I thought I'd quickly try to explain the difference between open pollinated and F1 seeds this week as I was asked about it twice over the last few days. There seems to be some confusion between F1 ... Read more

Pricking out tomato and chilli seedlings This week I have started pricking out and potting on my tomato seedlings, you can see the tomatoes happily growing away in the photo above. There are a coupl ... Read more

I can't believe I am already writing about the vegetable garden in August, where has all that time gone? I don't know what the weather is like where you are but we are seeing cooler, showery days whi ... Read more

What kinds of things can you do in the garden at this time of year. It’s not quite Spring after all? Well, no, we’ve still a long way to go before we get to Spring. This time of year is really a ... Read more

I took a few photos while the sun was out at the weekend which I might as well show you. Above you can see the beds covered in seaweed which has started to rot down. It starts off a mustard brown col ... Read more

This recipe comes comes courtesy of the very generous Domini Kemp (on the right) who has given us access to her recipe book. I'm off bread because I can't sleep (doesn't make any difference) but the ... Read more

What is Meant By Organic Gardening? You will no doubt often hear the term organic gardening or ‘gardening naturally’. What it actually means - or how strict the definition is - can be dif ... Read more

When you’re just starting on your food-growing journey, it’s probably best to be a little selective about what you’re planning to grow. There are some food crops that can prove to be surprising ... Read more

I have two books which are my vegetable growing bibles. One is Joy Larkcom's 'Grow Your Own Vegetables' and the other is 'Organic Gardening - The Natural No-Dig Way' by Charles Dowding. Both are f ... Read more

Here begins Part 2 of our guide to vegetable harvesting, going in neat alphabetical order. Knowing when to harvest can be just as important in its own way as growing, tending to plants, irrigation ... Read more

If you don't have a patch of soil to grow in then clearly you will have to grow your vegetables in a container of some sort. A container grown urban garden adds life to your balcony or back yard a ... Read more

As we move towards the beginning of May, things really start to move in the vegetable garden. Up until this point there have been very few seeds we can sow outside or seedlings we can plant out but t ... Read more

Raised bed vegetable garden plan.I include my 2016 vegetable garden plan below if anyone is interested in what I'll be growing next year. My garden is now split up into long raised beds with gravel ... Read more

As you know, September is about the final act in the vegetable garden when we harvest many of our crops and prepare the soil for winter. This week I have had a quick run around the garden to check in ... Read more

Brace yourselves folks, we are now entering the busiest time of year in the vegetable garden. The soil has warmed sufficiently for sowing and planting out but has also warmed enough for weeds and gra ... Read more

If you were alive 144 million years ago, you wouldn't need to worry about providing winter food for wild birds because you would have been on the menu yourself. It might be hard to believe w ... Read more

Right, well it's started to get a bit cold and the leaves are falling so I suppose we will have to admit that winter is coming. I have mentioned it here before that I am not a winter fan. This ... Read more

The end of March and early April is approaching prime seed sowing time if we are starting indoors in seed trays or pots (for planting outside in May). I think we covered timing already but, a ... Read more

Small Garden Ideas Vegetable growing should be available to anyone even if you have have a very small urban garden or no garden at all. Small urban gardens can be just as productive as larger suburb ... Read more

You don’t need a massive garden to grow delicious vegetables. Many vegetables can be grown in planters, buckets or bags with great results. Here is our top ten list of trouble-free container frien ... Read more

You may remember some of the vibrant looking photos from my vegetable garden in the Summer with its neat (ish) rows of healthy crops and tidy weeded paths? Well, it looks nothing like that now. I a ... Read more

Well, here we go again, another new year and another new season beginning in the vegetable garden! I really do love the fresh start a new season brings. Past blunders are forgotten and a fabulous new ... Read more

Depending on your location early potatoes are planted in mid March once the days begin to warm. To be fair, the soil is probably warm enough to plant now in most gardens but what you need to be ca ... Read more

Hi folks, I hope you all had a good Easter break. I don't know what the weather has been like for you but we have had a very pleasant few days with warm sunshine and a definite whiff of Spring. While ... Read more

Recommended Varieties: Hispi F1 Where to grow: Cabbage needs a fertile moisture retentive soil with good drainage. The cabbages will remain in the ground through the Winter so in wet a ... Read more

.Buying plug plants is the key to easy vegetable growing as veg seedlings already started cut out a lot of the tricky stuff that can put off a novice grower. New gardeners who haven't tried vegeta ... Read more

I am excited about this week's post because I am covering one of my favourite subjects, fermented food. To be fair, I am a lot better at eating it than making it but all that is going to change now I ... Read more

Square Foot Gardening is an easy to understand method of planting vegetables which splits a gardeners plot into square foot areas rather than into rows. This system is especially good for beginners a ... Read more