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Begonia non stop tubers

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  • ShennyShenny Posts: 127
    :) thanks for the tips. I think all the advice has given me more confidence. 
  • ShennyShenny Posts: 127
    Hi
    just a little update. Begonias planted into baskets and boxes. This is a photo of one of the boxes. As you can see lots of leaves but no buds or flowers. Am I just being impatient?
    fed with fish blood and bone when planted into the boxes. Tomato feed given a few times since then. 
    I have seen begonias in full bloom around the neighbourhood so a bit concerned about mine. 
    I’m such a worrier and very impatient. Need to work on those shortcomings!!
    any advice welcome. 
  • Shenny said:
    Hi
    just a little update. Begonias planted into baskets and boxes. This is a photo of one of the boxes. As you can see lots of leaves but no buds or flowers. Am I just being impatient?
    fed with fish blood and bone when planted into the boxes. Tomato feed given a few times since then. 
    I have seen begonias in full bloom around the neighbourhood so a bit concerned about mine. 
    I’m such a worrier and very impatient. Need to work on those shortcomings!!
    any advice welcome. 

    Mine look similar to yours so it’s probably normal - I’ve recently started to get buds. 

    maybe those neighbours with full blooms have bought them in flower from the garden centre 
  • AnniDAnniD Posts: 12,585
    I think that like a lot of things they are a bit behind this year @Shenny.
    As they were very small whe you first got them, they're a bit like premature babies, but they're catching up now. They look nice and healthy. 
    Give it a week or two and l'm sure they will be living up to their name  :)
  • LynLyn Posts: 23,190
    Next year just put them in plain compost, feeding will encourage lots more green to grow, mine are in rubbish compost, still waiting to be transferred into their positions, hardly any compost in the pots,  that’s what encourages them to grow. 

    Once they are flowering well you can add some tomato feed once a week. 

    Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor. 

  • FireFire Posts: 19,096
    If it's any help, I just put the whole window box in the shed for the winter (earth, tubers and all) and then take it out again after threat of frost has past. It couldn't be easier, really...
  • squirral87k4-WvGwTsquirral87k4-WvGwT Posts: 167
    edited June 2021
    Very helpful to know thanks @Fire


  • LynLyn Posts: 23,190
    Leaving them in their pots wouldn’t work here,  they get vine weevil every year,  I have to take the corms when they’ve died down and inspect them,  they bury into the corm and I spend ages picking them out with a meat skewer.  So while they’re out I wrap in news paper separately incase I’ve missed any and wait for them to shoot next year. 

    Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor. 

  • FireFire Posts: 19,096
    edited June 2021
    I've had my tubers going for about eight years, with some new earth and feed in the window box each year. What I mainly love about them is that they grow in the dark, more or less. I have a full shade side return by the house and they flower their socks off until the frosts - lighting up the dark where most flowers would really struggle. Fuchsias did ok there for some years.

    I think extra Begonias are one thing it's probably worth buying in, if you fancy, at the start of the season. My own re-starting begs don't start flowering till maybe July or so (like dahlias and quite similar in many ways). If you buy some in bud at the start of May, you get a good few extra months of blooming. But I daresay you could force them earlier in the house.

    I have had some lovely begonias at the front of the house too, lighting up the street. They catch the west light in the afternoon.


  • LynLyn Posts: 23,190
    To be honest, I’m not that keen on them but they were my parent’s favourites and some of the tubers are donkeys years old, I can’t bring myself not to grow them each year, I suppose the answer would be to leave the vine weevils in for the winter 😀
    Gardening on the wild, windy west side of Dartmoor. 

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