What You Should Have Done Last Week in your vegetable Patch – Or NOW

Don’t down tools just yet fellow gardeners, there are still more seeds to plant, still more to harvest, still more to store. Plant another batch of lettuce and rocket, plant radishes and chard. This is still a good time for germinating, but watch out for the slugs as when it is wet they hide under the leaves of your vegetables. If you feel that the nights are getting a little cold by all means use a poly tunnel this will definitely prolong the season.

Pick off any caterpillars that are lurking underneath your cabbage or broccoli leaves, I find it easier and more successful doing this by hand rather than by using some kind of spray, it doesn’t take that long either.

I have pulled up all of my onions and garlic, they have been drying nicely in the sun and now my six year old son and I have tied them into wonderfully French bunches – We feel very professional! You do this by getting a piece of twine about 1m in length, then tie on each onion individually. Make sure that the neck of the onion is tied off tightly, this will keep the onion moist, and help it to last.

At the moment I am harvesting courgettes, lettuce, rocket, tomatoes, basil, climbing French beans, runner beans, potatoes, raspberries, plums and a few apples.

Madeleine's Corner: Picking Courgettes, Herbs and Raspberries

This week my courgettes have started to enter our lives – they are ready to be picked when they are small 10cm (4”) as baby courgettes or as large as 30cm (12”). I normally go for something in between. There are so many different ways of eating courgettes, I shall include a new recipe in an adjacent article.

If you are like me and have planted nasturtiums as a companion plant in your vegetable patch, did you realise that you can eat the flower in a salad, or add them to a bacon sandwich to give them a fiery taste?

Herbs need trimming, weather it is a perennial like rosemary or an annual like basil, so if you are not trimming them to eat, you should trim them so that they don’t grow leggy and start to flower. Trimming them will encourage a better bushier plant.

Autumn fruiting varieties of raspberries will now be beginning to fruit, don’t let the birds get them, either place a net over them or get some birdscare ribbon. I find that the ribbon works for me; others may need something a little more in the way of a fruit cage.

Madeleine's Corner: Harvesting and Storing

I found that last week I spent a huge amount of my time harvesting my crops, this is one of the most prolific times of the year everything is shouting ‘I’m ready pick me, eat me, store me!’ So by now your redcurrants, blackcurrants and possibly gooseberries should be harvested.

You need to pull up any lettuces or rocket that has bolted and replace them by planting out another batch to keep you going through the summer. Some carrots/beetroot may be ready, when they are small they are so sweet and delicious, if you are going to cook them, cook them briefly and the flavour that you get from them will be so much better. You can also use the small beetroot leaves for salads.

Keep anything you have in the greenhouse well watered, although limp plants can come back to life after being watered. Watering in the evening is the best time to water as it gives the plants the whole night in which to soak it up. Last week I made, strawberry sorbet with mint, gooseberry fool, and I froze the majority of my broad beans – otherwise they were going to get too big and bitter.

This is a fantastic time of year, the time when all gardeners want to show off their years work, now is the time to make yummy broad bean salads, have warm new potatoes, and summer puddings galore. Weed your patches. Harvest your crops, eat them, share them or store them.

Storing – Blanch any peas or beans and put them in the deep freeze. Freeze any berries you don’t have time to eat. You can also freeze elderflowers to make elderflower cordial later on in the summer.

Look at your tomatoes and check that they haven’t sprouted any extra branches; otherwise all the energy into making tomatoes will go into making more leaves. So, you do this by looking at the main stem of the tomato, branches should come off that, but only 1 branch. If there are two or more, pinch out the inner branches with your thumb and index finger. Also make sure that the tomato is well secured to the plant support, by using Haxnicks SoftTie.

I have had great problems with finding more spinach to sow as it is not readily available like a lot of herbs or tomato seeds are. This is a good time to sow more of these to see you into the autumn. How about another batch of radishes?

Go to the garden centre and see what tickles your fancy in the way of seeds, because it would be so nice to have some winter and spring crops too.

Madeleine's Corner: Feast or Famine

Well it seems to be feast or famine with the rain, watering was not an issue last week! At least here in Wiltshire anyhow.

The peas, broad beans, lettuces are all ready for harvesting. If you have too many lettuces – give some away, they won’t last. Hopefully you have another lot coming up soon.

If you planted beetroot, you can use some of the smaller leaves in a salad. You may also need to thin out your beetroot, cooking the little golf ball sized ones, leaving space in the ground for the others to grow. Keep the edges of your patches under control, the grass is still growing and before you know it, it has invaded your patch and is spreading weeds.

The fruits and berries have been unbelievable. There have been so many I haven’t known what to do with them. So pick them all before the birds and slugs beat you and put them into the deepfreeze waiting until you have time to either make a jam or incorporate them into a pudding. Remember that Strawberries come out like jelly if you freeze them.

Keep an eye on the slugs, greenfly and caterpillars. Pinch off any caterpillars, re-home the slugs, and I suppose spray the greenfly. Do it or you will lose your crops. Slugs come out at dusk, so if you are really keen take a torch. Sow some more carrots for the winter and some more basil to see you through the summer.

WIN Haxnicks Easy Tunnels with Kitchen Garden Magazine

The July issue of Kitchen Garden Magazine contains a fantastic competition to win £75 worth of Giant Easy Tunnels!

To win the set of tunnels pictured, all you need to do is buy a copy of Kitchen Garden Magazine (available from garden centres, newsagents and supermarkets).  Turn to page 91 for the above prize information, and then on to page 101 to fill in the form to enter.  Alternatively, you can visit Kitchen Garden's Web site competition area and enter online.

Good luck!

Madeleine's Corner: Glorious English Summer

Glorious English Summer – well it is one minute and then not the next. One is never sure whether to water the garden or will the Good Lord do it for you? Just make sure if you can help it that it is neither feast nor famine. Lack of water means that your crops such as spinach and lettuce bolt: so water evenly. Anyhow, Last week there was an awful lot of weeding to be done, if you don’t do it the weeds take all the energy from the soil and your peas turn out more like pinheads, and your carrots will never grow. Which reminds me thin your carrots, I know this seems harsh but it’s worth it. Thin them to 1 every 2” 5cm.

I use Haxnicks Speedhoe for saving energy and time weeding, and Haxnicks Micromesh to protect Carrots from Carrot Fly (especially important when thinning out as the Carrot Fly will no doubt get a whiff off the seedlings that have been removed).

Cover any berries you have with netting, Bamboo Fruit Cages or rig up some Birdscare or old CD’s so that the birds don’t beat you to the crop, once they discover them there won’t be any left for you. Pick and eat Rhubarb, soft fruits, lettuces, broad beans and asparagus, pick some of the small beetroot leaves for a salad. Take the last of your plants to be planted outside and get them in the vegetable patch. Sow another batch of lettuce (if you do this monthly you will get lettuces all year round), rocket and radishes.

How to secure your plants with Soft-Tie ~ Plus WIN a free pack!

Haxnicks' Soft-Tie is a special reusable rubber compound coated wire that has a never ending list of uses in the home and garden.

Here we are going to show you how you can use it to train your Tomatoes, Sunflowers, Sweet Peas, Runner Beans, Grapevines or any other plant that might need to be secured as it shoots up.

Cut off lengths of Soft-Tie with a pair of wire cutters, or a pair of pliers that are designed to cut wire as above.

 

You may then tie your  plants on to your supports (in this case a bamboo cane).  Be careful that you don't tie them too tightly.

Perhaps you might want to create more of a gap between support and plant.  Why not try this fancy technique?

If you are trying to train a climbing plant along a piece of fence or trellis, simply tie the plant stem along at regular intervals.  Use the above picture as a rough guide if you like.

Watch the amazing Soft-Tie YouTube video here.

Haxnicks Soft-Tie - durable, flexible, reusable. Choose from Original, Woody, Slim and Slim Woody.

If you would like to WIN a roll of Soft-Tie, simply become a follower of this blog and we will contact you to arrange delivery of your free gift!