West kent - please help! I am not very good at this!!

[vegtable newbie!]

Hi

I am very much hoping you can please help me!

I gave up work a year ago to have my baby and now I stay at home with her. (I worked as a special needs teacher).

I put the veg beds in a couple of years ago and as yet I have not managed to make them very productive at all. We are the same as many families at the moment and counting every penny so I would really like to get the most out of the veg beds that I can and at the same time hopefully plant a passion for gardening into my daughter! I would love for my family to be eating as much fresh produce as we can over the year but I really struggle. We get one crop of things and that’s it – and that’s only if we are lucky! I don’t know where to start with planning it or what to put in and when!

I also have my granddads greenhouse – he had a huge passion for gardening. He died several years ago and I hated seeing his greenhouse falling down in front of my eyes, so we took the greenhouse down and moved it 60 miles to here so I could use it and it stayed in the family – which is very important to me. (This was all with my Nan’s blessing and tears of joy that it would be used). I am also very ashamed to say that I don’t get any use out of it all!

Please can anyone help me. I have dyslexia and although over the years i have taught myself ways to cope with problems, i am having a lot of difficulty with this as i really dont know where to start or how to construct a good plan or how to make the most of the areas i have! (Its not a huge veg patch - i have 6 1mx1m raised beds and some fruit bushes and trees).

I would be so appreciative of any help. Feel free to email me if you would rather.

Thank you so very much

x

[Thelma Sanders]

Lucky you with the greenhouse, so useful!
First thing is to decide what crops you would actually like to eat!
Then there is a chance of working something out

[stella]

I found it helpful to get some books from the library and have a look at the sort of things that you can do. Magazines are a great help as well as many will tell you what to do each month. Keep an eye on here as people will say what they are planting when and will offer advice if you are not sure. Make a list of the things you like to eat, go for the easy ones first. Have a look at your soil and see if it is ready to grow stuff ie is it full of weeds or compost. Most of all enjoy it everyone has a few failures but some sucess as well. Good luck

[horticultural_hobbit]

Play. Experiment. Have a go.

Grow what you like, what you fancy eating or what you think might be a nice experiment.

I'm still trying to get my head around succession growing; and the idea of sowing little and often. Something, that in hindsight, I should have realised when first started to grow beans, peas and lettuces.

For advice and guidance, the vine is amazing. I'm pedantic, so I also like flicking through gardening books. If you don't fancy paying full whack for them, I remember being in the BHF charity shop and having an ooh moment.

[Bren In Pots]

Have a look at Snadge's thread on dual cropping its easy to follow :-

http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ger_29101.html

[Two_Sheds]

I don’t know where to start with planning it or what to put in and when!

You have a greenhouse, that's a huge bonus. You can sow into modules and the seedlings will sit there nicely until you have space to plant them out.

As for what and when, follow the advice on the seed packets. I have a concertina file with monthly sections. If a pack says "sow in March" it goes in the March section. Each month I take all the packs out for that month, and sow what I think I need. It's not a problem if I sow too many of something: I'll either squeeze them in somewhere else or compost them.

[vegtable newbie!]

Hello

Wow thank you so much for everyone's lovely responses! All so kind and helpful!

Unfortunately due to my dyslexia I find using books etc can become quite frustrating for me and confusing! I do try though!

I think I would like to grow - lettuce, tomatoes (they always die on me and I have no idea why!), beetroot, radishes, carrots, cucumber, courgette, peas, butternut squash, onions, sweetcorn, potatoes and possibly broccoli! But I have no idea if that's to much for my little beds to get any decent quantity of veg!

It has been suggested to me if people knew exactly where I live they may come and help me! That would be so so fantastic! There is some allotments near us and I could go and talk to them but I don't really have the confidence for that!

Thank you all so much

X

[Potstubsdustbins]

VN you have come to the right place the people on here will do everything they can to help.

With regards to your wish list there would only be one thing I would put aside for the time being sweetcorn. I dont think you have the space to grow sufficient to make it worth while. the rest should be no problem but do remember as one grape put it last year cucumbers have a suicidal tendency. Could you let us know how big your GH is as this will help with advice.

Colin

[oldie]

You may find the Square Foot Garden thread helpful. The book is in the library and has some diagrams showing how to plant the squares, but read the posts on here to see how it works in this country. Here is the link:- http://www.growfruitandveg.co.uk/gra...ing_44388.html

[Two_Sheds]

due to my dyslexia I find using books etc can become quite frustrating

Your written English is super though ?

I think I would like to grow - lettuce, tomatoes (they always die on me and I have no idea why!), beetroot, radishes, carrots, cucumber, courgette, peas, butternut squash, onions, sweetcorn, potatoes and possibly broccoli!

Start with the easy stuff: lettuce, beets, peas, courgettes, onion sets, spuds. The spacing is on the packets, for example lettuce must be planted 8"-12" apart, spuds 12"-24" apart. You could make a little to-scale plan of your patch and play with coloured squares which represent the crops?

Butternuts are hard to grow in most of the UK, and take up a lot of room. tbh, they're only about 75p in Aldi: I'd grow easier squashes myself, Golden Nugget is a good one for small spaces

Carrots can be tricky: they like a light sandy soil and need to be kept covered with fine mesh (root fly)

Broccoli takes up a lot of room and likes a very firm soil, it also needs to be kept covered (butterlies & woodpigeons)

[singleseeder]

I notice that you have 1m square raised beds. Have you considered 'square foot gardening'? Check it out on Google and utube.

You could start plants in modules in your greenhouse so you always have replacement plants when your crops are used, so as to make full use of your space.

[vegtable newbie!]

Hello

Thank you again for your responses

I will look up that square foot gardening - thank you.

I have six beds of approximately 1m squared, green house at bottom and raspberries along one fence. Also a peach, nectarine, pear, apple and cherry tree - which I don have a clue what to do with!

Two sheds - thank you very much, I always think my writing is awful! Tthrough doing my degree and teaching I taught myself a few tricks and I had a Lot of help at university to correct myself! It takes me quite a time to write something though! That's nice to know its not to bad though - thank you!

X

[vegtable newbie!]

Sorry I meant to say as well my greenhouse is 8 x 6.

Sue
X

[WendyC]

The mistake I made when first getting my plot was to plant too much of the same thing so we'd have 20 cabbages or lettuces ready at the same time. Little and often is a better way to go. This is especially true of the salad leaves and lettuces. Good luck

[Helgalush]

There is already some very helpful advice on this thread so the only other things I can think to say is maybe send away for - or go online to order - some seed catalogues. I've got quite a few from The Organic Gardening Catalogue, Thompson & Morgan, Suttons, plus I regularly go on the MoreVeg website...then you can look and see which varieties you like the look of and it may get you buzzing...although be careful not to buy too many seeds which is normally my downfall!!

Just have fun with it and experiment - some things will surprise you and grow fantastically and other things will fail and you may have no idea why...its just a learning process. You could keep your own journal of what you have sown and when, so that you can look back next year and see what you did. I havent done this yet but got bought one for Christmas so I might do that.

I have this book which has some handy tips in it, you may be able to get it from your library: Your Organic Allotment: Amazon.co.uk: Pauline Pears, Ian Spence, Garden Organic: Books

You can grow many things in smaller spaces - I have grown most of my crops in either large containers or a small raised bed, I had this book http://www.amazon.co.uk/Crops-Pots-C...5521207&sr=1-1 which has some great photos and step-by-step instructions for container projects, but most if not all of them could be transferred in to a bed system and are great for whetting the appetite, because the photos are so pretty and also introduce the idea of companion planting.

Good luck and enjoy it