me wrestling with a wheelbarrow and a tonne of manure on my own, he offered to help, and between us we made light work of filling two bags. In return for his help I was able to get a longstanding problem with his TV aerial fixed, by emailing a contact at Hackney Homes (my neighbour had long since given up after being fobbed off so many times.)

Then another man on the estate, a Turkish man who doesn't speak much English, turned up with his young son to fill his bag. Meanwhile I had told my immediate neighbour about the project and he was keen to join in. Since it is easier for two people to fill a bag, I suggested they both work together, which they did, despite the language problem. It was lovely to see two neighbours who had never met work together, and at the end we all shook hands. It felt like the project had already delivered results, before any vegetables have even been planted!