Do you find it hard to be a "ruthless" vegetable grower?

[Primrose]

I wonder if anybody else is like me? My courgette plants are coated with mildrew yet still producing, and we have a vegetable tray in the fridge filled with the darned things which we are having difficulty eating our way through. To be honest, we're all "courgetted out" in this house and yet while my plants are still producing fruit, I simply cannot bring myself to rip them up and consign them to the compost heap.
Does anybody else hang on to get the very last courgette/tomato/bean out of their plants or do you sacrifice the last few fruits so you can start on clearing up your plot?

[The Mouse]

I have the same problem, Primrose!

That is why I was (not-so-) secretly pleased when my runner beans got blown over in the wind a few weeks ago - I really had no choice other than to rip them out and put them on the compost heap, did I!

Meanwhile, those courgettes just keep coming! Maybe I should get someone to 'accidentally' trample on them.

[glallotments]

Guilty of the same problem.

[Catherine]

I will be so disappointed when my courgettes stop producing. We have still got quite a few on the plant but I have to say that they are looking really sick I dont have the guts to pull them out.

In my polytunnel my three cucumber plants (given to me by a friend) are still producing fruit. They have to be the best producing plants in the pt we have ever had but again they are very sick with mould.

We have just dug up our carrots and put them in the pt to dry before putting them in dry compost for the winter, we weren't too successful keeping them last year as they started to sprout.

[PLUMPUDDING]

I find myself apologising to plants that are long past their best when I eventually consign them to the compost heap. I don't think anyone has heard me!

[Nature's Babe]

Guilty too, how can I uproot that courgette when there are still 8 bright golden baby courgettes on it ! Maybe next year I will have a stall at the gate. Its the same with seedlings always too many ! Have you noticed thjis seems to be a woman thing -

[alan refail]

Have you noticed thjis seems to be a woman thing -

Yes I had noticed that - but was far too polite to comment

[Geoff]

The problem starts much earlier than harvesting. What about those poor little spare seedlings that never did anybody any harm, why should they be composted?

[Nature's Babe]

You the ruthless type then Allen? How can you be so heartless -

[alan refail]

You the ruthless type then Allen? How can you be so heartless -

Yes. In any case the spare courgettes/marrows, cabbages, tomatoes, salads etc go straight to the hens. So I suppose we don't waste much.

[Nature's Babe]

Mine enjoy the same, the ducks love chopped lettuce and tomatoes
and any stale bread chopped up in water, and of course any slugs and snails.
The chickens love all veg and fruit and greens, especially sweetcorn and the seeds of things, commercial pellets come way down on their list of favourites !

[Catherine]

I threw some nasturtium seedlings into the compost which seemed to have failed to germinate. Imagine my suprise when I got the best naturtium plant I have ever managed to grow now growing in the compost, huge with many flowers which are still growing now. I dont think I will ever do that again. But it does make my compost bin look very attractive.

[Primrose]

Yes, I too have lots of nasturtiums in the garden this year - all self sown. The seeds survived our terrible winter, often just resting on the surface of the soil in sub zero temperatures and under a carpet of snow & frost. . I don't think I'll bother to save any seeds this year - just let them fall and fend for themselves.

[Beryl]

My excuse for taking plants out this time of the year is our lottie stall at the Michaelmas Fayre which is next Saturday. Anything that is saleable is taken off then the plants are consigned the the compost heap. Leaving just the winter crops such as sprouts cabbage leeks etc. and the roots.
I do like like to get the vacant soil well manured before the bad weather sets in.

Beryl.

[Nature's Babe]

Marigolds and foxgloves do the same Primrose,, they survive weeks of snow
and bounce back the nextyear. I have hundreds of foxglove seedlings, maybe I will pot some up and do a bit of guerrilla gardening around the village.