Allotment Gardening

September in the Veg Plot

Sprout — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 15:51:52 +0000

Vegetable growth slows down quite markedly this month as the nights draw in and get colder, but there’s still lots of jobs that need to be taken care of on the allotment. As the summer harvests come to an end and crops are harvested for storage through the winter, this creates a large amount of [...]

Vegetable Growing Month-by-Month: The down-to-earth guide

Sprout — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 16:46:31 +0000

Medwyn Williams, Chairman of the National Vegetable Society, and member of the Fruit and Vegetable Committee of the Royal Horticultural Society. solid words of advice in plain English… It will certainly have a place on my extensive gardening book shelf. Book Description The down-to-earth guide that takes you through the vegetable year. (more…) Related Posts:Grow [...]

The Expert Vegetable Notebook

Sprout — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 16:04:50 +0000

The Expert series is essential reading for all gardeners. –The Sunday Telegraph, 2008 Growing your own food has become one of the nation’s most popular pastimes – in 2008 sales of vegetable seeds exceeded sales of flower seeds for the first time. “The Vegetable & Herb Expert” is the UK’s best-selling gardening book and has [...]

Grow Your Own Vegetables

Sprout — Sun, 15 Aug 2010 16:04:45 +0000

Review If you buy only one book about growing vegetables, make it this one (Kitchen Garden )Practical information you can rely on – with productivity guaranteed (BBC Gardeners’ World )A fat paperback … bursting at the seams with the best advice on vegetables that you’ll find anywhere … Everything you want to know about growing [...]

Victorian Kitchen Garden

Sprout — Fri, 13 Aug 2010 22:02:36 +0000

First screened in 1987, The Victorian Kitchen Garden series follows, life long gardener, Harry Dodson, as he restores a near derelict walled kitchen garden. Presented by Peter Thoday, the series is a delight to watch. The demonstration of the basic gardening techniques used when the gardens were in full production are all sill relevant to [...]

Support Your Local Horticultural Show

Sprout — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 20:40:07 +0000

Local horticultural shows have been on the decline for many years in some areas, and even with the revived popularity of ‘Growing Your Own’ lots of gardeners seem reluctant to venture near, which is such a pity. If you’ve never been to a local horticultural show I think that you would be pleasantly surprised at [...]

August in the veg plot

Sprout — Wed, 04 Aug 2010 10:22:09 +0000

Allotments in August are just about at their maximum production, and harvesting can at times be a full time job. This month is also a good time to take stock of where things are planted and start to make plans form next years crop rotation. To make this just a bit more fun than writing [...]

Plant New Potatoes for Christmas Dinner

Sprout — Fri, 16 Jul 2010 19:41:17 +0000

New Potatoes for Christmas Dinner. The old trick was to try and store a few tubers of the first early varieties planted out in spring. This often resulted in very varying results. But now the seed potato suppliers store them for us just at the right temperature so they are ready to plant at the [...]

July in the veg plot

Sprout — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 09:49:51 +0000

The vegetable garden will be in full production and crops will need regular picking over to sustain the continued production of fresh young produce. Leaving vegetables to get to their maximum size is counter productive, as this slows down their growth and the result is less harvest from the plant, plus they taste better when [...]

Potato and Tomato Blight

Sprout — Sun, 27 Jun 2010 12:00:26 +0000

Potato and Tomato blight is caused by the same fungal organism (Phytophthora infestans) This is the scourge of commercial potato growers and can devastate a hole seasons crop for the allotment gardener. The disease over winters in infected tubers that have not been adequately disposed of, and as the spores are distributed by the wind, [...]