Planting Plan

[Westi]

Does anyone religiously follow their beginning of year planting plan, or like me does circumstances lead to a detour? Only the centre rows of my planting plan are correct, as on the left side my overwintered cabbage greens did not march on as expected but I am reaping huge cabbages now so was worth swapping the sweetcorn & runner beans and I had more potatoes then expected on the right so the root crops had to nudge up.

My winter plan also has had to be modified as well as found white onion rot where I planned to put the leeks, so a sneaky swap of those with the winter brassicas was needed - along with the extra compost & lime having to be dug in again for when they are ready to plant, but the leeks have a nice fertile bed to see them through the winter.

Westi

[robo]

I fell foul with the first thing I planted for some reason I planted about six rows of Pease down the middle of a raised bed I designated for salad planting, no matter what reason I keep telling myself why I did it I know I made a big mistake even though the Pease that where supposed to grow to around 18 inches high are now around 5 feet it was still my clock up

[Elaine]

My husband is obsessed with growing cauliflowers so the brassica bed always fills up, as he grows several different varieties to see us through the year. (I still have lots in the freezer and we give lots of them away to grateful family and friends)
Consequently, we end up with brassicas slotted in wherever there is space and the winter cabbages and sprouts end up being the only ones in the designated place.
Ken then grumbles next season when the said plants are in the way...and every year, I say "Shall we not grow so many caulis this year". And every year he agrees....then carries on as usual. huge sigh

It's a pride thing, I think, as so many fellow plot holders tell us cauliflowers won't grow in the soil on our site even though we have no problems at all. He loves it when somebody asks how he managed to grow so many beauties. He then gives them a lovely cauli, just to rub it in.

[Primrose]

I always have a planting plan but it's not very practical given the small size of the veg plot in my garden as I don't have enough space to plant or sow while the last winter kale, leeks and parsnips are waiting to be finished off. And the taller plants like peas shade the smaller crops too much for them to grow well u less they're at the far end of the plot where they don't shade out other lower plants.

I grow climbing beans and tomatoes in a border against a fence with some lower height crops like beetroot, kohl rsbi and lettuce in front of them and rotate these sriund each season but in the veg plot things don,t always move around as much as they should. I just try to add as much compost and manure as I can In hope that healthy soil will help deter the worst diseases.

Incidentally, some crops come with the recommendstion "grow on soil which has previously been manured for another crop". I don't really understand this as it means you effectively have to plan your growing schedule two years ahead. I believe you're not supposed to grow carrots and parsnips in freshly manured soil . I manure (usually the bagged stuff unfortunately as that' s usually all I can get hold of) the whole veg plot and things have to take their chance. We have very stoney soil which leaches moisture and nutrients at a rate of knots so I work on the principle that even the crops which are supposed not to like too much manure could do with a helping hand. i certainly don't notice any adverse effects from doing so.

I think you learn from experience and whilst you can never defeat nature, you can often get away with breaking lots of the commonly accepted rules.

[Elaine]

I agree with you regarding breaking some rules Primrose. We over-wintered Early Onward peas in the greenhouse this year and had a fabulous crop, ready in March.
We tried that because, the previous year, a couple of seeds must have made a bid for freedom and were growing amongst the cucumbers and I didn't find them until I took the cucumbers out. I thought they were Sweet Pea flowers and left them to see what they would do. To my amazement, they were Garden peas and we had lots of pods on them...not enough for a meal but certainly enough to snack on. This year we are putting them in both borders of the larger greenhouse, so we'll see how they go.

We also grew Spring Cabbages in there...wonderful. Beautiful clean plants with no slug damage at all.