Kitchen Garden Forum

Everyone's gardens look so lush and fine, mine looks bare & sad with everything struggling in this 'Great British Bake Off'. Here's a few pics, could do a before & after, mine before everyone else's after. Too much soil showing considering it's the time of the year when the potato foliage should cover the whole bed. Hey Ho! They may be smaller but at least I'm getting some crops of a sort!





Happy with the grapes - I've have never had any this size, even when fully ripe - either the vine maturing or the hours of reading & watching videos, feeding, watering etc.!

OK! I purposefully rotated the pics as always forget & give you neck ache - thanks KG for fixing that btw but I've given everyone neck ache again as no communication to say it was all cool!

I use it instead of Yoga exercises Westi…….

Lovely colours Westi. Your new tunnel looks good and your grapes are a lot bigger than mine. Will have to water them again.

I think I might have over done the Butternut Squashes, back from a couple of weeks away and the triffids have taken over half the greenhouse.

Tomatoes look good too! Always the same when you go away on holiday. You always come back to a jungle but hopefully you have some good fruit forming.

Thank you Primrose, those nearest are Supersweet 100, I really like those

The Sweetcorn must be around 8 or 9 feet tall, I notice a ridge cucumber has crawled through too.

Despite the heat (not as hot as doon sooth mind) and a two week holiday away, the greenhouse is earning it's keep again.

Your sweetcorn are huge Tiger, what variety are they?

Suttons F1 Sundance, Plumpudding, quite light coloured but nice and juicy.

How do you know when sweetcorn is ready?

Testing for ripeness is quite easy, when the husks have filled out and the tassels have turned brown, peel back the husk and press your thumbnail into the cob and if a milky liquid comes out they are ripe if it is clear leave them a bit longer.

Thanks Plumpudding

My favourite variety was Lark. It is a medium sweet, quite short fast ripening one, but for the last three years I've grown an open pollinated one from Real Seeds called Special Swiss Sweetcorn. It is sweet but not too much and you can save your own seeds as they come true.
They are a bit taller than Lark and have medium sized cobs. I only grow one variety at a time so know they haven't cross pollinated with anything else, although a lot of the hybrid varieties are infertile anyway.

I grew Lark and F1 Swift last year, both very nice.