Aubergine woes

[veggiewomble]

I've taken up all my planting troughs with aubergine plants and now regret it as I am really not sure how many aubs I'll end up with this year! Many of them are growing bigger and bigger, and one of them has enormous leaves but none are more than 6" tall. I sowed the seeds in May. Am I just being impatient? I haven't seen any flowers yet either. The plants are just producing more and more leaves - which are being eaten by some mysterious bug.

vw

[Cutecumber]

Very impatient!

Aubergines start slowly - if they're only two months old you are expecting too much for them to be in flower already.

May is quite late to sow crops like aubergines and tomatoes, but hopefully if we get our summer in the autumn, you should have enough time.

[queen of the cobs]

How big are the troughs you've sowed them into? I've sowed quite a few aubergines this year and they've all ended up in different sized pots, but the only one that has flowers so far is the one in the 12" pot. Perhaps it's a little early still as well, especially with the lack of sun?

[Flummery]

Oddly enough, queen of the cobs, I've got mine in pots from 12" down to about 6". It's the ones in the smaller pots that have the flowers. Stranger than fiction as the telly programme of my youth would have it! They're only in the small pots because I've run out of compost - till I can get the family driver to pick me some up! Maybe I ought to leave them?

[Alice]

I think you'll need to have a bit more patience Veggiewomble if they were only planted in May. Mine are making aubergines now, but they were planted in February and March. Yours should catch up quickly if we get a bit of sunshine. That's what we all need now.

[dexterdoglancashire]

I've got one plant as a trial this year for the first time. Would it be worth putting a cloche over it to try to speed things up? Bernie

[Flummery]

It would do better under glass DDL - is it in a greenhouse already? If it's outside a cloche would help - they're fairly exotic (Like us eh?)

Mine were sown in April and are only just showing flower buds. Patience - the hardest word!

[FoxHillGardener]

Mine are still tiny, too, with not a hint of a flower at all. They've been out in the plastic greenhouse for ages and not done anything apart from get nibbled by slugs and snails.

Reading through this makes me think I'm just being impatient. This is my first attempt at them from seed - last year I bought a plant so of course it was much bigger by this time, also I suppose the hot summer last year was much more to their liking than all this rain.

Let's hope we get some decent weather eventually!

[Wossername]

I planted some in February which went into a growbag in the greenhouse, they have flowered but no fruit they are weak and pathetic looking too. I planted another batch in April and have potted these on into 12" pots, these are now quite large plants approx 2' tall with an abundance of floweres on each. I have been quite fastidious with them though, watering little and often and misting them every other day to keep them humid, but leaving the window and door on the greenhouse open a fraction to allow a draft so as to avoid them getting too wet and suffering from mould or the like.

Good luck with yours, I am sure that they will come on nicely once the summer arrives.