I've never done so well for things grown under glass as I have this year.
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| Chilli peppers lining the long shelf in the greenhouse |
Everything is growing like mad and I think it's down to a combination of things (obviously the second greenhouse helps as well) -
A glorious summer - the sunshine has been great for everything in the garden and it's helped all the pollinating insects as well.
A glorious summer - the sunshine has been great for everything in the garden and it's helped all the pollinating insects as well.
The potting mix seems to be working really well, I did plant a few tomatoes in just compost and they seem to dry out much faster than the others. A mix of soil, compost, blood fish and bone, wood ash and chicken mature pellets seems to be the way forward. In fact it's cheaper than just compost!
The size of my pots - the buckets seem to be a great way of growing things, they hold so much more water, I only water once a day and they never really dry out, hopefully they should last a good few years and stack together for easy storage over winter.
My tomato food - I've been alternating between nettle tea and comfrey tea. Feeding them much more often than I would of if I was buying it, everything seems to be growing like crazy. I plan to plant a large area of comfrey soon - I've got about 20 plants ready to be planted out. Free, organic plant food is the way forward, everyone should try it!
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| A wall of tomatoes - 18 plants in all |
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| Different shapes and sizes - all taste amazing! |
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| Cucumbers, melons, and cucucmelons in the smaller greenhouse |
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| Sweet peppers in the small greenhouse |
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| My first ever melon - should I support it? |
I'd like to change my smaller 8ft x 6ft greenhouse for a bigger one as well next year but I've probably got jobs that are more important to take care of!
How is everyone else's greenhouses doing?
Nice indeed. My composter has been working full time all Summer. I need a green house like yours.
ReplyDeleteI've got two now and it's made everything so much easier! I think I could do with changing my small one for another bigger one then that would be about right for what I try to grow to feed us.
DeleteIn Australia we don't need green houses as much - I so admire the English for deciding, 'Well I am going to grow this thing that grows in hot places anyway!' I have a small hot house now to nuture seedlings in winter, than I change the cover in summer and it becomes a shade house. This Winter I grew one tomato plant and it took the whole of Winter to grow tomatoes.Do you use some kind of heating in your hot house over winter?
ReplyDeleteI think it makes us want to grow it more if we know its difficult! No need for shade houses here though - some people do shade their greenhouses over here but I've never seen the need for it. No heatng for ours - it would be too expensive for me to run it!
Deleteraid the good ladies tights and support your melon, its a sad moment when you go in there to find it has pulled the plant down and smashed.
ReplyDeleteYour greenhouses look very productive, mine is looking very empty but I hope to rectify that with some winter growing.
I found a net from some oranges so I using that instead. It would be a shame if I don;t get to try my first propper melon!
Deletei'm with Dawn above and i tend to support anything that is heavy like your melon. your greenhouse is doing amazing - good for you! i don't know if you have read far back enough on our blog but we grow stuff in tires, in raised beds and in my fantabulous greenhouse that my hubby built out of windows that he had been scavenging out of other people's garbages for the past 3 years. our greenhouse is 8 X 20ft and is built out of scrap wood and old windows that people have thrown out. he is a garbage collector extraordinnaire! anyway, we have tomatoes growing in tires with cages around them that are wrapped in plastic - we wrap them in plastic because we get heavy winds here. it looks like we will have an abundance of tomatoes this year - woohoo! but everything in your greenhouse looks fantastic! i congratulate you on all of your hard work and the pay off that you will receive because of it. good job!
ReplyDeleteyour friend,
kymber
I saw yours on some pictures in the distance - it looks great! And anything free is always better. I picked this up off ebay but it still cost £200 but far cheaper than a new one.
DeleteIt all looks excellent - well done :)
ReplyDeleteRegarding the melon - do you know that the Chinese are growing melons in square boxes - so that the melon grows square and will fit on the fridge shelf and not roll round ;)
I think that is crazy! But at least it's not having it's genetics altered!
DeleteI had to leave my greenhouses behind when I moved but am having a piece of garden leveled soon to put one on. I have missed them so much, I have 2 peppers on the dining room windowsill and 2 cherry toms in a little plastic grow house outside. That will go into to greenhouse for over wintering a few plants.
ReplyDeleteI'd be lost without mine! So important for starting seeds in and for tomatoes!
DeleteVery nice, it will be great for starting plants next spring.
ReplyDeleteYeah, that big shelf in the big greenhouse is so useful, it'll be full of pots in the spring.
DeleteA very envious non greenhouse owner here Kev, looks like you've done yourself proud.
ReplyDeleteCheers John - maybe you could get one for the allotment one day? If you ever get one you will wonder how you ever managed without.
DeleteWorth all that effort from your Dad and yourself! A big step towards being more self sufficient.
ReplyDeleteYeah - Big thanks to my dad, I don't think I would have got it finished in time without him! I must give him some more tomatoes!
DeleteOh wow! Can't wait to get our poly tunnels. We might then be able to harvest a decent crop of tomatoes! And get a good start on the growing season! And be somewhere we can hide out in when it rains!
ReplyDeleteA poly tunnel would be great then you can have really early crops of things like carrots and potatoes. I did a tree pruning course once and when it rained we had the class in the poly tunnel where it was nice and dry and warm!
DeleteLooks great, I am still struggling with leaf yellowing on my tomatoes, tried calcium, and magnesium supplement but it does not seem to be improving. There haven't been many bees around this year so hardly any pollination taking place.
ReplyDeleteMine started to go yellow at one point so I gave them loads of the nettle tea food that I made up and it seemed to stop it. If you tap the flowers a few times you can make them set themselves rather than having the bees do it.
DeleteYou should patent that potting mix recipe, Kev. It sounds like A John Innes number 3 compost.
ReplyDeleteIt seems to be a good mix. I even did a few different ones to see which was best - the more food the better with tomatoes.
DeleteWe'd love a greenhouse...and if it looked like yours...WOW!!!
ReplyDeleteJane x
You guys should get one - being vegan I should imagine that having fresh veg is even more important to you and this would enable you to have it for longer periods of time.
DeleteI'm so jealous!! looks divine x
ReplyDeleteI like yours with the chickens in! Although mine did live in the greenhouse last winter for a few months when I first got them and they had no feathers!
Delete~Thanks - have you managed to grow much this year?
ReplyDeleteI'm very impressed ....... and slightly green with envy. Well done.
ReplyDeleteI'm sure I'll be green with envy when you get your poly tunnel up!
DeleteWow, your tomatoes look amazing. I have a bumper crop this year, only problem is that 3/4 of them have blossom end rot!! From what I've read I think I 'killed them with kindness'-too much fertilizer. Our radio garden guru said you should fertilize your tomatoes, quarter strength, every day! I think that maybe that was too much.
ReplyDeleteSome grocery stores here have brought in the square watermelons from Japan. They are selling for $90.00 each!! The tv station bought one and cut it open to see how it tasted. They said it was very disappointing-tasteless. The store had sold several!! I saw a couple at the farmers market.
they weren't for sale, just for show.
$90! that is mad! it would have to have $88 in change inside for me to buy it!
DeleteI feed my tomatoes every other or every third day. End rot is normally cause from irregular watering or having pots that don't hold enough water. If the soil drys out between waterings then thats when the rot strikes in my experience.