how do

[Nate]

wotcha

not really done any gardening other than cutting the grass since i left home, mainly due to not living anywhere with garden i can grow stuff in. but this year i've moved in with my other half and taken over a "derelict" bit of the bottom of the garden which hasn't been used for anything other than burning hedge cuttings on for pushing 15 years.

we've had a mixed sucess. after clearing a patch roughly 12' square we got planting:

red and white cabbage -white got completely blitzed by slugs and catterpiddlers, but they don't seem quite as keen on the red

caulis - ready for picking and then went past it while i was ill for 2 weeks grr!

onions - red and white, but very few came up

leeks - thousands of the buggers!

courgettes - filling the freezer nicely

dwarf green beans - still going crazy and trying to climb the budlia

butternut squash and pumpkin - didn't realise quite how big these would get! they're slowly invading the lawn and seem to be fruiting quite well, although until they get a bit bigger i'm not sure which is which

tomatoes - plodding along in their growbag

chard - got a bit overgrown with cabbage, and now been discovered by the nibblers

purple sprouting - not sure where it's gone. it's somewhere behind the courgettes, but you can't see it or get to it now!

dwarf sweetcorn - neer grown it before, it's got purple hair

off to do a bit more picking now, so i'll take the camera with me

[DavidT]

Good evening Nate and welcome to the site. It sounds as if you are doing well for a first year. Well done.

[Lesley Jay]

Hi Nate, welcome to our forum!! Wow, you have done very well in your first season growing veg!

[Nate]

the nibblers really have had a feast on these



the reds have fared a bit better



i missed picking these from being ill and forgetting about them. i've left them in for the time being as a distraction. hopefully they'll get eaten instead of the reds! also handy rabbit food



onions on the right of the pick. reckon i've got about 2 dozen from 200 seeds. some went straight in the ground, some were started inside in trays. neither method seems to have done better. unlike the leeks (which really want thinning) so much so that we had to plant out the rest of them...



...over the other side of the garden. ah well, i love leeks



the squash, pumpkin and courgette. i think the instructions said plant 3 foot apart. 3 foot? but they're tiny little plants! well, they were at the time. the bit of box hedge they're growing over is nicely keeping the fruit off the floor away from the sluggies though







and fruit they have! the plants get well watered morning and night, even when it's raining, but that big pumpkin still looks like it isn't getting enough to me



i only bought these as they were in the same "6 pots for a fiver" as some of the others i got from the church fete, and there wasn't anything else i wanted, but they've taken so little looking after i think i might get a few more in next year. i originally thought the flowers would become the bit you eat, like on most plants, and was really suirprised when they started growing hair





although to be honest, i think it's more that i'm jealous that i don't have hair like that any more

[greengirl]

Hi Nate, sorry about the slug problem. Why not try scattering coppers (one and two pence bits) all around the bases? Could cost you a few pounds, but well worth it. Slug will NOT cross. I haven't tried it yet, as I have my courgettes in pots and hung from greenhouse to be safe from all but flying slugs.