Planted my first veg...

And I mean first ever! Never grown any veg before (never really grown anythin much before this year tbh...) but it's all fun and exciting.

I've got a small patch reserved for veg, and I put my first seeds in this weekend: Carrots (normal and round - round carrots!!? wow?!), peas, parsley and parsnip (can't stand it myself but my wife wants it), radish and red onion. got some courgette, aubergine and red pepper growing insde to put out next month and a space reserved for some tomatos, when we buy them.

Quite a lot for a little patch I know, but just a few plants of each - more for fun and to see what happens rather than to 'feed the family' (never gonna happen).

Took a lot of work to get the ground ready: needed loads of sand, loads of earth/compost and a little bit of gypsum to turn the heavy heavy sticky/rockhard clay into something resembling good earth. Oh, and plenty of digging and then some more digging, but we're about there now.

Looking good, feeling good - let's see what happens... any tips for what to do now, what not to do now or what to look out for?

Thanks,

 

Hi Hrochnick

Sounds like you've been busy. The only things I'd advise would be:

1 Keep a gardening diary of what and when you plant, when it's ready, etc so you can build up your knowlwdge.

2 I can sense your impatience. Just let Nature do its work now!

3 Watch out for long dry spells when watering might be necessary (Idon't know what the climate is like in Brno).

4 Watch out for pests - particularly slugs and pigeons which just love very young seedlings.

Good luck!

 

"And I mean first ever!"

Well Done!

"any tips for what to do now"

Water the carrot and parsnip seed drills with a fine rose (i.e. gently!) twice a week. They will take ages to germinate ... if you can just water along the drills that will be even better - the weeds will germinate faster than the carrots and parsnips :(, so seeing where the drill is will help to decide which is which!

"what to look out for?"

Critters eating your plants / seedlings. Slug pellets might be a good idea, or a slug-pub (sunken jam jar with 1" of beer in it that they can drown in), or a torch-light vigil to find and squish them when they are feasting!

 

Summers here a pretty long, fairly hot and mostly dry so regular watering will be a must. I considered putting a simple drip hose thing in but the wife thinks it's an unessessary expense for the plot we have, and she's probably right. But I like gadgets!

Haven't seen any slugs yet (along with any other ground based non flying life - garden was a building site this time last year), but they may start appearing now - like the idea of a slug pub if they do!

Got a semi documented diary... partly in excel, partly on labels on pots and partly in my head. Probably should get it all down somewhere properly.

Thanks for your help guys.

 

"Got a semi documented diary... partly in excel, partly on labels on pots and partly in my head. Probably should get it all down somewhere proper"

Have a look at my other thread and if you think it would help send me a PM with your Email address

http://www.gardenerscorner.co.uk/forum/showthread.php/should-long-20227.html?p=318826#post318826

I don't know if the dates etc. will be applicable to Czech Republic but I'm be very interested to see what dates you record and compare them.

 

Thanks Kristen, I've sent you off a PM. Will be interesting to see what you've done with the sheet and see how the plans and dates compare to what I see here. Bearing in mind that the vast majority of what I'm doing so far is: reading the back of the seed packet, adding a bit of guesswork, mixing in a helping of 'when have I got the time' and shoving on a big lump of 'let's chuck it in and see'!

Cheers.

 

Yup, that's how I do it too. But then I get to next year and think "I wish I could remember when I did such-and-such and whether I decided I should have done it sooner / alter / more often

This year I have planted all greenhouse crops at the earliest date on the seed packet - Tomatoes in February etc.

I think the lack of light (and heat) means that they didn't gain anything, so I'm not going to be in quite such a hurry next year, although it might make sense to buy commercially raised plants at the time I would actually sow next year - so maybe buy plants around the middle of March. Anyway, hopefully some half decent crop records will help me achieve that.

 

So, a well overdue update: Things coming along nicely, the tomatoes are great, the carrots plentiful, the aubergines on the small side (so far) but lots of them and tastey. From two courgette plants I have courgttes coming out of my ears and we're running out of ideas... courgette pasta, couregette pizza, couregtte soup, grilled courgette, courgette omelete, courgette quiche, stuffed courgette... will it ever end I wonder!

The peas were okay, but too much work for too little benefit for my liking. The red onions are nearly ready...

My red peppers are okay but mysteriously half of them died suddenly, litterally overnight - most odd. I lost one of my chilli plants in the same manner too, and almost lost all four. They're doing fine now though, bags of hot chillies on the way.

Soon, I'll be able to cook a meal of (almost entirely) home grown stuff - this was one of my initial goals - a pasta dash with home grown tomatoes, onion, courgette, chilli, red pepper, aubergine and courgette and a few herbs from the garden too. The only thing I'll have to buy is the pasta and the cheese. Oh what fun!

 

You've obviously tried a lot harder than your original posts suggested Congratulations on some good crops, I bet you're telling everyone "I GREW THAT" :yho:

 

Indeed, my friends are bored crapless by it all!