Sorry.................

[chykensa]

thatguy - that book is an excellent read. See if you can borrow it from your local library first (if you still have one ).
Potatoes will grow quite happily in a deep plastic 'trug' which you can buy from most cheap'n'cheerful stores - a large ridged plastic container with handles on the top, all moulded from plastic, and usually with ridges embossed on the outside. Drill half a dozen holes in the bottom for drainage and away you go, plenty of depth for new potatoes.
You can buy kits in garden centres too with a special bag and some seed potatoes and compost, doesn't cost a bomb and really easy to grow.

Get your kids involved - they love getting their hands dirty legitimately, and they might eat more of the produce if they have had a hand in its cultivation. It's also setting them up for the future nicely too.

With the space you have available, you could grow a full range of salad crops and also peas and beans really easily; it is really surprising just how much you can cram into a small space provided that the soil is well fed and watered. Grab a copy of that book - you won't be disappointed

[lobeydosser]

Whilst that book is full of great ideas about where you can grow veggies and growing vertical crops, I am a little disappointed that much of the crops shown and explained are for warmer climes and of the sort that are not freely available in the shops and therefore not known by the majority of the readers.

I cannot remember the last time I tasted Cucamelons, Pea Shoots, Florence Fennel, Kohl Rabi, Swiss Chard, Pak Choi, Japanese Wineberries, French Sorrel, Lovage or African Basil and that is before we get onto the more exotic plants.

I'm afraid I am more of a down to earth basic Spuds, Neeps and Lettuce guy and so books on Allotment Gardening, albeit on a much reduced output, are more helpful regarding what I can grow and expected harvesting times.

I don't know if it is still true, but in the past there was only certain varieties of Potato that we were allowed to grow here is Scotland. As no gardening book that I have read so far has mentioned this, I will need to look further into this.

[lobeydosser]

I was born one morning when the sun didn't shine.

I picked up my shovel and I went to the mine.

I loaded 16 tons and what did I get?

Another day older and deeper in debt.

Like the song, I am now another day older and when the soil bill arrives, I'll be deeper in debt,
so for those that are mildly interested in what 16 tons looks like.....

[lobeydosser]

3 years ago and again, thanks to the money I had saved from changing from Smoking to Vaping, the other side of our Back Garden went from this;-


To this;-


People stop me in the street when they see the e-cig hanging from my lanyard and ask ne if I get any benefits from Vaping instead of smoking.
If only they could look over my fence and see for themselves the whole new world that has opened up to me thanks to Vaping and the folks on this Forum.

[gill2009]

Really beautiful...& so encouraging lobeydosser 

[lobeydosser]

Hi gill2009, everything takes time and I only spend what I have saved from not smoking.

But it is nice to sit on the deck of an evening, vaping ofcourse, while I watch the dogs play in the garden.

[whiteclouds]

hats off to you lobeydosser , that’s both a fantastic transformation and effort, are you doing a crop rotation, different crop cycle in each bed?.

I have some fruit trees and bushes and in my greenhouse cherry tomatoes in hanging baskets, , home made Tom soup cant be beaten... Auto watering set up for the greenhouse hands off apart from picking and checking.

What a top job you've done there

[lobeydosser]

Yes whiteclouds, 4 year crop rotation. Each bed is 5 foot by 10 foot but I am still to work just how much stuff I can cram into each bed.
There seems to be quite a bit of different opinions by different "experts" on this subject. Guess I will just need to suck it and see.

I too have an auto watering system in the greenhouse and also to the rest of the garden just for when we go away in the caravan for a couple of weeks.
However I can see these trips being reduced somewhat once the garden starts producing.

[lobeydosser]

I have just had the electrician in to advise me on what I need to buy for installing electricity into the greenhouse.

So tomorrow I start digging trenches across the back garden to bury Armoured Cable from the house to sockets in the greenhouse.

Whatever happened to the days when all you needed to grow something was a Jam Jar, a piece of Blotting Paper and a Pea?

[lobeydosser]

One of the main problems about sharing gardening information with each other is that what folks find good to grow in Devon or Cornwall, may be rather difficult or even impossible for us to grow here in Scotland's Central Belt where our season starts later and/or finishes earlier.

I have come across program online that solves this problem;-
Growing guide
and this takes into account where you live along with what you wish to grow.

It has a Free 30 day trial period and I have been trying it out.
It is bloomin' marvellous!!!
It not only tells me planting times, but also how much I can expect to grow in any given size of ground.
I can even plan follow on crops on the same bit of ground.

[whiteclouds]

Sept 24, 2015 18:26:13 GMT lobeydosser said:

One of the main problems about sharing gardening information with each other is that what folks find good to grow in Devon or Cornwall, may be rather difficult or even impossible for us to grow here in Scotland's Central Belt where our season starts later and/or finishes earlier.

I have come across program online that solves this problem;-
Growing guide
and this takes into account where you live along with what you wish to grow.

It has a Free 30 day trial period and I have been trying it out.
It is bloomin' marvellous!!!
It not only tells me planting times, but also how much I can expect to grow in any given size of ground.
I can even plan follow on crops on the same bit of ground.

looks good and you are right there are some plants/veg that wont take whatever you try and any help is good.

I use this as a rough guide of what can be planted from Suttons, as you say it doesnt mean it will grow ;-)

[lobeydosser]

Last week I was busy running armoured cable between the house and the greenhouse and putting in sockets (waterproof) and bulkhead lights to the greenhouse and the electrician has just left after connecting it all up.

This coming week I will be gutting the place and sorting out what I have and what needs binned and repairing the old shelving.

Then I will be ploughing through catalogues for propagators etc, getting everything ship shape for next spring.

Starting gardening is a lot like starting vaping. So much to learn and so much to buy!!!!

[lobeydosser]

I have now worked out my Garden Plan for 2016.

It consists of about 240 individual plants, covering 24 Veggies and 5 Fruits.
Some will be in the Greenhouse, some in the Garden in Tubs, but most in the Raised Beds.

[lobeydosser]

Well I have just sorted my first failure.

I originally copied a compost bin design that I got on the Internet. This was built by a guy in the US of A and it looked exactly what I wanted.


Sure, my joinery skills are rubbish, but it all seemed to work okay. However a couple of months down the line and my compost was staying very cold, but also drying out and vegetable matter does not rot down if it is cold and dry.
So I was having to water it every couple of days which in turn was making it even colder.

So another search on the Internet showed that 90% of UK compost bins were solid wall affairs and so I have spent the past week, stripping off the spars and redoing the bins with solid walls.


In between times I have planted 75 Onion Sets of which 41 have green shoots. If I can get 52 to grow, that will do me all of next year.
I have also planted 30 winter flowering Pansies to give us a bit of colour through an otherwise drab winter.

On order to be delivered over the next few months are Roses, Potatoes, Raspberries, Rhubarb and Tayberries. These are all year old plants.

Bedtime reading is now Seed Catalogues and Veggy growing magazines.

How sad am I?????

[Arrowmunda]

Oct 14, 2015 22:01:33 GMT lobeydosser said:

Well I have just sorted my first failure.

I originally copied a compost bin design that I got on the Internet. This was built by a guy in the US of A and it looked exactly what I wanted.


Sure, my joinery skills are rubbish, but it all seemed to work okay. However a couple of months down the line and my compost was staying very cold, but also drying out and vegetable matter does not rot down if it is cold and dry.
So I was having to water it every couple of days which in turn was making it even colder.

So another search on the Internet showed that 90% of UK compost bins were solid wall affairs and so I have spent the past week, stripping off the spars and redoing the bins with solid walls.


In between times I have planted 75 Onion Sets of which 41 have green shoots. If I can get 52 to grow, that will do me all of next year.
I have also planted 30 winter flowering Pansies to give us a bit of colour through an otherwise drab winter.

On order to be delivered over the next few months are Roses, Potatoes, Raspberries, Rhubarb and Tayberries. These are all year old plants.

Bedtime reading is now Seed Catalogues and Veggy growing magazines.

How sad am I?????

Not sad at all! I'm 29 and love growing pumpkins! I think growing your own fruit and veg is brilliant