Last year I installed a couple of raised beds and grew runner beans/leeks/purple sprouting and lettuce.
I wish I had done this years ago
This year I made the mistake of buying summer purple sprouting and leeks in plant form from a seed catalogue.
Due to the cold spring this year the plants arrive a month late, the leeks are still small and the purple sprouting didn’t sprout at all though I have been eating the leaves as I would spring cabbage.
It’s the last time I buy plants, back to planting my own seeds in the spare bedroom next year.
Hi DM I only did so because there was a special offer of no postage charge for the plants when I looked in the catalogue to buy my seeds, I have learnt my lesson
Hi, Meg! Yes, too good to be true; no P & P, but not what you expected. I’m trying saving my own tomato seed this year, OG had a thread on how to do it. Might do it with the chilis and basil also. will have to buy onions.
I buy seeds from a catalogue here in Australia, Eden Seeds. They are open pollinated varieties, so you can save your own seeds when possible. I grow herbs successfully, but the sub tropics can be hard on vegetables - silverbeet grows best (Swiss Chard). Currently I have some good cucumbers coming up.
I have six chickens and well-rotted chicken manure is good for most of what I’m growing. But recently I had a bad bout of bronchitis, then it rained and rained and rained so my garden got neglected. We had a bad drought for years, then 18 months ago we got some rain, then more… The dams went from 15% to 100% and spilling.
I find trees do better for me - I have mango, paw paw, avocado, elderberry. mulberry, passion fruit vines, choko vine, bananas, cape gooseberry bush, strawberry guava, peaches, oranges and mandarins, but only some of them produce well. Currently I’m getting plenty of paw paw, elderflowers, and some bananas are nearly ready. This year we had a bumper crop of mulberries, but the jam is all eaten now. The peaches always get eaten by the Queensland fruit fly, but I give them to the chickens - the maggots are a bonus for them. Some of the paw paws get eaten by fruit bats too, but they usually leave plenty for me.
I always think of my old Dad when gardening - he was good at it - I’m not. He kept us fed through the post war years, and during the war, but I wasn’t yet born. He kept rabbits and chickens and a pig, so we never went short of meat. He grew vegetables and berries too. They were all so skilled back then - the people who lived through 2 world wars and a great depression.
What a fascinating lot of fruits you have, Joan! Pics would be nice when the growing season starts … isn’t it just turning to Winter now in the Southern Hemisphere? My mom grew veggies in a Victory garden during the war; would have had chickens if allowed in the City.
It was our midsummer’s day two days ago, but you wouldn’t know it. The rain and winds have cooled things down. We are supposed to be flopping around like stranded whales in the heat and humidity at this time of year, but we are wearing socks to keep our feet warm, and wellies in the garden!!
You know, I reckon all that home grown food in the war and post war years kept us healthy for life. They didn’t know they were organic gardeners, but they were. Funny how it has all come back. Those war time concepts (I was born in 1945 but remember hearing them) such as ‘make do and mend’ ‘waste not want not’ have returned as ecological and ‘green’ options.
Too right, Joan! The Depression mantra when I was growing up was “Use it up. wear it out, make it do or do without”. and that is now recycling! And very fashionable now. I agree, growing up without fast food (junk) was probably one reason most of us are in quite good health, considering. You mentioned “elderberry tree”; here in the States elderberries are a shrub, grow wild and make marvellous jelly; used to help my grandma pick them by the railroad tracks when I was a child.
I guess an Elderberry is a large bush/shrub or a small tree!!
Just thought of another war time slogan appropriate to Britain today: ‘Is your journey really necessary?’ They are trying to get people to put off their travel plans 'cos of the snow.
The rains pushed one of my Elders away from the fence and over the pathway from the back door, and as the tree was already festooned with a rampaging passion fruit, it got all heavy and drooped low. So now I have to bend low when I go feed my chickens!
Just remembered, I’ve also got two fig trees and a pomegranate, though all the pomegranate has produced so far is some spectacular orange flowers. I think I might have got an ornamental by mistake…
I’ve never made elderberry jelly - do you mean jam? I might make wine with the next lot though.
As I recall it was jelly, not jam, but may be mistaken, that was back in the 30s - 40s so the recollection isn’t that clear after all this time. I remember standing in the kitchen watching grandma stirring the mixture in a very large pot … marvellous aroma!. She never tackled wine, though. When I bought this house there was a large fig tree that bore heavily … forget the variety name but they were green when mature. Unfortunately it succumbed in one of the very bitter harsh Winters in the 70s. I’d love to try a pomegranate, not sure if it would survive the weather, though.
There are 67 people on my allotment waiting list. Half of them will be dead before they get one. Some of them have been in the same family for 70 years. I grow apples, pears, plums,blackcurrants, blueberries, strawberries, rhubarb, salad veg, cabbage,sprouts, pots, onions, chard, peas, beans, toms, peppers, cucumber and lots of herbs. I also have 12 hens and 7 ducks who eat all of the leftovers and are such fun I spend far too long sitting watching them.
I have an allotment. This will be my second full year. I am currently building raised beds made from scaffolding planks. It hasn’t been allotment friendly weather just lately. I have grown onions, tomatoes, potatoes ( just eaten the last of my spuds from last season), artichokes, courgettes, pumpkins and other squashes, lettuce, radishes and my favourite - runner beans. This year I will be trying to grow Jerusalem artichokes.
Make sure you plant your Jerusalem artichokes at the back. Mine grew to 8 foot tall and I had 5 rows of them. It was like a jungle. I expected snipers popping out with poison darts.
I’ve planted broad bean seeds today in the greenhouse and I’ve got seed potatoes chitting upstairs on a window sill. Yes I know it’s still freezing out there, but I just can`t help myself. Anyone else bitten the vegetable bullet yet? :shock:
Have a lotty which is still giving gyp due to the fact the previous owner had a ‘no dig’ policy so the soil if full of weed seeds that keep on coming back! This is our 2nd year. Looks like it wil be down tome to do the toil as husband not able to any more. Planning this year’s crops and also looking at completely covering 50% with fruit trees and bushes.
It’s tough taking over a poorly kept allotment Babooshka, good luck with it and keep us informed of how you get on. I am lucky that I have a good sized back garden and have used around 100 square yards for veg and fruit. Over the years I’ve put in raised beds with gravel paths around, installed a greenhouse and improved my sandy soil to give it more body and good fertility.
Here’s the veg garden…
And here’s my fruit garden
The garden gives great pleasure now that all the back breaking has been done and I can manage to weed pretty much with just the hoe. What is your soil type and what veg are you planning this year?
I only did so because there was a special offer of no postage charge for the plants when I looked in the catalogue to buy my seeds, I have learnt my lesson 
I’d love to try a pomegranate, not sure if it would survive the weather, though.