So waht are fellow allotmenteers up to in Feb-what seeds are you starting off ?

[fakeblondie]

Its almost time to start the take over of all available space with my numerous seedlings ! What have you started if anything ? x

Just tomatoes so far. And a bit of cress in a small pot with a face on for my 3yr DD (she's already caught the gardening bug).

Looking through the rest of my packs this weekend and having another realistic go at my garden plan (no allotment, just raised beds I've built).

Oooh, this weekend I'm starting off seeds indoors:-

courgettes
squashes
tomatoes
savoy cabbage
cucumbers
rainbow chard
going to try some sweetcorn from seed at home this year as had mixed success with popping them in the ground
various flowers, like lobelia, for the garden

We have over winter style leeks in from last year's late sewings still and picked the last of our red cabbage last weekend.

Our potatoes (Charlotte and Maris) are chitting at the mo and we plan to pop them in mid March.

We've got onion sets and garlic already going from December plantings and a lovely yellow tulip patch that my DH dug and planted as our first baby is due April 23rd!

I dont have an allotment and grow flowers not veg but i am going to start of my Begonia bulbs this weekend and get the rest of my lily bulbs in.

I have started some chillis, cut and come again salad, and broad beans, but I am planning on planting more this weekend - am cataloging my seeds once my DS goes to sleep tonight yes I AM rock and roll on a Friday night!!

I am going to put some compost on my allotment on Saturday and when I get paid on the 28th I'm going to buy some topsoil for the new salad patch in the back garden.

Wow love getting inspired by what everyone else is up to. One thing i have learnt over the years is not to plant out until beg of may as lost much to late frosts !.
Also just getting stuff in rather than spending too long making the whole plot look neat !
Ill be putting in yellow round courgettes, outdoor cucumber, squashes (my pride and joy ) sweetcorn, green beans , and a few fruit shrubs when i find rhem reasonable enough !
Last year i sprinkled one of those 1.99 cans of colour coordinated wildflowers and it was absolutely stunning !
Karratekimmi-your not alone i`ll be ordering seeds online tonight. Glass of wine pen and yipee ! Am actually quite excited x

Slow start this year - last year's rain left me a bit dis-heartened, I put in a lot of work and didn't get very much in return - I'm dithering about giving up the allotment but have decided to give it one more year. I've got some potatoes chitting on my kitchen windowsill, and have bought some onion sets. I'm thinking I'll start off some broad beans this weekend (in newspaper pots, under a plastic bell cloche).
I also plan to plant leeks (the one thing that grew well last year) and courgettes (didn't get many last year but did really well the year before)
Have any of you had success with carrots? - I tried sewing them twice last year, and neither time germinated - can anyone recommend a type that do well? - also, which month do you normally plant?
Also squashes - last year my butternut didn't get anywhere - the year before i was given some squashes that were similar to butternut but smaller, and they did better - not sure what they were called - can anyone recommend a squash that ripens well in a Briitish summer without a greenhouse?

Nooo, don't give up pour!

reliable and tasty carrots are Amsterdam. They also grow pretty straight, rather than tapered, so you get more in your space and easier to get out. You can even do them in tubs! I wait until after frosts, so late May really.

Courgettes are usually pretty easy so long as they are planted out after frosts (we lost a few in 2011 due to being too keen to get them in the ground). Can you get some compost and enrich your soil before popping them in?

We used some organic potato fertiliser on our tatties last year and they were fab.

Leeks are a great staple. We use two types from Sutton seeds - one that you can eat as a baby leek or a big one, therefore you can eat your thinnings and waste none, and one that you can over winter. We still have some in now that were planted in late summer. It helps to motivate us for winter allotment work to be able to pick some winter veg!

But squashes - pah! Although we cook with them a lot, we cannot get them to thrive at all. I'm not doing them this year as we want to use the space for a nice sweetcorn crop, but i'll be asking the old boys on the site how they get theirs going.

Good luck!

I am starting out for the first year, and have a lovely large manger style trough which I was given for Christmas. I've been to the garden centre and bought 'smaller variety' seeds. I also have one of the cheapie outdoor zip up greenhouses.

So, I presume I should start my seeds indoors, and then move them out when the frost it nearing an end? When is that?!

I have:
-round cucumbers
-rondo carrots

• F1 balmoral squash
• F1 buckingham courgetts
• baby type F1 action beetroot

and some -Sprite Dwarf French Beans.

Excited, but a little apprehensive!

No one seemed to have carrots on our site last year, very depressing it was. I am sitting on my hands as can't be bothered to have loads of pots with seedlings around the place. However I'm very lucky and have a heated greenhouse and have side shoots from last years tomato plants that are flowering an possibly an overwintered aubergine, though I think it might have red spider mite.

My aquaponic system has oriental greens, garlic, leek, coriander and a couple of French beans that are slowly climbing. All my seeds have arrived now and I might stick some broad beans in soon.

wynken I'm sooo jealous of your heated greenhouse!

ppt you can start off most things indoors or in a heated greenhouse from late feb, but not root veg - they need to be sewn where they will grow, then thin out the seedlings to keep the strongest ones. Beets can usually go in in march and can tolerate some frost. But courgette plants (or seeds) are best put outside late may. We are in the SE and still get a frost mid may for some reason. So I'm cautious about these.

Hi there

We got a free allotment through my work last year as they are running a project but the rain really hampered us! We've a serious amount of weeding and digging to do lol.

We've been looking at potatoes - Sarpo Mira were recommended as being blight resistant. Anybody know what they taste like tho?!

I can't quite believe my luck with the greenhouse, it's for work. But my Mum's not well and I'm off for a bit and am not making the most of it which is fustrating.

Not tried Sarpo Mira, sorry. Am not sure I can be bothered with spuds after last years disaster.

I think if you plant first or second earlies they are ready to pick as new pots before blight has a chance to kick in. I grew Charlotte last year in patio bags and ALL the foliage was blight-ridden, but we chopped it off and the spuds were fine.

I was about to order some Sarpo Mira myself and then saw the 'blight-dodgers' icon next to all the first and second earlies, which according to the blurb, have a better new potato flavour.

Am considering planting some butternut squash seeds from one we ate last night - supermarket job. Anyone done this with any success?

Yeah, we had a touch of blight just at the end of the econd earlies (Charlotte & Lady Krystal -sp?) and it moved to the main crop. But didn't seem to affect the harvest.

I just can't wait for the raspberries to get going as I luuuurve them and made tonnes of yummy jam last autumn.

I had lovely butternut plants from seed last year until there was an ALMIGHTY deluge and they washed away. I replanted them but they didn't take

Fairydogmother: did you plant seeds you had from an actual squash, or were they 'proper' ones?
I've just bought a --shitty- budget lean-to polycarbonate 2' x 4' greenhouse, just to get my seedlings going and various stuff potted on, as I never have any success with direct sowing.
Will probably end up with far too many plants , but have decided after last year's crap weather, to adopt a far more shove-it-in-and-see-what-happens attitude. It seems as soon as I stop worrying so much, it's fun rather than stressful when stuff goes wrong. Very empowering!

I had so many spaghetti squashes last year I had to give them away to anyone who would take them.

I even made some spaghetti squash and pineapple jam to use them up!

So to all you who struggle with squash these are easy to grow and make lots per plant.

Growyourown77 - I have had great great great success with squashes and pumpkins using my granpa's method, none of the mound rubbish they advocate on the back of the seed packets, you have to dig a hole! a big one! And fill it with a mix of manure, bloodfishandbone, a bit of superphosphate, and the soil that was in it. and shredded newspaper. Give your hole an edge, a bit like a dam wall, iykwim. Fill it with water, and leave well alone untill planting time. I put 3 or 4 plants in a station like this, I'd say my planting station is about 75cm/ 1 m sq. I usually put 2 next to each other, and let the squashes grow in diff directions, so this year, one lot will grow left towards/ in amongst the runner beans etc and squashes in the second station will grow right towards the corn. Great use of space too. Guaranteed success, really! When you water during growing season, just empty a watering can into this 'dam'/depression. Water doesn't run away, roots get a good soaking, squashes luuuuurve lots of water.

Trying to warm up as spent a couple of hours at the plot his morning. Dug over/hoed a quarter and rather optimistically chucked some broad bean seeds in.

Brought home some Daikon that I'd forgotten planted last year for DD. Was mystified as to what it was for most of th year but now the foliage is dead it became more obvious finally!

Well I dug over about a third of my allotment this weekend . oint some lovely bright lights ( I think ) Swiss chard from last year. Anyone know if it will be ok still and what do you do with it !
have tons of Jerusalem fartichokes too and never eaten these either !
feeling a tad excited by the forthcoming growing season x

Thanks for the tip, gandalf! I think this will be one for next year when we don't have a newborn coming as it's a bit more involved.

blondie I love rainbow chard, but have to really dress it up for DH to eat it. I chop off the stalks and sautee them in garlic, oil, parsley salt and pepper, sometimes some paprika depending on what it's going with. Cut the leafy part off the central thin stalk as it's just stringy, then shred the leaves and pop them in the sautee pan at the last moment to wilt doown/cook through and serve as a side dish.

Alternatively, use like pak choi in stir frys (but still take that think stalk part out of the leaf section so you can cook the main stalk and soft leaves separately.

We got all our indoor sowings done the weekend before last, so that's a great relief and we have some sunflowers and courgettes sprouting already. My Dad will help DP dig and pop the potatoes in in a coupl o f weekends as i'll be 35 weeks pregnant by then and theyv'e banned me from digging. Hoping to get some of the March outdoor sowings in that weekend too. Maybe start off some hardy radishes and beets in a protected corner, or make use of the small fleecey tunnel we were given.