How Does Your Garden Grow?

[Onoff]

@DAPPH irrespective of your lovely drawing I'm struggling to get what you mean!

"bent D shaped pieces of plastic thick WPM membrane & inserted one in each hole to make a cup/spout/ support".

What's "WPM" for a start?

I was thinking...cut round holes in the main barrel like you said then pop rivet, with a couple of penny washers, an upcycled plastic detergent, Coke, whatever style bottle or other plastic container just below the hole in the side of the barrel. I've tried to sketch it. Thinking the tapered neck would help secure the plant? Not sure how the plant would fare with the weight of soil above or whether the roots going down the neck of the bottle, would get enough nutrients?

 

[DAPPH]

WPM = water proof membrane,

Alu rivets through steel or stainless steel washers don't last long in wet soil , that's why I thought your idea of short lengths pipe ...... 3 -4 inches angled slices of down pipe in each hole sounded brilliant.

 

[DAPPH]

@DAPPH irrespective of your lovely drawing I'm struggling to get what you mean!

"bent D shaped pieces of plastic thick WPM membrane & inserted one in each hole to make a cup/spout/ support".

What's "WPM" for a start?

I was thinking...cut round holes in the main barrel like you said then pop rivet, with a couple of penny washers, an upcycled plastic detergent, Coke, whatever style bottle or other plastic container just below the hole in the side of the barrel. I've tried to sketch it. Thinking the tapered neck would help secure the plant? Not sure how the plant would fare with the weight of soil above or whether the roots going down the neck of the bottle, would get enough nutrients?

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Soil will easily wash out or if too dry dry avalanche out from above the cup

 

[brewdexta]

A few pics of the wife's polytunnel. She practises permaculture so predominantly organic, no pesticides or herbicides, loads of mulch, companion planting, home brewed fertilisers and all that malarkey. Seems to work, we are a few weeks behind southern uk as were northern and elevated but everything is growing like mad now.

 

[DAPPH]

A the small mammal farm I got fed up dragging a loaded hose pipe about in my polytunnels , so I tried commercial industrial drip watering at low pressure , it wasn't a great success .

When I came here 17 years ago I tried all manner of drip watering systems for the flower beds , veg beds & glasshouse . After several hundred £'s of failures I settled with Hozelock AC1 time clocks & adjustable microbore Antelco spray misting heads. Expensive but very reliable if fitted up correctly .

My glasshouse :- equipped with one visible overhead adjustable angle & spray micro misting head on a time clock set up , also a slack handful of umbilical micro misters on the same time clock &the split main water run piping. Some of the misting heads are inverted , using a 3d printed block set vertically on sticks to stick in tomato , cucumber , peppers , chili or egg plant tubs (using 300 mm long 5 mm carbon fibre rods made from the carbon fibre spring out of a dead pop up kiddies tend ... (Off Freecycle ).


The aluminium thing at the rear is a heat retainer / reflector pull down from out of a supermarket that was being refurbished & fitted with plexiglas doored cold & freezer cabinets .
It's a good reflector and also keeps the slow growing plants on the outside staging out of strong sun .


I've designed & 3 D printed the angle -able bracket bits that carry the overhead micro mister heads .
Had to wait two weeks for the special type 22 mm extra long cropped head alu bolts to arrive , to fit the holders to the aluminium channel of the glass house frame.

On the rest of the brackets I've used nylon nuts & bolts incase I ever need to undo them & I've cut off any excess thread.


If anyone is interested ........I'm happy to take & post some detailed close up's of the brackets & heamisting heads etc.

 

[DAPPH]

Today 21 may 2022 the great curbit sowing experiment has ended , proving conclusively it does not matter one iota which way you put your curbit seeds in , what does matter though is how wet & cold ( both weather & soil ) it is , which may affect the germination or cause the seeds to rot & fail , plus any little bugs , snails & slugs might have a feast on your prospective plants

Along the front left to right .....all sown within a few minutes of each other on the 9 May 2022 , using four year old self grown courgette seed stored in a small airtight container .
Extreme left ..pointy end down , left pointy end up second shoot is hiding behind the seed label , inner right laid totally flat on it's side ( firsts one to poke through ) extreme right sown on their edge pointy side to the left .



In the background in the orange plant pot several delicious large ( LIDL supermarket ) Pink Lady apple seeds that were air dried for a couple of month s, put in the freezer for four days or so then in the fridge for three days then sown in the pot on the 5th April 2022 . Out inthe garden I've also got two pairs in plant tubs sown a year apart . Which are 7 & 6 yrs old so ready this year for the big wide world .

 

[DanZac]

Thanks for the update on the Corgette seeds @DAPPH interesting conclusion, but makes sense. The seeds wouldn't all land up the same way in the wild, so it shouldn't make much difference which way up they get sown.

In the background in the orange plant pot several delicious large ( LIDL supermarket ) Pink Lady apple seeds

Do you think they will fruit and be true to type. I was under the impression that most fruit trees were grafted onto rootstock and not grown from seed?

 

[Onoff]

The seeds wouldn't all land up the same way in the wild, so it shouldn't make much difference which way up they get sown.

My 50 bean plants have grown at different rates though all planted at the same time in the same medium and all from the same packet. As of today 49/50.

Most are 4-6" high and need to go in I think. A few have only just broken through the soil.

I wonder if that's all to do with seed orientation when I planted them?

 

[Onoff]

Bloody hard graft this gardening lark! Trying to ring fence the beams with sleepers. Not sure how to do it as the site is on such a slope? Might have to go two high in places...

 

[DAPPH]

Thanks for the update on the Corgette seeds @DAPPH interesting conclusion, but makes sense. The seeds wouldn't all land up the same way in the wild, so it shouldn't make much difference which way up they get sown.

Do you think they will fruit and be true to type. I was under the impression that most fruit trees were grafted onto rootstock and not grown from seed?

It's a hobby gamble , the fruits if any will not be true to type they could be even better .
I gather that Pink Lady also need a different apple pollen to cross pollenate . . To this end I hope to be grafting two sicon's on each tree from a different type that flowers at the same time. ( Fingers crossed it works )

Rootstock selection is a multifaceted advantage , vigorous roots take a lot of goodness that can go to the apples so grafting on a small quality root stock keeps the tree size down yet usually give the same flavoured & attributed cloned fruit .
Putting a grafted bud or scion on a small root stock also means .... I think , that you can have many more trees per hectare if it is a smallish height one you'll also reduce the pruning & maintenance .

 

[DAPPH]

My 50 bean plants have grown at different rates though all planted at the same time in the same medium and all from the same packet. As of today 49/50.

Most are 4-6" high and need to go in I think. A few have only just broken through the soil.

I wonder if that's all to do with seed orientation when I planted them?

I suspect that it's a bit of that and the not having the same precise quality & quantity of soil & water , nutrients & anything that alters micro climate on the soil around each seed . ( lots of variables ) .

Mother nature is also quite clever , the seeds are likely evolved to come up a slightly different time so the first through get eaten by the bugs etc. which grow up and eat other things the plants remaining will grow harden & produce different pheromones that may mask the smell of the last through thus giving the species a better chance of surviving for thousands of years.

 

[DAPPH]

Bloody hard graft this gardening lark! Trying to ring fence the beams with sleepers. Not sure how to do it as the site is on such a slope? Might have to go two high in places...

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Don't use a strimmer near the turned /open ground , you get zillions of seeds & weed growth nodes thrown on the soil and they'll all to often take root .


One years weeds means seven years weeds .

 

[Onoff]

Don't use a strimmer

I rarely do. Vintage hand sickle with a handle on it my mate copied from the old one & turned up for me whilst I waited:

I've got the looks and the body but need a proper old fashioned scythe. At least I think that's what SWMBO meant when she said I could do with something bigger...

 

[Onoff]

Aside from the 50 Czar runners I've got going, I got some other runners and dwarf bean plants for my birthday along with some tom plants. Tbh the beans were well along and needed to go in. SWMBO found a couple of pots, canes and string as a temporary home.

Crack of dawn this morning I found one 'orrible grey slug! Soon flicked him off.

I'm trying a band of 9x1 copper on each pot tonight. Badly soldered into hoops and held on by duct tape whilst the CT1 sets!

 

[4String.]

The fruits of my labours today (bad pun intended ).

Tomatoes moved to their final home with some young kale plants to keep them company for a while:



Haven't used growbags before so time will tell, but the "halos" should make watering a sight easier. And there's room in front of the growbags for a few trays of low growing veggies .

And 4 french beans also in their final home, alongside the spares which will soon be off to a good home:

 

[roofman]

Worked on a lady's house 14 years ago and she had 6 big established Wisteria trees, i asked her for seeds off them and this is the result after waiting 6 years before it gave the 1st flower...heavy cut back each year and it just keeps giving, May being my favorite month of the year just because of the show this plant gives

 

[DAPPH]

I rarely do. Vintage hand sickle with a handle on it my mate copied from the old one & turned up for me whilst I waited:

View attachment 347451

I've got the looks and the body but need a proper old fashioned scythe. At least I think that's what SWMBO meant when she said I could do with something bigger...

View attachment 347452

Go and stand naked in front of a beehive & beat the hive soundly with a stick or whatever comes to hand , then ask the A&E doctor " Please take the pain away , but leave the swelling for my wife " .

Re scythe .
One of the new titanium or top grade duralumin pressed tube oval shafted lightweight scythes' is a lot better than the old fashioned heavy wooden ones with a grass nail as they are about 1/3 of the weight and can be had with a smaller 20 inch or so blade . Ideal for dyke banks , orchards and small areas of rough ground

For the farm back in 1989/90 I chose a standard sized super light weight scythe aircraft grade duralumin staith with a 30 inch fully tempered high carbon steel blade ... expensive ...
But to me well worth the £70 or so I paid for it all those years ago . When I got crippled in 1995 I gave it to our young neighbour s who had just started out small holding together , We last met up with them in 2015 , it was still in very good condition , being regularly used round fishing lakes & on their small holding .

Aside from the 50 Czar runners I've got going, I got some other runners and dwarf bean plants for my birthday along with some tom plants. Tbh the beans were well along and needed to go in. SWMBO found a couple of pots, canes and string as a temporary home.

Crack of dawn this morning I found one 'orrible grey slug! Soon flicked him off.

I'm trying a band of 9x1 copper on each pot tonight. Badly soldered into hoops and held on by duct tape whilst the CT1 sets!

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Never found copper any less than 2 " wide worked , if the tub sits on flat on concrete & there is a drain in the bottom microscopic baby slugs can get in the pot , grow inside the tub and have a slugfest on their 21 st day birthday along with their mates .

Re the width it could be that whilst crossing such a wide barrier they try to eat the copper with their digestive juices & thus die of copper poisoning I don't think the copper battery weak electric current theory holds water .

 

[DAPPH]

The fruits of my labours today (bad pun intended ).

Tomatoes moved to their final home with some young kale plants to keep them company for a while:

View attachment 347683

Haven't used growbags before so time will tell, but the "halos" should make watering a sight easier. And there's room in front of the growbags for a few trays of low growing veggies .

And 4 french beans also in their final home, alongside the spares which will soon be off to a good home:

View attachment 347684

Nice size for planting out plants , at that size unlikely to be chomped by slugs
Perhaps it's really down to fine hard pointed hairs on the stems ? or Chemical sugar level changes in the plant now it's emerged & producing chlorophyll but some plants still succumb to them .

 

[DAPPH]

Worked on a lady's house 14 years ago and she had 6 big established Wisteria trees, i asked her for seeds off them and this is the result after waiting 6 years before it gave the 1st flower...heavy cut back each year and it just keeps giving, May being my favorite month of the year just because of the show this plant gives

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Fantastic colour ........ That's given me something to strive & live for ... six years you say .. can I beg some seeds in a jiffy bag please ? Can PM you my address & compensate you .

 

[Onoff]

I'm still debating nematodes and their possible effect on the slow worms, frogs, toads etc.

Similarly whether I'll isolate any such fauna with this in effect, walled off area?