Community › Community › General Gardening › Vegetables › Yellowing leaves of peas, lettuce, spinach › seedling growth
Hi compostpope,
Yes it was the green waste compost I was mainly concerned about but that’s because the soil itself is more of a known quantity: what little of it there is (only a couple centimeters in places) is very stony and surprisingly dry-looking. It almost looks like grey dust when it hasn’t rained for a while. Having said that, it’s mainly the well-dug, previously cultivated parts that look parched. I planted some broad beans on newly cleared ground and it surprised me to see how much more moisture retentive the soil in that part of the plot was whereas when I tried to water some planting holes in one of the previously cultivated beds I almost had the impression of pouring water into a bottomless well.
I believe most of the other allotment holders on my site are growing organically. A lot of people buy manure from the same source as I got, others visit local stables and bag up the free stuff to take away, and at least one person I spoke to mixes spent hops available free from the local brewery with garden compost to reduce soil alkalinity as spent hops apparently are slightly more acidic than other types of compost.
By the way, I really couldn’t believe the difference on seedling growth made by warmth, as Charles said. I visited the plot yesterday afternoon and after a wonderfully warm, sunny day the lettuce had grown glossy new leaves, the beetroot stems had thickened and spinach leaves had grown bigger and more plentiful, so perhaps there is hope yet! The only thing that hadn’t improved was my late-sown broad beans which appeared to have been savaged by birds. Their leaves had all been pecked at, presumably by birds rather than slugs as there were virtually no holes in either the spinach or the lettuce. I covered them up with fleece to protect them. I hope they don’t get too hot under cover and that they manage to bounce back soon.