*Ahem*!! I would like to announce.....

[Greensleeves]

...that my moong beans and my chickpeas have put up beautiful healthy seedlings :):):):)

As have my radishes, my turnips and dh's potatoes and shallots!! And my gooseberry bushes are already weighed down with fruit!

The carrots, cauliflowers, pumpkins, squash, broccoli, onions, parsnips, peppers and leeks remain recalcitrant although the batty old dear in the next allotment assures me that they will all come up "when they're ready"

Anyone else got any growing news?

Sounds like they are doing okay SHR.

FMF - i am growing parsnips this year for the first time. A tip i read was that where you are planting the seeds, take a crow bar or similar, push into the ground as far as you can and make a hole by rolling it around the edges to make a conical/funnel shape in the ground iykwim.

Then fill that hole with compost.

Then plant the seed in it. This should allow the roots to grow without forking. Allegedly

Made everyone do gardening this PM, even DD and DS mucked in one for a cinema trip and one for a CD! We found a mummy duck high up in a nest in the hedge with all her babies, so cute.

So will those weedy geraniums eventually do something, I've potted them on into 4" pots.

yes, I have had a forking nightmare with parsnips in the past (hoe hoe, did you see what I did there . Shall try your way. Now, where did I put my crowbar...

I have too many slugs in my garden . They ate all the runner beans i put in pots!! Some had slug pellets some didn't but they still got eaten!

On my veg patch, i have carrots, onions, cucumbers, sweetcorns and some newly planted runnerbeans are beginning to sprout in the veg patch.

I am just scared they are all going to be eaten by the snails! i tried beer cups, i know egg shells are a good idea, but i just don't eat enough eggs to spread everywhere!

FMF

I have a terrible slug/snail problem. You wouldnt think so with all the frogs and toads in and around my pond but hey ho. It seems i am not gardening organically this year after all as i caved and bought pellets in the end.

I have evidence today that my runner bean(s) are sprouting and so are my peas

Also signs of my onions and peppers. (One pepper seed had fallen out of the pot and onto the moist kitchen paper underneath and it had still germinated and grown to about an inch and a half tall )

Im sure now your geraniums are potted on they will get stronger and stronger SHR.

Yes, I try to be organic but in the end, I alsways end up using some slug pellets

Thanks VVVVV, will keep talking to them.

Only garlic and spring onions in the ground so far but courgettes, peas, beans and sprouts will join them soon.
Loads of strawbs,blackcurrant, tay berry, redcurrant, gooseberry and rhubarb - have eaten rhubarb but felt bad about it cos the stalks were so weedy.

LOL at your weedy rhubarb (rather reminiscent of what mine is currently like)

We have peas, runner beans, tomatoes, chillis and garlic atm, and lots of herbs. Bloody slugs Keep eating our beans.

Hunker, i might have some overflow seedlings for you

today I bought a raspberry and a redcurrant bush. i couldn't pass them up for £3 each.

ooh, my herbs have sprouted. I've got basil, sage and thyme on the dining room windowsill.

£3 each! Where from?

Thank you, VVV. DS1 was most impressed with your squash seedlings the other day. Or was it the yoghurt pots?

Lol yes! It was definitely the squashers

WTF are squashers?

School and church fetes are brilliant places for buying bargain plants oh and bootsales too.

Our patch is going great, we've got carrots, parsnips, pak choi, rocket, peas, onions, shallots, garlic, runners, fava beans, sweet corn, pumpkins and half a dozen different kinds of squash coming up right now as well as our new fruit net that DH and my Dad built from scrap wood with raspberries, tay berries, blueberries, black berries, red currants and black currants in it. And strawberries down the bottom of the garden in a pile of old manure.

Loads more int he green house too Aubergines, melons, cues, peppers and chillis. I can't wait for them all to be ready now!

Please can i join in as I have just got an allotment!! It hasn't been worked for 25 years and was hard work to clear.
Tomorrow the shed and greenhouse arrive!!

I wanted to ask what do you think I can plant in the next few weeks to get a crop this year, apart from salad and the tomato and cucumber plants I've started off? I would really like potatoes, but think it's too late,cabbage and would love home grown Brussels sprout an Christmas Day!!

One of the guys on the plots has put beans and tomatoes in tubs ready for me, that was such a nice gesture, especially as so many people have been so negative.

I must add that we are using the 'No-Dig' method, due to my arthritis, has anyone else tried it?

\link{http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/schools_organic_network/leaflets/NoDigGardening.pdf\no dig}

\link{http://www.gardenorganic.org.uk/factsheets/gg2.php\no dig}

Do you have to officially join, cos Im a new MNer and I just joined in a few days ago with no intro?

BTW, we have a hare problem in our orchard (only a wee one) in that they keep eating the bark from new trees. We have the yellow pipe around them but they can reach above that.

Any ideas?

Daisy, it's definitely not too late for potatoes. I live in colder N Ireland and we have still some late varieties to put in.

I'm not sure, but I think you're still OK for sprouts and cabbage too. It was such a late Spring here that everything's a bit late. Should be OK .

Dont listen to negative people - just enjoy your garden. There is NOTHING like sigging up fresh veg and having it for dinner.

Thank you dewmeadow, for your encouragement. I'll investigate the potatoes later, I could start them off in container while I'm making the raised beds, I'm trying to use the garden to get things going while I sort out the basics on the allotment.

People were negative because they were embarrassed about having used our plot as a dumping ground, we've had some spectacular bonfires of old sheds etc!! We've kept the bath, any ideas for how to use it?

I did accuse the committee of having killed an ackward allotmenteer off and buried the body on our plot, lol. It seemed the only explanation for the tut-tutting!

Luckily people have accepted that we are committed to this project and arein for the long haul. Some of the plots are so lovely, productive AND beautiful they are an inspiration.

I have the no dig book and have been trying to persuade DHof its logic and merits. I think he htingks digging is the only thing I'll let him do though.

Dewmeadow - just wade in like the rest of us

Im not sure how this ties in with the no dig method daisy but beetroots grow very quickly, as do spring onions. Calabrese and Brussel Sprouts should be fine to start off, and beans you can still do. Herbs i think too.

I have been a bit late starting off some of my seeds this year but only by two weeks or so, so i dont think it will be a major problem.

bettythebuilder: i went to a garden nursery rather than a gardening center. seek one out near you.