Vegetable Growing 2024

@Obelix-Vendée I said not a veg but correct me if I am wrong but I think it is classified as a veg!
We don't use any cloches just every year our own compost goes on top of the crowns in the winter.

 

@Obelix-Vendée I will be putting the domes on the trays at night so that they will have a little bit of a cold frame within a greenhouse effect.

@burnie you must not have known about Spinosad - it is a natural product that doesn't harm pets, people or anything but those leaf sucking pests.

@On the Levels I am green with jealousy - my rhubarb hasn't even tried to peak up through the soil - our ground is pretty much frozen right now and I am anxious to see something show as I am worried it won't forgive me for moving it. Yet again!

 

I haven't come across that product, though to be fair I haven't looked, I am trying my best to be organic in my growing, though not all my seeds are organic and I buy compost that may not be, I am trying to produce my own compost, but we don't make enough of it in a small garden.

 

I've been taking advantage of the fact that lettuce can survive winters uncovered in my area.

It has been a very mild winter so they are growing quite well.


Mixed curly lettuce


Lamb's lettuce


The first picking

 

@burnie I have been feeding my houseplants this winter with a liquid made from soaking OH's daily banana skin in a pot of water. When it's full, I drain the skins and put them on the compost then dilute the liquid to feed my plants. These include plants such as a Bird of Paradise, a ficus benjamina and a ficus elastica which spend summer outside and can pick up pests.

I've recently added a weekly orange peel to the bananas as I read that it is a natural pesticide. So far so good. No pesky beasties or aphids.

Could be an organic soluion for your problems.

 

To the above, it is strictly controlled in EU, therefore also UK. Certain sources supply on the 'black market' but I do not know of an approved domestic market UK supplier, unless you know otherwise.

 

@On the Levels yes, technically it's a stem so a vegetable but nearly always used as a fruit. Unlike tomatoes which are a fruit used as a vegetable.

 

I think we will only have washing up liquid in a year or two.
But even that is not allowed officially as a pesticide, as far as I know.

 

I strongly suspect that fruit grown in unregulated foreign lands where pestilence, insects and disease doubtlessly thrive, receive sufficient quantities of
insecticides and fungicides etc to ensure that your fruit reaches you with everything needed to keep your houseplants as clean as a whistle. Organic ?, well not in my book.

 

That's very impressive @misterQ ! Lettuce wouldn't last five minutes here outside - the slugs would have it even if it grew.
Do you not get slug damage at all? I grow wild rocket, which is slug repellent, but everything else needs to be well protected once it is outdoors in spring/early summer.

 

www.phsdirect.co.uk/media/3954/bc2454-fairy-professional-non-bio-washing-liquid.pdf

 

@infradig I buy organic bananas from French territories in the Caribbean. I expect controls are rather better there than in most banana growing countries. The oranges I buy are also organic and Spanish so also subject to EU standards and controls.

Not perfect but I do my best and don't use chemicals in the garden except for vinegar and a bit of WUL when washing pots and trays if they need more than a blast from the hose. So far so good and I only get pests like aphids and a bit of scale on the houseplants that live outside for the summer.

 

There's an ongoing scandal in Guadeloupe (and probably Martinique too) about the previous use of Chlordécone, a persistent pesticide, and it's long-term effects on the population. As for Spanish oranges, many products now banned in France are still freely available and used in other EU countries, so how can anyone be sure that they're buying 'organic' anything?

 

Thanks @noisette47 I didn't know that about Guadeloupe. Don't see French papers or TV and my friends here don't discuss politics.

I buy untreated oranges and lemons when I can and wash their skins if I need the zest. I grow my own lemons too but not enough for year round consumption.

 

Isn't it satisfying, though, growing your own citrus? Before you know it, you'll have branched out into limes, mandarins and oranges My lime tree-in-a-half-barrel produces about 15kgs of fruit a year and the sweet orange had 42 fruit last year