4 easy ways to grow more during a wet summer

Post by Robbie Cumming

Here in the UK we love our unpredictable weather.
We love barbecueing indoors, picnicking on ground sheets and going to the office in our wellies.


But our plants haven't loved the lower than normal temperatures and lack of sunlight, so we aren't able to enjoy the produce of our vegetable gardens as much as our dear friend Mr Slug (another matter entirely).


But the question is - can we do anything about it?

The good news is - YES!

And being experts in plant protection (even if we say so ourselves) we have a pretty good idea of exactly which products will help you make the most of a poor summer.

Here are just 4 ways that you can make a world of difference in your garden NOW:

Bell Cloches
The main picture (above) shows my little garden - nothing is growing especially well, apart from the weeds, a self seeded Ash tree, and the herbs growing under my Victorian Bell Cloche.  The vents are opened during rainy days and closed at night.  The only downside to this method is that you must remember to lift the cloche right off your plants on hot sunny days.  Otherwise they'll cook before you've even decided what recipe to use them in!

Tunnel Cloches
These do three wonderful things to your veg plot:
1) Protect your plants from weather
2) Protect your plants from pests
3) Increase and maintain higher air temperature

We sell Easy Tunnels - they're quick, easy and fairly inexpensive with lots of deals on at the moment in most garden centres.  But you can also make your own - go for it!  Make sure you use Haxnicks plant protection fabrics, bamboo hoops and ground pegs if you want something that will last you more than just one season.

If you've spent all your money on seeds and slug pellets though, there are other options.  You can use an old sheet of polythene draped over a few pieces of blue tubing secured with tent pegs which is fine if you don't care too much for how it looks.

Please note, it is really important to think about ventilation on sunny days.  Humidity can become a problem, leading to mildew and various diseases.  Scorching (if we get enough sun) is a problem too, and if you don't allow pollinating insects at your flowers, of course you won't get any fruit.

If you use a tunnel cloche you will ensure that your normal growing season is extended - that means you'll be able to harvest earlier and later in the year than anyone else.

Micromesh Fabric
Using mesh in the garden in summer is pretty standard nowadays - and essential if you want to keep the bugs off your edible crops.
But it also makes the perfect shelter - from sun, wind and rain - letting in the right amounts of light, air and moisture.
You can either buy Enviromesh or Micromesh depending on how fine a gauge you need.  Buy Micromesh if you want to guarantee protection from whitefly and other aphids.

Micromesh Products include Micromesh Pre Pack Fabric, Micromesh Pest and Wind Barrier, Micromesh Giant Easy Tunnel, Micromesh Raised Bed cover and Grower System (see below) Pest Protection Cover.



Greenhouse
If you are lucky enough to own one of these, you will probable be using it more often than usual due to the cooler weather.
Keep as many tender, non-indigenous fruit and vegetables (eg Tomatoes, Peppers and Beans) under glass. These plants need as much warmth and sunlight as they can get.
If you are planning to grow climbing veg in your greenhouse because of the weather, then you might want to think about using a patio planter which you can move outside on sunny days.
You might want to use a special planter dolly to help you though.  Planters can get pretty heavy with all the soil, canes and fruit (fingers crossed!)

If you don't have the space or simply can't afford a greenhouse, there are loads of lower cost options, including:

• Conservatories, Porches or Windowsills
• Cold Frames
• Planthouses
• Growhouses or our Grower System

If you have any questions about any of the methods or products featured in this blog post then please let us know using the comments section below.  You can also call us, email and write to us - or why not see if your nearest Haxnicks stockist can help?

We'll cover slugs in the next blog - there are many ways to defeat them, stay tuned to the Haxblog for more top tips...

How to protect carrots from carrot fly

If you have yet to experience that awful sinking feeling of lifting carrot after carrot riddled with dark crevices, tunnelled out by the dreaded carrot fly larvae, then consider yourself lucky. But for those of you that have, fear not! Haxnicks have been fighting various garden pests for over 15 years, and have picked up a few tricks along the way...

Image courtesy of www.morguefile.com

But first... some facts about carrot fly:

• Carrot fly also affects other vegetables in the parsley family, such as Parsnip, Celery and Celeriac
• They are attracted to the smell of bruised foliage
• The larvae that damage the roots can continue to feed through the autumn into winter, moving between plants
• The adult carrot fly is approximately 8mm long

How can you tell if your carrots are infected? - Check for reddening of the foliage and stunted growth

So now we know a little bit about the pest itself, we can look at some of the ways which we can protect our crops from infestations:

1. Make sure to avoid using previously infested ground. Carrot fly larvae are capable of surviving through the winter, so avoid re-sowing any vegetable from the Parsley family (see above)
2. Avoid sowing during the main egg-laying periods, which are (for most parts of the UK): mid-April to the end of May & Mid-July to the end of August
3. Sow disease and pest resistant varieties such as Fly Away F1 and Resistafly F1, available from garden centres and online seed suppliers.
4. Erect a fine-mesh barrier at the time of sowing – at least 70cm high. Check out our Micromesh Pest & Wind Barrier for an example
5. Sow thinly so as to avoid ‘thinning out’, releasing the smell of bruised foliage
6. Thin out or harvest on a dry evening with no wind – or use scissors so that no bruising of foliage occurs
7. Try companion planting - growing varieties of pungent Rosemary, Sage or Marigold as a deterrent/’smokescreen’
8. Grow your carrots in planters taller than 70cm - for example ‘Veg Trugs’ or Carrot Patio Planters
9. Lift main carrot crops by Winter, especially if any are infected – don’t leave them in the ground to serve as food for overwintering larvae.

Thinning out tip: Use scissors to avoid bruising the foliage (and releasing the carrot-fly attracting scent)

To find out more about carrot fly, why not take a look at this entry on Wikipedia or this in depth factsheet from Garden Organic.
Click here for some Hax-tips on sowing carrots...

Have you any experience of carrot fly damage? What do you think went wrong? Please let us know your thoughts using the comments section below.

What to add/what not to add to your Compost heap

It’s easy to make your own compost with the right mixture of organic kitchen and garden waste.

When composting on a small scale it is essential to get the right mix of ‘greens’ (waste with a high nitrogen content) and ‘browns’ (high in carbon and useful to create air pockets). Add them in thin alternate layers and shred waste for easier composting, smaller pieces = faster decomposition.

Do add:

GREENS
Tea bags/coffee grounds
Grass Cuttings
Organic kitchen waste (eg vegetable peelings)
Old flowers
Annual weeds

BROWNS
Twigs and shredded prunings
Small strips of cardboard
Scrunched up paper
Eggshells
Straw or hay
Dry leaves
Sawdust

Don’t add:
Meat
Fat
Cooked food
Dairy products
Animal droppings
Diseased plants
Perennial weeds (in particular roots & seeds)

Compost makes a great soil conditioner, excellent mulch for borders (adds nutrients and suppresses weeds) and can even be used as potting compost if you put it through a sieve before use.

Find out more about home composting from our friends at WRAP: click here for their web site

Watch Rabbie as he tries his hand at composting - click here for the video!

Empty the Greenhouse!

Post by Madeleine Cardozo

It’s all very exciting, everything has started growing like mad – including the weeds!
So really you could be spending a lot of time outside enjoying the garden, weeding the flower beds and planting out all sorts of exciting things.
You shouldn’t need to water your vegetable patch unless we have a heat wave. Do not overwater.

Jobs for the garden this week

1. Start to take most things out of the greenhouse as it will get too hot in there. Plants like tomatoes, basil, cucumbers, peppers, chilli’s and aubergines can all stay in there as they love the heat. Don’t forget to water well.


2. Plant out all kinds of beans, sweet peas, peas, courgettes, tomatoes, lettuces.... Make sure that you harden off the plants before actually planting them. When planted water well straight away. Some plants will benefit from still keeping the tunnels on such as tomatoes and strawberries.


3. Pinch out extra stems from tomatoes, pinch out broad bean tips.


4. Weed any beds that are getting out of control, try to keep on top of the weed situation. Don’t let your vegetables have to compete for energy from the ground.  If you keep using the hoe you will save yourself heaps of work later.


5. Sow another batch of salads. If you are doing 2nd batches of beans or peas sow these too. Sow carrots too...


6. Harvest asparagus, rhubarb, strawberries, and salads.


7. Get ready to protect any flowers on your soft fruit - more on this coming soon.

Tools/accessories to get out of your gardening shed this week:

Time to swap poly for mesh

Giant Micromesh Easy Tunnel For keepings bugs off and providing shade

Micromesh Pest & Wind Barrier Put this up as soon as you've sown your carrots

Net Easy Tunnel keep crops from being pecked at.  Shading conserves moisture so you don't have to keep watering too.

National Gardening Week Giveaway Results! Part 1

To celebrate and promote the first annual National Gardening Week, we ran daily competitions on our Facebook page www.facebook.com/haxnicks.

It took a couple of days for most of you to find out about it - but once you did, you responded in great numbers.  There was such a wide range of comments and views from gardeners of all ages, from across the UK (and abroad too).

Some of the feedback was extremely interesting, insightful and creative - some just downright hilarious!
We are going to publish some of the poll results (e.g. most popular Gardening Celeb) in the next few blogs, so don't miss that - you might want to make sure you get them sent to your inbox by entering your email in the 'subscribe' box to the right of the blog.

Now, let's get down to the winners - it was so difficult to choose these, we wish we could have given the prizes to all of you that liked and shared, you made the competition much more interesting and exciting, and allowed many others the chance to get involved (we don't advertise these things you know!).

NGW Giveaway Results

Day 1
Question: What's Bruno's least favourite vegetable?
Prize: Children's Vegetable Patio Planters
Answer: Peas
Winner: Katie Bourn


Day 2
Q: What's the strangest vegetable you've ever grown or eaten?
Prize: Vegetable Patio Planters, Jute Veg Sack
Weirdest answer: Durian (click on image for full answer!)
Winner: Laura Sturgess


Day 3
Prize draw: Compact Rapid Rootrainers with drip tray and seeds of your choice

Winner from a draw of over 300 entries: Jo Carroll
Let us know what you want to sow Jo!

Day 4
Q: How many steps were on the instruction label?
Prize: RollMix Composter
A: 4 or 5 steps (both answers were ok)
Winner: June Munday



Day 5
'Heavy Nettle' - Your favourite gardening songs?
Prize: Victorian Glass Bell Jar Cloche
Best answer: They were all so good, especially "Sowing the Seeds of Love" and "Never promised you a Rose Garden". Also a school singing practice song and bizarre music video dedicated to the joys of composting!
We just couldn't decide on the best one, so Ali in customer services picked a name from the hat: Diane Whale with 'Strawberry Fields Forever' by those famous garden insects - the Beatles!

Day 6
Your favourite Gardening expert, TV programme, magazine or web site
Prize: 3 Cane Patio Planters, Bamboo canes and Canetoppers
Winner: Alan Titchmarsh fan Sarah Mills

Day 7

Your least favourite gardening chore or most annoying problem?
Winner (picked at random): Dee Dmonte
Prize: Soft Tie & SpeedHoe (to help with the weeding!)

 I've won! I've won! What do I do now?  

Email us: lovetogrow@haxnicks.co.uk

Don't forget to leave your name and address for your prize to be posted to!

If you can't get to a computer just call us: 0845 241 1555 - just ask for Robbie who deals with our competitions.

There are several people that entered the competitions that we felt needed a special thank you - and those people are:

Titchylin Lisbeth Young

Jen English

Rod Mse

Ed Keep

Jean Moran

Aurelia Fredon

Laura Sturgess

and

Jennifer Newbury

So, to the people in the list above - thank you!  We would like to send you each a Patio Planter of your choice!  Email lovetogrow@haxnicks.co.uk stating the one you would like and your postal address and we'll send them to you as soon as we can.

Once again thank you everyone for entering the giveaways - and stay tuned for the next few blog posts as we analyse your answers!

The small print: These competitions, although run through Facebook, were not affiliated in any way with the site and so they may not hold any liability or responsibility.
In regards to any personal information (email address, telephone number) that you supply us - although we will publish the results of the competition for all to see on the web site, we will not use your details for any kind of marketing activity whatsoever so you will not receive any junk mail (we hate it so why subject you to it?!)

The National Gardening Week 'Love to Grow' Giveaway!

To celebrate the first annual National Gardening Week (16th-22nd April), Haxnicks are giving away 7 different Grow Your Own prizes - 1 for every day of the week!

How to get involved

1. 'Like' Haxnicks on Facebook 

2. Answer daily questions to win!

Every day we will post a different question or riddle.  The best response to each post wins the prize on offer on that day!



If you don't have a facebook account, don't worry as you can also 'tweet' it to us @haxnicks using the hashtag #lovetogrow


Don't worry we haven't gone facebook mad - you can also email your answer to lovetogrow@haxnicks.co.uk or call us on 0845 241 1555 too - we would love to hear from you!

The first giveaway will pop up on Monday 16th April - so stay tuned to either Facebook or Twitter for more details!

How to get growing

Guest post by Marcia MacLeod

It's the first day on the plot you've been lucky enough to beg, borrow or steal - but one look at all that empty space is enough to put anyone off, however hard you worked to get it in the first place. What should you grow? When and how? And where do you start?

A lot depends on whether the plot has been worked recently or was derelict, the type of soil and the geographical location. Newbies taking over an active plot should be able to plant most crops in the first year. It would help, though, to find out what the old plot-holder grew, and where, as some things, like carrots and brassicas (broccoli, cabbages, etc), should not be planted in the same place in successive years. The old plot-holder can also tell you what worked well on the plot and what didn't, although you can pick up a lot of local information from other people on the site.

The key to a successful plot is to grow what you like to eat

If the plot has not been looked after properly or has been unused for some time, you will probably have to clear the ground before you can start. Get yourself a big tube of ointment for bruised and tired muscles (or a bigger bottle of whiskey!) because that means digging. Although some people advocate a 'no dig' method, involving covering the soil with a thick layer of compost and leaving it for a couple of months, most growers get a sense of satisfaction from digging. If nothing else, it gives you time to think about what you want to grow.

The key to a successful plot is to grow what you like to eat and to sow little and often to try to minimise gluts and provide a regular harvest of your favourite fruit and veg. Start with the easy things: potatoes, spinach and chard, lettuce, herbs, beans, courgettes, maybe a few carrots or tomatoes (although blight spreads on an allotment and producing blight-free crops without a greenhouse is difficult).

But even with easy crops, the type of soil can have a huge impact on how to treat your plot. For example, carrots don't like clay as they find it hard to push down into the soil; try short or round varieties instead. Blueberries need an acid soil. Soil testers, available from many garden centres or online retailers, will provide a fair idea of the plot's make-up.

Ask for advice from other gardeners and allotment owners in your area

Soil is often dependent on the geographical location: most of London, for example, has clay. But local weather also plays a part. Allotmenteers in the south can plant many crops earlier and later than those living in colder climes: broad beans can be sown in March, instead of April or even May, and fast-growing crops like spinach, Swiss chard and lettuces can be planted as late as late August and still be harvested before frost sets in. Remember that instructions on seed packets are geared to the average customer and cannot take account of regional differences.

For more advice, talk to fellow plot-holders, ask at a good garden centre, and read as many books and magazines as you can find, including Your Allotment of course!

Marcia MacLeod is the, Editor for 'Your Allotment' Magazine. Your Allotment covers allotments in north London , but offers practical advice and information for allotmenteers everywhere. Check out www.yourallotmentmagazine.com for more details.