chilipepper's Journal

Busy time of year!!

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Well as the title says it is a busy time of year for us!! have planted up 28 bags of spuds so far!! have nearly finished potting on the toms, and we are about 1/3 of the way through potting on the onions, all the chillies and peppers are potted on and are looking good, also picked the first of the rhubarb last weekend, delicious!!! will put up a list of the tomato varieties when i get achance!!

Tomatoes

Tomatoes

As usual my discipline regarding the amount of varieties of toms i grow each year has gone out the window, again!!! i recevied a batch of 10 varieties from a friend in Poland, 3 of which id grown before, but i just had to try the other 7!!! so thats 32 varieties this year!! and thats definetly it for this year!!!!!!!!

Early Potatoes

Early Potatoes

Planted the first veriety of our early spuds today, Rocket, planted 6 bags, all our early spuds will be grown in bags, 30 bags in total....

First Lemon of the Year

First Lemon of the Year

We picked our first lemon of the year this weekend, it was put to good use with a bag of ice and a bottle of Gordons!!!!!

Compost bins

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I managed to get the compost heaps turned during the week and was delighted with the results!! all ingredients have composted down fully to give us plenty of compost for growing our tomatos and early spuds in!!

Jurga Help!!!!

Jurga Help!!!!

Hi Jurga, any chance you could translate the name of this one for me!!!

Getting ready for next month!

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Have planted all our garlic (Maro) in 3" pots in the greenhouse, 70 pots in total, and also have the Spuds chitting, 6 different varieties, earlies are, Rocket, Duke of York and Sharpes Express, 2nd earlies, Orla, and main crops Roosters and Pink Fir Apple, 180 tubers in total!!!

Pairie Fire

Pairie Fire

These are the first sown and so naturally the first seeds to germinate for me this year, i start these off a good month before everything else as they spend the whole season on the window sil!! they are a dwarf chili that grow to just 1ft in height so are ideal for the window sil, each plant produces loads and loads of half to three quater inch rich red chilies which are quiet hot and great to cook with! 

Tomatoes

Well who is growing what this year?? we grow heirlooms about a dozen or so types, plus each year we trial about 5 new varieties, if we find a new type that we like we add it to our portfolio! some years you can be luckier than others! last year we trialed 8 new varieties to us and found 2 really good ones! in total over the last few years we have grown well over a hundered different varieties and have a top 20 which we use as the base of each years crop! so tell us who growing what? and has any one any particular favorite, we would love to hear your views..........

Growing Mushrooms

Just another angle on this, these woodland mushrooms can be grown by means of drilling inpregnated dowls into hard wood logs, only thing is logs must be at least 1ft in diameter, so i would be looking for about 3 or 4 logs about 3ft to 4ft long and at least 1ft + in diameter, they must be hardwood also!! anybody any idea where i could get these, all info welcome!! just found out that the best type of wood for the shiitake is oak, beech, chestnut, hornbeam or hazel and the logs would be ok to be between 6" and 1ft in diameter, so 2ft to 3ft would be fine!!also freshly felled and diease free!!

Making Compost mix for growing Mushrooms

Was just wondering has anybody out there tried making up their own mix for growing mushrooms? dont really want to go down the road of buying one of those small kits as they are a bit on the small side and pricey for what you get!! have got a couple of instructions off the net regarding making up your own mix, and intend to do so and purchase my own mushroom spawn, just wondering has anybody experience of making their own mix??? all info welcome......

Onion seed sown

Hello all, Finished sowing onion seed in modules & planters, trying a few new varieties this year for the first time, the old reliables Sturon, Purpetta and White Lisbon are joined by Red Amposta, Sweet Spanish White, Long Red Florence,White Wax and Lilia, all are been started from seed with the intention of growing them to bulbs, the aim is to provide around 300 to 350 bulbs for storing and pickling

Plans for 2013

Hello all, its been a while!!! just dont seem to get the time to write journals anymore, cant believe its been last April since i put up a post!! well still as busy as ever with the gardens and orchard and have spent the last week making plans for the coming year, for those of you who are not to familiar with our main horticultural intrests, they are specifically in veg & fruit growing! predominately tomato and chili production! well, have made ourselves a promise to try get at least one decent post up a week so hope it goes better than last years effort!! anyway have the chili seed in since last week and hope to start the onion seed in moduals tonight, we have 8 different types to try this year! but thats another journal, good to be back on the site again and will post soon

regards Dave     ps.... Cant pull the wool over your eyes Jacinta, you wouldnt let me sneak back!! 

Full Steam Ahead With The Veg!!

Tomatoes

Hello all, well its full steam ahead with the veg now, the 1st early spuds are all showing now about 5" above the soil, Rhubarb is ready to be picked, have nearly finished lifting the winter leeks, the onions we planted last September are doing really well and will be ready for lifting in early May, the Winter garlic is doing nicely and will also be ready for lifting in May, this years seeds are also starting to show, we have 3 varieties of scallions, 2 of beetroot, carrots, kale, cabbage, 3 varieties of lettuce and various salad leaves all growing strongly, the peas, broad beans, onion sets and brussel sprouts are all now about 6" tall, the tomatoes, chillies and sweet peppers are all doing well and will be in their final pots around the middle of the month (will do a more detailed post on the toms later in the month) turned the compost heaps yesterday and filled 12 black bags with compost that in part will be used for the toms, chillies and peppers! also got the nemasys in for the vine wevil, slugs & ants!! so all on track, will do up another post on the fruit garden, this is the second year for most of the bushes, so we are expecting big things we have put a huge amount of work into this side of things in the last couple of years and its been really exciting to see it evolve.......     

Help needed to name tomatos!!!!!

Help needed to name tomatos!!!!!

Hello all, i bought about 8 pkts of tomato seed from Estonia early this year and i have managed to identify all bar 2 packets! i have taken a photo of the 2 packets and i think one is called "Crown Prince" and the other "Russian Giant" any help to identify which is which would be gratefully welcome, regards Dave..........