Mar 30, About garden shredders

garden shredders are a big help with garden waste - compare their designs and discover how you could use them in your garden

Mar 29, Raised Bed Potatoes

You can expect raised bed potatoes to be clean & unblemished as there's no digging involved. Find more here on how to grow a clean unblemished potato delicacy even on hard surfaces

Mar 26, Organic Gardening Goes Into Overdrive

My friends in America tell me that Boston has only recently been cleared of winter snows.

But for many, when the Easter holiday garden arrives - late this year - it will be looking extra extra good. And right now is the most busy time.

This Week's Important Gardening Tip:

Every day! sow seed, or plant out, or weed and clear a new patch.

I'll be sowing some seed most days from now on. Variety is the spice of garden life and it well makes up for the occasional failures.

This year my focus is on a range of small crops that I really enjoy: onions, carrots, beetroot... oriental greens... I'll be growing lots.

Remember last year - 6 potato varieties took pride of place. This year I've opened up a new patch but the spuds are getting a rest with only 4 varieties.

Big Allotment Gardening Tip

Don't waste time on growing food plants that you won't enjoy eating, or in growing too many for your own needs. Many gardeners rave about their favourite food, their broad beans, their parsnips... ...

But if you don't grow what you enjoy and can eat then you'll end up giving them away which can be disheartening. Your neighbours will have grown for their own needs too, so you can't guarantee getting a swap.

However, it's also worth noting that freshly picked organically grown food tastes much much better than store bought. It can even convert you to food you might have disliked. Take care with the cooking Mum!

To make the most of your garden this year visit these links.



Grow even more seeds and plants - the best prices for American Gardeners are here.


Quality Seeds (no thrills packaging) - U.K. experienced mail order and I always make savings with them.

Easy Seeds for Children and Organic Seeds variety is the spice of gardening life and you'll find some nice plants here.


NOTE: Postage and packaging on seeds (U.K.) is virtually zero and you can take advantage of freebies and surprise gifts.

Mar 19, On Top Of Garden Weeds

Sowing Seeds:

Yesterday I prepared leaf mold for seed compost - and it's great stuff for growing seeds.

I sprinkle the leaf mold (which is on the dry side) through the flame of my weed wand and into a bucket.

Then I mix in a sprinkling of bone meal.

I almost fill a seed tray with this compost. Then gently and evenly firm down the compost. This helps to ensure a more even germination.

Then water the compost and sow my tomato seeds 1 inch apart on the surface. I got a total of 24 seeds from 3 tomato varieties into the tray.

Then cover with about a quarter of an inch of compost and very gently and evenly firm and level.

The tray is now on my windowsill covered with newspaper to reduce evaporation.


Websites for Seeds:


Garden Seeds at DirectGardening - Offers quality plants at great prices, take a look at what I mean!


Garden Seeds at Dobies - U.K. always offer good value.

Easy Seeds for Children are here at Suttons.co.uk

Transplanting Onions:

Today I planted out my onion seedlings. They grew in trays indoors for about 3 weeks.

Then over the last week they've been hardening off in the greenhouse.

Now they are transplanted into pre-warmed soil in the garden. I've covered them temporarily with fleece to continue the hardening off.

Before transplanting I worked in about a good handful of bone meal along each 4 foot row.

Tomorrow I'll plant out my surviving onion sets from modules that I set up in the greenhouse last autumn.

Weeds: You'll find all you need to know for weed control on this link.

Everything is growing again and it's time to be alert to weeds and keep on top of them.

Hairy Bittercress Cardamine hirsuta crops up everywhere in some gardens and in pots. I was told it is edible and Plants For A Future affirms this.

So I tasted some leaves and indeed they are really good. From now on that will add some nice flavour to my salads.

But I can't let them grow near my onions. Check out my page on organic weed control where I provide all you need to know for taming wild places and keeping your weeds in order.

Mar 11, How To Save Money With Your Garden

If you've read my recent About Me page you'll realise why I'm keen to make my garden pay. So let me briefly share a few top tips on how to reap the benefits of your garden and reduce cost.

With Potatoes you can expect to get at least 6 good sized spuds off each plant and probably more... That's about 60 spuds for a 10 foot row. A potato bucket with 4 plants may give you 20 spuds. And home-grown short season 'new' potato varieties beat shop prices.

You can save more when you share your seed potato order with neighbours, friends and colleagues. Yes, why not get everyone gardening?

And I've long recommended

DirectGardening to American gardeners for the lowest prices by a long long way...

That's because their website generates volume sales. And that's something for you to take advantage of - wholesale prices.

You get wholesale unit prices even with smaller quantities suited to back gardens and tubs... And you get an even better unit price the more you buy.

You have to buy them to grow and eat them so the price difference with culinary potatoes is small. But the biggest plus of growing your own from horticultural seed potato is the wonderful choice of variety.

And of course quality certified reduces the risk of plant disease that might prevent you growing future crops.

Find good seed potatoes here  + 

Grow your other vegetables and flowers now from packet seed. Especially in the U.K. the price difference between seeds and plants is huge. Remember that most packets contain enough seed to last 2 years.

With a little care and attention you can grow dozens and dozens of plants - flowers, vegetables, and herbs to plant out all from low cost seed packets. The potential to save on food is huge.


 Garden Seeds at DirectGardening - Offers quality plants at great prices, take a look at what I mean!

 
Garden Seeds at Dobies - U.K. always offer good value.

Easy Seeds for Children are here at Suttons.co.uk

Once again the massive choice of variety exceeds any other way of growing plants.

Buy online by mail order where the offers keep cropping up. You save on an outing to the store and the stuff you get comes direct from the nursery.

But when you combine your orders with other stuff that you need there's also more savings to be made on order value and postage and packing.

Find more at Amazon.com and Amazon.co.uk

Mar 6, Potato Plant From The Ground Up

Explains how a potato plant grows, its origin, needs & diseases affecting potatoes.

Mar 6, Certified Seed Potato

The meaning & importance of 'Certified seed potato' is explained & why all potato growers should plant them.

Mar 6, Harvesting Potatoes

What you need to know about harvesting potatoes - 'new', 'maincrop', 'lates', from the garden, potato bags, tubs or potato barrels. You'll find when to harvest and how to store your potatoes in good condition & disease free.

Mar 4, The Organic Gardener Under The Weather

I wish I could get some gardening done this weekend. But I'm down with a cold.

At least my website won't stop working and you can see my recent update about organic weed killer. While researching this I discovered troubling news about Roundup.
And I included a link to a study that maintains that Glyphosate immobilises plant nutrients.

Extensive use on GM crops may lead to nutrient deficiency in the human diet. You see the crops won't show any signs of being nutritionally low value.

Amazingly the author of the report claimed that Roundup killed by causing plant disease resulting from nutrient deficiency. But Glyphosate is supposed to kill plants by blocking protein synthesis.

I cant' say I'm surprised at finding any of this.

It's time for us all to be more sensitive and change to organic gardening.

I've also written about my gardening history and importantly, how I made this website.

Time to dig this...

Mar 4, the organic gardener

Meet the organic gardener and discover the delights of gardening free. Here I explain how growing and working from home has changed my life for the good.