The Vegetable Patch 2024/2025

[MereDintofPandiculation]

Come and share your triumphs and failures in your vegetable plot or allotment.

Rain came just as I arrived but managed to get a bit done. Beetroot planted out, strimmer under the fruit trees and lots of bindweed and mares tail removed.

Looks fab !

Starting small, top pic is what was there on Saturday morning, bottom pic is what is there now!

3 peas
2 dwarf green beans
1 raspberry cane
1 blackberry cane
3 strawberries.

Now to just keep the slugs/snails away!!!

Very excited!

We spent the weekend strimming (almost to bare earth) around the 3 veg beds and covering in cardboard so we can get membrane and pebbles down as mowing is a nightmare.

Got all the grass cut, but no room in the brown bin to scarify, so that might be this weekends job, weather dependent!

This was the harvest today from autumn-planted climbing beans in Melbourne. No leaves on the plants at all, so nothing more I expect. Still, a first time outing for this.

My courgettes are a disaster, first three went out, two destroyed by slugs. One left in the ground but not looking thrilled with life. Have some in the greenhouse which I will pot on again and feed to see if I get them bigger and more slug resistant. Peas doing ok, climbing beans looking good, dwarf beans all got munched by slugs so will need to sow more of those. Squash and cucumbers all looking good but I can't risk putting them out until they're bigger still so more potting on to do. Amazingly, my tomatoes look really healthy and the bush varieties are starting to flower. Sweetcorn looking good in the ground, potatoes doing well and the raspberries and strawberries have been fantastic already. Most of my brassicas have succumbed to slugs and snails so I will need to restart sowing those for overwintering plus some caulis as it's too late for Brussels Sprouts and autumn cabbages from seed now. Leeks are looking good. What a mixed bag!

Couple of hours at the allotment this afternoon, handful of strawberries picked. Weeded in between the raspberries and put a a couple of wheel barrows of woodchip on the paths. Potatoes are now in flower.

My second sowing of beans has failed, I think it was old seed so going to start some more off today.

Hi, if I took a picture of my veg patch would someone mind critiquing it please? I've got no idea what I'm doing!

@bakewellbride I don’t think I am in any position to critique but go ahead, hopefully others with experience will weigh in.

@TheWayTheLightFalls thanks so much, I'll try to post a pic tomorrow. I've got onions, spinach, runner beans and cucumbers.

I water 1-2 times a day unless it's rained, do weeding as and when and use plant food once a week. Is there anything else I should be doing?

I'm in France and still haven't even sown beans yet.

I am due to do a sowing of a load of things as I finally got all my beds weeded and prepped.

And my late sowing aubergines and tomatillos actually started getting their third set of leaves after doing nothing for weeks.

So today it is sowing day. Just take the seeds and labels out and sow rows of everything I can fit in.

@bakewellbride sounds as though you are doing it right! Just avoid watering little and often as you want the water to get to the deep roots, not just the shallow ones. A good soaking every few days is usually better than a little bit every day.

I don’t seem to be doing well with much this year. I have sewn a few more runner beans as 4 have been attacked by slugs, my squash plants don’t seem to be growing very quickly (maybe I’m being impatient?), onions have started to bolt, lost half my peas but purple peas are doing amazingly, fruit bushes not doing great this year. Weeds growing really well 😬.

I do have my first courgettes appearing but not much else.

Snap @Lovemusic82 except that all but one of my courgette plants have been eaten by slugs... I'm too scared to plant the last remaining one out now!

Unless in pots, when little and often is better particularly with peat free compost

As a result of what i’m reading on here, my courgettes are staying in the greenhouse as long as possible! They’re in almost half-barrel sized tubs and just starting to crop well.

Just been up to my plot and looks like a fox has been busy trampling my beetroot seedings and leaving me a little gift 😬

I think I have to just give up this year. Getting fed up of re sewing seeds and replacing things. What will be will be now. Hopefully a few things will survive.

@bakewellbride I don’t feed anything that’s in the ground, just a good mulch in winter, and try to return as much vegetable peelings and soft paper to the compost heap to make up for the mass I’ve taken out, by eating or by lazily taking sharp thorned prunings to the tip. Our rivers are suffering from too high a nutrient level, in the countryside the plants that flourish are nettles, docks, brambles and other things that like a high nutrient soil, so I reckon for many of us our soil is already rich enough

New to veg but I have a small bed about 6x6 which I’m half way through weeding. It has a massive rhubarb in one corner and I’ve just put broad beans in another corner so I’m wondering what to put in the rest. I did grow potatoes in there last year so might do that but it is a bit shady at the back.

@MereDintofPandiculation thanks for the info x

This is what it looks like. Onions & spinach as visible in the pic, then freshly planted - more spinach, runner beans and cucumbers. The kids love it but I do feel pretty clueless!

Well done to everyone, I don't post much on this thread but do often look at the beautiful pics. Some real successes.

Also what's the deal with onions? I feel like they've been tiny for ages, am I doing anything wrong or do they just take really long to grow? What about the green stalks, can / should I trim them and use them in cooking or is it best to just leave them alone?

Today I have had the sad but mostly determined job of thwarting wildlife in my garden. My first urgent task was to cover my fruit bushes to protect them from a family of enthusiastic blackbirds. They are tall bushes, maybe eight feet, so this was not easy.

Then I had to put bird spikes on my bean supports because the pigeons had enjoyed perching on them and raining pigeon poo on the beans and sorrel.

Then I tried to save my soloman's seal by picking off the saw fly caterpillar. I gave up after about half an hour-- too difficult and yucky. Sometimes you just have to throw up your hands and say nature wins, this time. In truth friends tell me not to grow soloman's seal because of this issue. But I do love them 😔

Having finished, I put my tools away in the greenhouse and passing the strawberry bed discovered a very cross blackbird stuck under the bed's netting. Nature will always win (of course I freed him, I do love the blackbirds despite them devouring my fruit).

Sidling into the thread if nobody minds. I’ve grown lots in the past but it’s been a bit patchy (big understatement) for the last few years for various reasons, so I’m trying to do a bit more this year. Planted out my pot-sown runner beans a couple of days ago and they’re still OK - well, one lot's thriving, the other lot (Cosse violette) aren’t sure, so fingers crossed.

I have my tomatoes in the greenhouse and finally got round to planting them into the growbags recently. I cut my bags in half so each plant has a really generous amount of compost. Question: does anyone else find, with the peat-free growbags these days, that as soon as you water, it just floods straight out? It’s very alarming. The texture of the compost is like barely held-together bits of twig and stick so it’s no wonder. I know it’s good to eliminate peat but I’m not very happy with the result. They're Levingtons, so a good brand 😕

I've spent a few hours this afternoon potting on and also taming wildlife (started greenfly! I'm 11 stories up!).

So a few pants have gone in the bin and will be composted - lovely healthy plants but too infested. And lots of squishing on the rest and fingers crossed now for the next few weeks.

My climbing french beans are twining around their poles, the dwarf ones are greening up nicely, the peas are done (I got first harvest but flies took over so 2nd flush wasn't worth the risk to other things). 1st handful of purple mange tout will be in a dinner this week. Biggest tomato's is stating to set fruit, and 4 smaller plants growing in final pots. And 5 courgette plants in final pots as well.

I am away a few days this week, but when I'm back I may resow the planter with salad leaves to cut n come again.