brassed off with brassicas

[Doctor Deb]

I'm on ny 6th attempt to grow some brassicas, with the same outcome every time. In October, I tried to sow some spring cabbage to keep in the (slightly heated) green house and plant out late winter. They germinate well, develop into strong seedlings, survive transplantig then wither away just as the 2nd lot of leaves are emerging. I've retried in November, then again in January, and am on my third lot since mid Feb! I've used up whole packets of spring cabbage, broccoli, calabrese, sprouts and red cabbage. Ive read and re-read the article Andrew Tokely did last autumn in KG and follow his advice, but with same outcome. I've ordered plantsfor april/may delivery now, but am too stubborn to give up. Is it timing or heat or disease? Ive tried to rule out these, but fear I'm missing something obvious!

[Jenny Green]

Are you putting them straight out of the heated greenhouse into the soil without hardening them off?
You also seem to have your timing wrong for some of these if you've been trying to plant them out during the winter. Have you read the correct times for sowing and transplanting on the packets? Your post isn't very clear about when you've been planting out the others. Generally, midwinter's a bad time to be planting anything out. Overwintering crops are planted in the autumn to give them time to establish before the winter sets in.
Another possibility is clubroot. Were the roots all lumpy and malformed on the dead plants?

[alan refail]

If you want spring cabbages to grow on outside, you need to sow them early August where you are, and plant out in Autumn to overwinter. Late winter is not a good time for planting out anything. It's perfectly easy to sow spring cabbages in a seedbed outside and then transplant from there to final position - no need to harden off, of course.

The above is how I used to grow spring cabbage. Now I sow in modules and plant out in the polytunnel. If you particularly like spring cabbage, it can be sown to crop at other times of the year. I generally sow in August and March (varieties Offenham Compacta, Precoce de Louviers, April and Southampton Wonder). All of these can be eaten as "spring greens" or left to head up.

Don't give up.

Have a look at this to keep your spirits up:

http://www.rhs.org.uk/vegetables/crops/cabbage.asp

Alan

[dewwex]

So you are sowing seeds in a pot or tray and transplanting at first leaf stage. where are you transplanting to? individual pots/ modules or direct to soil bed? hope its not to the soil bed. that would be clearly wrong. by the way, you are not 'transplanting', you are by the sounds of it doing whats called in the business 'pricking out'.

I personally don't bother with this pricking out lark. i get a multi cell module or pot and place 1 or 2 seeds in the module cell or pot. And grow on for between 4 to 6 weeks, before planting, depending of the tme of year. The commercial growers as far as i am aware do the same thing!

to be honest your sowing dates seem all wrong. you really should not be trying to sow brassicas from late october to mid febuary at least.

where are you keeping your seedlings? At a guess this sounds like cold killing your vunerable seedlings or damping off disease or over watering?? water requirements in the winter are much lower than in say spring or summer.

i have had a looked back the through the kitchen garden magazine for to try and find Andrews Tokley article you refering too!Is the article from July 2006 titled 'broccoli lovers guide'.
The only sowing in september/october he suggesting, is a sowing of a varity of calabrese which is winter hardy, ie 'Belstar F1'. i cant find any other articles refering to sowing of brassica by Andrew for within the magazine months of august through to november.

my view is, that for a novice gardener i would avoid trying to over winter young brassica plants too much. try spring cabbage, but trying to over winter others seems to be a newish trend, and something i would leave until you have a bit more experience. i personnlly am not really interested in trying to grow things out of season. i would be a little bit wary of that article. i don't feel it explains the procedures or potential pit-falls for the specific months with any great detail.

try and keep your brassica sowings between say march and may, and i feel you will have better luck.

Another thing i have found out through trial and error,is that its imperative that you get your plants planted out in the field or glasshouse bed from 4 - 6 weeks of sowing time. say 6 weeks for your March sowings and 4 weeks for your May sowings

Alot of advice is 6-8 weeks but this information i feel is wrong for module/pot raised plants. the information is based on the older system of field transplanting. ie: you sow in seed bed and pull up plants and transplant them to their final growing-on bed or drill.

last year i sowed my sprouting broccoli plants on the 6th of may in polytunnel. they were planted out on the 6th of june. they have become excellent plants.

Any plants that i left for longer (its took me two years to realise) will get pot bound and usually are right-offs. they become stunted or run to seed prematurely!

bellow is a link to another post on germination and propagators which may interest you

viewtopic.php?t=3398&highlight=

[cevenol jardin]

Oh dear you must be pulling your hair out.

It does sound like the issue is timing - an i can understand why - there are some bum steers out there.

Some Spring cabbage seed packets suggest sowing in August but whenever i've tried that the best i got was poorly stunted cabbages too young and not established enough before its too cold to put a spurt on.

When its cold plants are mostly dormant - if you think about it logically you need to get your plants in an almost fully formed state by the time it is really cold i.e. first frost (for us that Nov 15) so i would aim to have overwintering brassicas in the ground by the end of August. If you work back from that you need to be sowing at the lastest by the end of June.

Re sowing brassicas - i personally like to sow brassicas in the ground they naturally have a deep root which i find sowing in cells inhabits, its also less work and they are less prone to drying out etc which is always a problem for me. They can be left a lot longer in the ground before needing to be transplanted and using up valuable space and you get a stronger plant. I tend to put them in following onions or beans/peas.

I have a very small seed bed that i grow my brassicas and leeks before transplanting. Its just a bit of well maintained (lots of humus not too much nutrients) soil 2.5 ft x 4ft which has a cold frame over it. The advantage is that the baby plants have some protection and if the weather changes you can cover, open or take the light off depending on what's necessary.

also have you tried these 3 brassicas these are my favourites easy to grow and delicious. There are some pictures of them on my website because they were all in season this month, if you want to have a look.
Tuscan Kale
An Italian heirloom vegetable. Superb taste and available all the way through Autumn, Winter and early spring. Beautiful strappy crinkled dark green to black leaves . Sow April - May Harvest September to March

Purple Sprouting Brocoli
This is a great crop, it is delicious and by sowing several varieties in early April to mid May you can get a cropping season from December to April.

Romanesco Cauliflower
Outstanding lime green conical heads with delicious crisp and nutty sweet taste. Sow early April. Harvest from late autumn to early spring.

I'd start again in April if i were you and if you have a coldframe i suggest you give it a go.
Good luck hope you get some brassicas this year.

[alan refail]

A lot of useful advice. Certainly the times mentioned for sowing are a good guide for most brassicas, and I have always used them.
However, I would not be without spring cabbages. Seed packets usually do suggest sowing times of late July for North and early August for South of UK, and I have found this works. In Leeds I sowed late July outside in seedbed and planted out late September when plants were at least 6 inches high. Now (in NW Wales) I sow in modules and plant out in polytunnel. These spring cabbages photographed this Tuesday - 20th March - were sown on 27th August last year. So a lot later than I was suggesting. The reason for the late sowing is merely to ensure the plants are not too big before I take out tomatoes which occupy the bed until late October/early November. I would like them to be ready for Christmas, but with such a late sowing, no chance. In late winter I start cropping them as spring greens, then leave them to head up.



As you can imagine, I am far from brassed-off with this method.

Cofion gorau - Regards

Alan

[cevenol jardin]

Wow Alan they look good.
I am still learning how best to use my tunnel so your method for spring cabbage sounds good (would also keep the cabbage whites off them which doesn't matter so much for curd or sprouting stuff I might give it a go this season and hope the winter is not as hot this year as i don't think they'd have done well in the 40c sauna that was my tunnel until November. But if i plant out as you did in Nov then they could be ok. The variety i've got seeds for is Wintergreen. What variety have you got there?
Last time i tried with spring cabbage, without a tunnel & following the August sowing date on the packet they were miserable specimens 2005.
PS i still can't get pictures in here, can you tell me again, i know you told me but i can't find which thread it was.

[alan refail]

Salut CJ

Checked on spring cabbages after posting the picture. The ones you see are Myatt's Offenham Compacta (Tuckers). I also have April (?) and Precoce de Louviers (Real Seeds, but easy to find in France).
Just to keep you going, here are more things photographed last Tuesday, all sown 27 August 2006.

ASPARAGUS KALE


NERO DI TOSCANA


MUSTARD GOLDEN STREAKS


FRISEE PANCALIERI


WILD ROCKET (Seeds of Italy)- (MINERS' LETTTUCE Montia perfoliata to the right)


Cofion gorau

Alan

[alan refail]

CJ

Re posting pictures:
Have a look at this previous thread - it tells you all
viewtopic.php?t=25

Alan

[cevenol jardin]

Great stuff Alan - are they all in your poltunnel?

My Tuscan Kale looks quite different to yours. If i wasn't such a techno numpty id post a pic.

[alan refail]

In polytunnel - yes
Get on to photobucket - like now Dead easy

Cofion gorau

Alan

sorry, forgot the link last time

[dewwex]

i never done spring cabbages. but i think i have read a few times that spring cabbages are meant to be sown in a narrow window in what i presume is refering mid/southern england as these are main growing regions commercially??

this sowing period is from the 20 of august till 28 of august each year.

has anyone read the same?

Take not much notice in what i say here! i feel johnboy and alan are correct. i don't believe in such narrow windows either!

[Johnboy]

Hi Dewwex,
I don't know where you got your narrow window information from but to me it is not correct.
You actually can sow Spring Greens/Cabbages from the first week in July and the whole month of August which means at least a 6 week sowing slot and a week or so at the beginning and end of the slot. Normally planted out in mid September to mid October.
This gives the plants a sufficient growing period before the onset of harsh weather. This is generally a long enough period to get some good root growth which will assist the plant through the winter period.
JB.

[alan refail]

Johnboy
I'm 100% in agreement with you. The only point I'd emphasise is this: sowing time depends on where you are and it is essential to have plants big enough to cope with planting out late September/early October. In Leeds I could not have got away with outside sowing and growing later than the end of July; in NW Wales end of August is just fine for module sowing and planting in the tunnel.

Dewwex
I don't know where you got your information from. I do not know of any vegetable which has sowing dates specified by actual dates - let alone as few specified days as eight! I personally have 'preferred' dates, but purely based on past experience and record-keeping. Appropriate advice is usually based on seasons: late spring, early summer etc etc. Again, this varies on where you are, but for me I work on a monthly conversion: early spring is March, mid spring April and so on.
Poor Deb seemed to have had enough trouble already; I just hope she isn't totally confused by now. Many types of cabbage can be sown and grown successfully at times other than generally advised and it's always worth experimenting. But you need to bear the following in mind:

1 the time from sowing to maturity (varies with time of year and, of course, type of cabbage)

2 whether you are sowing/growing indoors or outdoors

3 your average weather conditions

The 'window' then becomes Feb/March to end of August.
The same might apply to other brassicas, though those where the flower is the crop (caulis, broccoli, calabrese) are a lot trickier. I usually have some success with calabrese sown early April and cropped in the summer.

Alan

[Johnboy]

Hi Alan,
When I read my posting I realized that I had not been specific enough. You are quite right.
I used to produce Brassicas for Commercial Growers initially for my own family but one farm went out of vegetables and cut my income drastically so I then went on to supply other local growers.
20 acres of Sprouts is quite a lot to sow in one hit!
(10890 to the acre but with harvesting lines it goes down a bit but certainly 50 x 216 Per acre to account for missed plants and 'wrong-uns')
JB.