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A couple of questions from complete beginner
noviceneedshelp
Posts: 66
in Fruit & veg
hello all, just a couple of questions any and all opinions and answers will be very helpful thank you
is there anything i can sow now for the winter or am i too late? Ie winter cabbage, leeks? ect or can i buy some from a garden center that are ready to plant now?
how do i care for sweet peas over winter if i sow some now? will i need to keep "pinching" them whatever that means! I have a heated greenhouse i can keep them in
and lastly is there a good book that is worth me getting that will tell me all i need to know about fruit and veg gardening?
i have recently moved house and inherited a very large garden with a kitchen garden which i would lime to try and make the most of!
Looking forward to all of your thoughts
thank you
0
Posts
Garden centres have kale plants in to plant now, and spring cabbage.
You can sow overwintering broad beans such as aquadulce claudia.
If you have a greenhouse or cold frame you can sow sweet peas. They do not need heat over winter. If you have a heated greenhouse, sow in Feb, then grow on cold. They soon catch up on autumn sown ones, flowering maybe a fortnight later.
If you can get a copy of John Seymours, the self sufficient gardener, it is pretty comprehensive for a large garden.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=john+seymour+the+self+sufficient+gardener.
The RHS encyclopedias are good as well.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_ss_i_9_3?url=search-alias%3Dstripbooks&field-keywords=rhs+encyclopedia+of+gardening&sprefix=RHS%2Cstripbooks%2C170&rh=n%3A266239%2Ck%3Arhs+encyclopedia+of+gardening
If you're a complete fruit and veg novice, I'd recommend starting with Mark Diacono's book "The New Kitchen Garden". He makes a lot of very good points about traditional style veg plots not being the only way to do it well and describes quite a few of the mistakes certainly that I made as complete novice 5 or 6 years ago. (His book wasn't published then, sadly, or I might have wasted less time and money).
You can sow some types of peas now as well as broad beans and also plant garlic anytime between now and midwinter. And there are a few types of quick growing lettuce you can sow now or various types of salad plants in the garden centres - rocket, chervil, lambs lettuce and purslane as well as winter lettuce.
“It's still magic even if you know how it's done.”
The Dr D.G.Hessayon Expert range of books have been going for many yrs. I started reading them about 50yrs ago and still have some of the originals.
Very straightforward and helpful
Billericay - Essex
Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.
Thankyou for all your tips and ideas,
i am very new to all of this so have alot of questions!