The journal Begins

Garden Journal

Green house






Up to now the only problems with the green house have been a few more flies than I would have expected. To ease this problem just opening the window for a while does the trick. I have not used any chemical for obvious reasons and would hope that any insects which have entered this area have pollinated the plants which are in flower.
The odd slug seems to manage to get in and head for the runners, marrow, and dahlia plants. This would seem to have been halted quite a lot from the addition of gravel on the top of the soil at the base of the plants. Once again I have resisted using chemicals and pellets to stop this problem.
The other problem which has been progressive is the lack of flaming space. It seems now that an additional if not a third green house are needed to undertake the activities I have in mind. 2009 was always to be my test year and so 2010 the greenhouses are to be a must. Where I’m going to put them I don’t know and I doubt the ducks will be happy if I continue to take over their space.





The Green House in General

The green house needs to be checked every day and maybe twice a day if the sun is strong as ventilation is needed at this time. Plants need to be checked on each visit to ensure that there are no problems such as disease or infestation.
The plants are watered in the evening should they need it and are fed with a fruit feeding liquid added to the water once a week. The soil in all cases except the mother of thousands needs to be moist at all times as for example with tomatoes, should the soil become very dry then watered well this can cause a brown mould on the bottom of the fruits. Consistency is needed at all times.
The only thing I use which would have chemicals in it would be the plant food. I am determined to have an organic arrangement for plant growth.









Experiments

I decided earlier in the year to try an experiment which entailed potting plants in different ways to see which would be the best method.
I used runner beans and tomatoes of different varieties. The tomatoes when being potted on were treated in two ways some in a pot with no bottom then put in a grow bag, some directly into the same grow bag. All were in the same place in the green house and able to get the same amount of food water and sunlight.
The runners were potted in three ways. Some were individual in pots some were direct to the grow bag and the last were individual in pots but placed in the front garden. The first two were watered, fed and situated the same. The latter were left to grow alone. I deem the survival of these down to the high level of rainfall over the month.