What are your new year's resolutions for 2013?

[Nikki Arnold]

Okay, so there is a little way left to go until we celebrate new year, but by now most of us will have already started making promises to ourselves to try something new on the plot in 2013, or at least to prevent making the same mistakes again!

So whether you fancy keeping chickens next year, growing only heritage varieties, employing a different growing technique, have made the decision to grow more (or less!), get organised or go organic – we want to know about it! Share your GYO new year's resolutions here, and make them official!*




*please note your responses may be edited and published in the January 2013 issue of GYO magazine.

[VirginVegGrower]

I have stressed to be self sufficient in fresh fruit and veg after what has been a fruitless 2012. Growing conditions have made this year impossible so I also resolve to learn a new dance - the sun dance! Heritage veg growing is an automatic inclusion.

[Two_Sheds]

I want to "spend less time on my plot".


I have 4 gardens and my allotment to tend, plus other hobbies and a new(ish) dog. I just don't have the time that I used to have.

This year I vowed to reduce the time I spend making and spreading compost. I already moved my daleks around the plot to where I want the compost to be (usually on a legume bed), which saved time normally spent lugging buckets of compost about the plot.

This year instead of composting everything, I simply chopped up with secateurs as much as I could, and dropped it on the surface. Weeds (non-seeding), foliage, green manures, old plants, dead stalks etc, it all got chopped & dropped. It's improved my soil more in one year than compost had in five: it's brilliant.

more info here

[SarzWix]

I've already spoken to the headteacher at the primary school which I volunteer at about setting up a 'getting started in GYO' course for parents in the Spring. I'm thinking probably 6 or 8 weeks, on a Saturday morning, from mid-March to mid-May. Just trying to work out costings and where we'll do it (our school polytunnel isn't big enough to use as a classroom).

I'm probably a bit crazy, as I don't really have the time spare, but given the news reported recently in the Guardian, that the world (particularly the West) is eating more food than we can produce, I think teaching people how to grow more themselves is absolutely vital.

[Mikey]

Every year I make myself the same resolution, this year will be better. Whether that be better planned, tidier, more variety, increase space it takes different forms every year. This year I'm mostly hoping for a cold winter, to kill off the slugs, and give me a fighting chance.

[Thelma Sanders]

I must get organised to pot on or plant out stuff at the right time - rather than let things get rootbound!

[northepaul]

I just want to get better at GYO - I know its been a terrible year, but this has only heightened areas I lack knowledge in.
I also want to grow some new things - tomatillos particulary!

[PyreneesPlot]

I'd like to grow my own goose for Christmas. And maybe rabbits.

[Glutton4...]

My resolution, like every year, is not to make any resolutions. It's far less stressful that way, when everything goes pear-shaped!

[Andromeda]

Have a little more control when it comes to plant numbers, I always end up with far more than intended and I can't/won't throw good seedlings away.

[binley100]

not to be lulled into a false sense of security by good weather early on ........

[veggiechicken]

To sow little but often to keep up the continuity and as insurance against bad spells of weather and my own inadequacies!

[planetologist]

Get back to last year's crop diversity. So many things were eaten by the slugs, got blight or otherwise failed this year. There were a few things that didn't mind the weather, so I didn't actually have to buy any fruit or veg, but it was rather boring. Last year I ate about 80 edibles, including fruit, herbs and carbohydrates.

[Potstubsdustbins]

Carry on in the same 'some would say boring' old way, working with nature and not fighting it.

Use the vareities that prosper in our climate so as to ensure a harvest, along with a few exotica as a challenge.

Colin.

[BertieFox]

One moment it is cold, freezing and far too early to sow anything with success. A blink of the eye later and it is warm, the soil has dried out, and I've missed the sowing dates for onions and many other early crops. So my resolution is to make sure the plot is ready and prepared well before the growing season however unpleasant and cold it is, and to start sowing in batches from very early on. I always leave things in pots too long too, so my resolution is also to get stuff planted out as soon as possible.