Thank you - I`ll be careful and risk it next year but I might have to look at my planting plans more carefully in future.

No Tony, I didn`t know what the main problem was. That`s the trouble with rules sometimes. The 'why' isn`t always obvious.
So thanks - I`ve had no blight at all but I`ll take extra care to get every tiny tuber out of the ground in the bit of the plot that`s overlapping.

I do try with crop rotation - not always successfully by the book. However, I have a problem with potatoes. Over a third of my plot is taken up with potatoes and a third with legumes, brassicas, onions/leeks etc and the rest with the permanent beds - strawberries, other fruit and asparagus. This mak...

Thank you Mike. They`re all in now and I`ll look forward to them whenever they arrive.

Oh yes - I never thought of that. Thanks for your advice!

I posted this in the 'seed potato' thread but perhaps it would be better here. My seed potatoes have only just been delivered and I `ve put them to chit. The chap on 'Gardeners` World' said they should be going in now but they haven`t really sprouted yet. Is it best to chit and be a bit late or put ...

My husband bought me one of those 'backsaver' spades with a spring that flings the soil forward.
I was very dubious but it`s been great! I can dig 5 or 6 rows with no back pain at all - with my ordinary spade I can`t do more than one row.
Big success!

My seed potatoes have only just been delivered and I`ve put them to chit. Is it best to plant them early even if the sprouts are undeveloped or leave them for a week or so when they`re bigger?
(Lady Christl & RedDuke of York)

Just what I was thinking. My runner beans were started in root trainers and because of the dry weather (!) and various other reasons were etiolated, leggy and feeble looking when I eventually planted them out. I tied the poor things to canes to stop them from just falling down and hoped for the best...

I`ve grown swiss chard for the first time - the kind with different coloured stems.
Now I don`t know how to cook it!
And do I cook it on the principle that 'young is best' or 'let it mature'.
As you can see, I haven`t a clue.
Help!

Hmmm - worth a try, eh? For the cost of a stamp.

Talking of Christmas -- well, why not? Clearing out a drawer I found an Argos gift card that a cousin sent me the Christmas before last but I mislaid it. When I tried to spend it at the weekend the assistant said that it had expired! Expired! How can that be? He gave Argos twenty quid to pre-pay any...

I`m not an expert but this does seem a very small number of eggs from 15 healthy hens. I only have two but I`m getting about ten a week from them. Is the run and nest box absolutely secure? Nothing can get in and steal them? They`re not laying in the run somewhere are they? One of mine started to la...

And the starry eyed new plot holder on our site who chirped, "Why don`t we get together one day and get rid of all the bindweed on our plots at the same time so we`d be shot of it forever."
Yeah, right.
Bless her.

I`ll be an ALLIGATOR!
Not fair! Not cute and furry!
Not even a mammal but a cold blooded reptile!
Somewhere in my youth and childhood I must have done something bad!