Garden Diary: Growing Vegetables in Containers

My six on Saturday this week focuses on some of my vegetable success stories which makes a change from my usual woes regarding blight, grey/white mold, and the rogue blackbird. While growing fruit and vegetables in containers are more challenging than growing in raised beds or directly in the ground it does have some advantages when you are limited for space or restricted by hedge roots or sun challenges

I continue to tidy and weed the garden plus clear any vegetables that are almost end-of-life to reduce watering duties for Gnome while I am in hospital and during post-op recovery. Yep, knee replacement operation is scheduled in a couple of weeks so he will be head gardener, cook, and bottle-washer.

1. LETTUCE

The Bativa lettuce I grew from seed is finally ready for harvesting. This time I kept the pot covered with a plastic crate to protect the lettuce from the sun and the greedy blackbird looking for worms.

This week, I was delighted to find some Lollo lettuce plugs for sale at a little garden centre.

 

2. BUTTERNUT SQUASH GROWING IN A POT

The butternut squash planted from seed on the 11th of April is doing well.

My first baby squash!

I won’t mention the little white spots.

3. KABERI F1 BABY ABUREGINE GROWING IN A POT

Normally, I buy aubergine plugs but this year as the market closed I was forced to grow some from seed. Shortly after lockdown, I discovered a seed company in Portugal that accepted small orders. I felt like a child in a Toyshop and ordered lots of different varieties of seeds. The Kaberi F1 was one of my purchases and so far I am delighted with the result. I also changed my compost and the results are outstanding! I only planted this on about a month ago.

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and you can see the difference. These are seedlings still waiting to be planted on. I think they are trying to tell me something!

4. GROWING MELONS IN POTS

Much to my surprise, the green melons started as seeds on the 31st March are already beginning to bear fruit, and dare I say the foliage looks relatively healthy. I have given them a couple of feeds of Epsom Salts so perhaps this has helped?

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5. GROWING ONIONS IN CONTAINERS

I grew these onions from seed! I need to thin them out, but so far so good. Normally, I buy the mature onion plugs from the plant man at the local market, but thanks to COVID it closed for several months.

The red onions were planted as plugs at the end of February in a large container. I was a little lazy and did not thin them out to give them room to develop, but even so, I am happy with the result.

6. THE TUMERIC EXPERIMENT

Has anyone tried to grow turmeric? A friend bought me some fresh turmeric months ago and because we use the garage as an isolation zone for all food before it is brought into the house, I completely forgot about it. Three months later I found it beneath some old cloths and it had sprouted!

Apparently, I need to plant 2-4inches deep in a wide container so it has room to grow.

 

That’s it for this week, folks. Why not click over to Mr P’s blog to check out other six on Saturday bloggers