This is what I would do . . . . wash the soil off the roots and cut them back by 1/2. Cut the blades back by 1/3. Drive a thick dibber into the ground and wiggle (the dibber that is) extract the dibber and insert the leek. Water down the hole. I have no doupt others will disagree. Cheers, Tony.

I use "Slug Clear" a liquid concentrate. Diluted and watered onto the soil so I don't have to wait for the divvils to eat a blue pellet, it sinks into the soil and gets them there. Safe for pets and wildlife too.

Cheers, Tony.

Different spuds take different lengths of time to 'mature'. Normally wait untill the flowers die off, sometimes all the foliage.

You could have a sly delve and feel what they are like underground.

Cheers, Tony,

Pinch out the tops before the blackfly descend and start sucking all the juices out of your plants. I would pinch them out anyway as you don't know when the little divvels will arrive. I don't think it affects the yeald too much as the flowers should be pollinated and well on their way to producing ...

Personally. . . .I'm doing naff all.



Cheers, Tony.

Picked up a bag of "Gourmet Merchant" (I think) black, brown, red and white rice. Very very tasty, now we cannot remember where we got it and cannot find a stockist!

Typical. . . Cheers, Tony.

The larva hang upside down from the surface tension (or skin) of the water leaving a breathing tube above, adding a few drops of washing up liquid will break this skin and the larva will sink and be unable to breath. That is for the future. This year I should get a kid's fishing net (or the foot off...

I would tend to leave them there. But watch at night and see if they set off on a forage, if so you know what to do. Cheers, Tony.

None that I know of. The leaves will keep on growing for some while. Cheers, Tony.

Our Nero de Toscana is ignored by whitefly and cabbage whites. Cheers, Tony.

Shhhhhh don't tell everyone, the wax on the wax discs melts and forms an airtight barrier on the top of the gloop. Cheers, Tony.

I have no doupt your gentleman aquaintance is correct. Quite a few 'Old gardener's tales, were based on fact. A lot were arrived at through a lack of spare cash to keep the garden Centres growing 'like Topsy'.

Cheers, Tony.

Whenever the slugs and snails get too much, I apply a water soluable zapper liquid to sink into the ground and get the beggers at home. Cheers, Tony.

" I always assumed that this term did not refer to moulding in the sense of forming a shaped ridge. Rather mould in the older English sense of earth. In which case Pádraig's "mowding" was my "earthing". The bit that does (most) of the work by turning the soil over on a ploug...

And you say you are on your third? ! ? ! Takes a while to sink in. The 'management' thought these would be good airlines in the workshop, they lasted ten minutes before being slung in the skip.

Management = lighthouse in the desert, brilliant but bleedin' useless.

Cheers, Tony.