Vegetable Growing 2024

First cucumber picked today (Marketmore grown outside). Very nice too, looking forward to more of them. Did have to google what to do about the spines though!

 

Try not to swallow them whole and you'll be alright !

 

Lovely crop of onions @Scroggin !

 

Run the back of a knife down it...

 

Finally got a good solution for growing basil. I have tried growing it in the greenhouse beneath tomatoes, but they don't get enough light. Outside is typically too wet and too cold even against a south facing wall. This works though, in my sun room. This lot was propagated from one pot of supermarket basil back in June I think, a couple of plants each in 6 similar sized pots and put in a tray to bottom water. I have had more than I know what to do with despite picking it regularly. Not gone to flower either yet. Next year I'll grow the lime and lemon varieties from seed this way. Time to make some pesto and freeze it I think

 

Yes that's the answer I found.

 

I harvested these pumpkins yesterday:




I usually get 3 or 4 per plant but this year the numbers are down to 1 per plant due to the cooler temperatures.

The rinds on these are firm and hard so I think that they will store well.

They weigh 11kg and 8.5kg (from left to right).


However, about three weeks ago this one burst out of its hammock netting support:




Two plants grown vertically in a box of finished compost next to the compost heap.

It dropped down about 10 minutes after I watered them. Luckily, it was a soft landing as there was another compost pile on the other side

The weight of the fallen pumpkin was just over 10kg, and the rind was semi-hard but not fingernail proof.

 

Also yesterday, the first of my karelas (aka bitter gourds):




Here it was just moments ago




I don't actually like them myself but my mum and my plot neighbours love them.

 

And, the first of my kohlrabi which was harvested last week:

 

An update on the melon experiment, the watermelons were finally coming along ok, one plant died for no apparent reason after setting fruit and the other two were coming along ok.
The other evening I found one melon on the "lawn" with teeth marks.
Ben, (dog) had decided there were something to play with and had "picked" them for me, needless to say they were not ripe but getting on that way.

Pretty small for watermelon but I think considering the rubbish weather, they never really got moving until late July, they could have been better in a good year.

Still got a couple of cantaloupes that probably wont ripen now anyway, since the winter started yesterday, probably just rot.

 

I have one in GH and one outside, only one fruit on each plant though. Variety Sweetheart, both hard as rock at the moment.
There's an old saying "the melon ripens as it vine dies " Not sure if that still applies to modern F1 cultivars tho.

 

10kg! each, a great harvest, thatll last a few minutes!

Ours mini pumpkins are all ripe now, though ive got one I planted very late just to see what it would do that is still growing.

I dont think they yield very high, I saw them at sainsburies for the same price as the giant ones. "Jack be Little" variety I think, or "Hobgoblin". One of those. In the bigger pot I think we were going to get maybe 10 but a dry week and many fell off, now only 5. Ba humbug!

 

Every year I grow Utchiki Kuri because we like them. This year, my cultivated plant had produced 1 decent pumpkin depsite sowing, pricking out and planting out being done under sound horticultural principles, as usual. We had cold, wet, grey days at the wrong time followe dby hot, sunny, dry days at the wrong time.

One decent squash on the surviving plant.

Meanwhile, a self sown plant had established itself next to the compost heaps and has produced 2 good fruit. I've stopped it so they are ripening nicely.

 

I don't yet have any mildew on my squash plants, usually it sets in over August.

I haven't actually tried to see how many I have, I did initially plant maybe nine winter squash plants but had to repeatedly replant them as they got eaten by slugs and didn't take off due to the weather. However the four plants that made it look good now

I grew them as part of a two sisters system, with a squash plant down the middle of the bed every metre and two corn plants on the bed edges between them. The corn has been better pollinated this year than in the past where I did the standard block planting, which was interesting. Might be the weather again though

 

Out of the hundreds of flowers on our kiwis we managed to harvest 12 fruits! We had one today and it was brilliant. Lovely taste and texture.