Grow and cook your own revolution with, 'Rocket Gardens'.

[Ricard with an H]

I haven't been to their website, I saw this advert on the back of a Jamie Oliver magazine supplement, these are their headlines.

"We send you a box of baby organic plants so you can create your own instant kitchen garden"

"No gardening experience required"


If someone supplied me with a box of baby plants and they turned up unexpected, on a whim or fancy I think I would have a lot of hard work in front of me and even my few three years experience would be a great benefit.

I'm not suggesting this is a scam, artistic-licence has increased over the years as our resources to legal solutions diminishes.

What do you think ?

http://www.rocketgardens.co.uk

[Westi]

Saw that as well - I think people are going to be disappointed as they will truly think it is instant!

Westi

[Ricard with an H]

I discussed this with my partner last night, she was adamant that any encouragement to get people growing stuff is positive, she also pointed out that not everyone needed to go to the lengths I went to to create a kitchen garden.

Her view was that a number of grow bags and large pots together with small areas already used for flower growing could end up in a kitchen garden.

I'm afraid we agreed to differ, I don't see a few grow bags and a couple of pots as anything more than a decorative attempt towards an illusion. For herbs and flowers yes, six cabbages will take up a lot of space and with no experience you'll loose them to creatures who love cabbages. I just had little gem pulled out of the ground by the wind, yesterday I learnt that little gem lettuce has a root just like a cabbage. After three years and the support of this forum I feel confident to move in the right direction and slowly make less mistake, I am bordering on obsessive. I put a lot of work into the soil and protection so I don't loose stuff.

And finally, buying plants is very expensive compared to sowing a few seeds and loosing them down to inexperience though I agree that having plants rather than having to raise from seeds cuts a lot of problems out of the process.

Advertising this as a "grow your own revolution" and "no experience needed" is an absolute nonsense, vegetable plants have been available for years. (Example) Last year, because I hadn't sown seed I paid £1 for four cabbage plants two of which were eaten by slugs within a day. This year I bought seed from Aldi, 39 pence for a packet of seed and two sprinklings of seed have given me fifteen plants. There is possibly enough seed in that packet to keep me going for three years or more if the seed remains viable.

NOTE TO SELF.

Richard, you don't need to sow the whole packet of any seeds.

[Primrose]

I agree, although everybody has to start somewhere and most humble beginners start with garden centre seedlings at inflated cost until perhaps they start with a packet of lettuce seed or something similar and gradually grow in confidence at starting from scratch and realise it works out a lot cheaper. There will always be those who don,t have the time or patience to sow from seed, or who only want a few token plants for a small area.
I personally sow all my vegetables from seed now although until this year I always bought in parsley which I had no luck germinating. This year it has germinated for me but the packet said Curley parsley and it has turned of to be Flat leaved parsley which I'm a bit miffed about so I will still have to buy in some as it's probably getting too late now to resow.

[Ricard with an H]

Seems I've been very lucky with parsley for two years running, the one I have was from Lidle, it was seed tape of an Italian giant leaved parsley that whilst slow to germinate did germinate and I have four strong plants from a dozen seedlings.

I actually threw seedling away this time because from last years experience this parsley grows big and tasty. Four plants would need a large pot each or about eighteen inches between which is a six foot row and they need easily eighteen inches in width.

But back to this nonsense about "rocket gardens" and no experience. These people are trading on other peoples vulnerabilities. It's very cathartic to grow your own but at the risk of exaggerating in the opposite direction gardening is closer to a science than it is to just bunging a few plants into what looks like soil.

Even buying compost is an art form and don't we all know that we can end up with a bag of rubbish littered with plastic and bits of glass that hardly sustains growth.

Sorry, I'm on a rant here and expecting an audience. I'll get my coat.

[WestHamRon]

I discussed this with my partner last night, she was adamant that any encouragement to get people growing stuff is positive, she also pointed out that not everyone needed to go to the lengths I went to to create a kitchen garden.

Her view was that a number of grow bags and large pots together with small areas already used for flower growing could end up in a kitchen garden.

I'm afraid we agreed to differ, I don't see a few grow bags and a couple of pots as anything more than a decorative attempt towards an illusion. For herbs and flowers yes, six cabbages will take up a lot of space and with no experience you'll loose them to creatures who love cabbages. I just had little gem pulled out of the ground by the wind, yesterday I learnt that little gem lettuce has a root just like a cabbage. After three years and the support of this forum I feel confident to move in the right direction and slowly make less mistake, I am bordering on obsessive. I put a lot of work into the soil and protection so I don't loose stuff.

And finally, buying plants is very expensive compared to sowing a few seeds and loosing them down to inexperience though I agree that having plants rather than having to raise from seeds cuts a lot of problems out of the process.

Advertising this as a "grow your own revolution" and "no experience needed" is an absolute nonsense, vegetable plants have been available for years. (Example) Last year, because I hadn't sown seed I paid £1 for four cabbage plants two of which were eaten by slugs within a day. This year I bought seed from Aldi, 39 pence for a packet of seed and two sprinklings of seed have given me fifteen plants. There is possibly enough seed in that packet to keep me going for three years or more if the seed remains viable.

NOTE TO SELF.

Richard, you don't need to sow the whole packet of any seeds.

I agree with your partner and so should you for an easy life.
I got into growing veg by my wife showing me how to grow potatoes, tomatoes,french beans and courgettes all in pots and grow bags.
Since when have cabbages been part of a kitchen garden?

[Ricard with an H]

I agree with your partner and so should you for an easy life.

Oh-yes, very sound advise. And it was her that encouraged me but she encouraged me at the level you started. I threw myself in at the deep-end.

Since when have cabbages been part of a kitchen garden?

Have I made a massive mistake ? I love cabbages but they are ungainly and take up a lot of space considering their cost in a shop, and, this is possibly my imagination but my home-grown cabbages taste better than store-bought. Raised on cow-poo and no insecticides or other dodgy stuff.

Yes, cabbages are for a kitchen garden but only if you have lots of space and you enjoy cabbage.

Ron, have you been affected by dinner-lady-cabbage ?

[Geoff]

That's what I'm doing wrong - I've got 5 varieties of Cabbage on the go. Not to mention 3 varieties of Sprouts, 3 varieties of Cauliflower, 3 varieties of Calabrese, 3 varieties of Kale and 5 varieties of Broccoli.

[Ricard with an H]

That is fantastic Geoff.

And I do know it's a lot of hard work together with skills gained from making mistakes and learning from others.

I'm also growing that long-thin Italian dark green cabbage this year, the seed should arrive this week and hopefully it won't take too long to germinate.

Oh-yes, and I will be judicious about the amount of seed I sow, to many cabbages means a lot of farting for some people but I can live on the stuff.

Fried cabbage, drizzle of oil, garlic, bit of pepper or jallapenos. Mix in with some spaghetti and a little grated cheese just enough to go with the pepper. Lovely.

[WestHamRon]

I agree with your partner and so should you for an easy life.

Oh-yes, very sound advise. And it was her that encouraged me but she encouraged me at the level you started. I threw myself in at the deep-end.

Since when have cabbages been part of a kitchen garden?

Have I made a massive mistake ? I love cabbages but they are ungainly and take up a lot of space considering their cost in a shop, and, this is possibly my imagination but my home-grown cabbages taste better than store-bought. Raised on cow-poo and no insecticides or other dodgy stuff.

Yes, cabbages are for a kitchen garden but only if you have lots of space and you enjoy cabbage.

Ron, have you been affected by dinner-lady-cabbage ?

That was my point. A kitchen garden doesn't really have the space.
Maybe I'm wrong, but I always consider a kitchen garden as something quite small, mainly herbs, toms, beans but not large plants like the brassicas, pototoes, squashes. They go into the veg part of the normal garden.
Dinner Lady cabbage was replicated by my Mother, but I soon learned how to cook it for myself.

[Ricard with an H]

Dinner Lady cabbage was replicated by my Mother, but I soon learned how to cook it for myself.

O.M.G. No escape for a few years then.

My lady won't eat cabbage, she gets flash-backs to dinner-lady cabbage and possibly her mother replicating the stuff as was the case with you.

At home as a child I used to get sausage meat rolled in cabbage leaves then the whole lot tied up with string that got into your teeth. I think it was a Polish?German concoction. Very tasty, but the string............