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.