What needs manure?

I have dug my first ever two veggie patches, one I have put some well rotted ( well it looks well rotted to me ) manure in , the other I haven't.
Could some kind soul please tell me, What veggies must have manure and what veggies don't like it at all please?

 

thanks. I think the only other things I am going to try and grow that you haven't mentioned above are tomatoes and strawberries.

 

Will do, thanks again.

 

John, I have never grown veg, so know nothing about them or their requirements.

The principle that I work on is that most flowers don't need feeding, they may like it but don't necessarily need it. The reason is that if you cut back all the foliage and return it to the border, either composted or uncomposted, you aren't taking anything away from the soil. And that process can go on almost indefinately as everything is recycled.

However with veg, you are removing quantities of material, which are composted inside the body but are not returned to your own soil. In my ignorance I would have manured everything as a way of replacing what had been removed. If root crops aren't manured or fed, how do they cope with the continual depletion of the soil.

Or is this where crop rotation comes in. The soil has to be replenished somehow if it is to continue to produce.

 

I've just been watching a Geoff Hamilton DVD that a friend gave to me.."The Ornamental Kitchen garden" where he's cropping in small area, then once done he pulls out all roots and debris..forks in some more compost and a handfull of Fish Blood and Bone..to replace what the previous crop took from the soil. Then ha sows or plants out the next crop.

Steve...

 

Thanks John for your reply. I find the principles most interesting, because they are common to all plants not just veg. What happens if you heavily manure root crops?. You said they tended to fork. Is this just a presentation problem? Does the yield (by weight) increase or do the plants really not like it.

As you know, manure does two seperate things. It is primarily a soil conditioner, putting more organic matter into the soil, making it more open and holding more water. And to a lesser extent a fertiliser, adding nitrogen from the urine (most of which will have been washed out) and all the other minerals that were in the food that has passed through the animal.

Do you have any views on which of these aspects root crops don't like? Or are we simply in a Euro- bureaucrat position of only wanting straight roots?

Steve, I would have just manured and fertilised irrespective. But it is a fact that different plants have different preferences.

 

Thanks again John - interesting.

 

Great information here John - very useful! Didn't realise that the nitrogen would cause forking in root vegetables! Our allotment has been heavily manured in previous years by the previous allotment holder - but seems to have been done over the entire allotment.

 

Thanks from me too.