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I to have had trouble with mr Watman. Delivery was short by 18 bags and it took a lot of phone calls to get the rest delivered.
I think I have also had problems with contamination, my whole bed of multi sown onions turned brown at the tips and refused to grow. This was my first year of no dig gardening and I had to rely heavily on commercial manure, hopefully my homemade compost will be enough for next year.Thank you so much for that Hazelky, I was feeling very sorry for myself after loosing half my plants, but the vision of masses of slugs having an orgy made me laugh. Perhaps if I put some slug pubs in amongst the cabbages they can then die even happier!
Thank you Rhys, that’s an interesting point about the peas, I suppose as long as they were grown in good compost each year they would still be strong plants producing good viable seed.
I am finding Back garden seed sowing by Sue Strickland a really fascinating book,as well as all the great advice on the real seed company website I am going to give it ago.
At the moment I am licking my wounds, a trip to the allotment yesterday revealed most of my brassicas had been eaten by slugs, and some how the pea weevil got in under the fleece and decimated my pea shoots.
Who said it was the gentle art of gardening? It’s a war going on out there.Having already mentioned the total failure of lettuce Mottistone I received another packet from Suttons, these were sown together with lettuce from real seeds. The later have germinated the Mottistone nothing.
I have also failed wth pea Ambassador, again from Suttons, the Heritage peas sown on the same day germinated almost 100%.
I wonder if the wet weather we had in August last year is to blame?
I have treated myself to the seed saving book recommended by real seeds, so I can have a go at producing my own fresh seed, really fed up of spending loads of money for no return.I too have had trouble with some seeds. A packet of Mottistone lettuce has refused to grow even one seeding.
I tried them in the heated propagater, the window sill and the greenhouse bench. I tried growing with a covering of compost and on the surface of the compost under a sheet of glass, not so much as one lettuce.
I have never tried this variety before but they looked so good in Charles book I was looking forward to adding them to my salad bowl.Hi Jacob,
This is going to be my first year of no dig, all previous years I have cosseted my seedlings, spending a fortune on heating my greenhouse.
This year I decided to follow Charles advice and left them unheated. We have had some of the worst weather on record in Devon, with heavy snow and wind chill of -7. I couldn’t even get to my greenhouse during two days of blizzard conditions.
All my cell grown veggies are happy and healthy, I fact they look better than previous years as they are much sturdier.
My advice, trust Charles.Hi Matthew, broad bean plants attract bumble bees in large numbers and you benefit from the harvest as well. Be aware that different types of bee need different types of flower.
Bumble bees have long tongues and like tubular flowers such as comfrey and beans that they crawl up into. Honey bees have very short tongues so need small flat flowers like lavender or cow parsley.I grow Hungarian paprika peppers, to dry and grind. Nothing tastes as good as home produced paprika and so far they have survived winter in the greenhouse.