Sow+what?

=What to sow and grow now...=

This weekend I planted up two hanging wall baskets. I didn't realise how expensive sphagnum moss is! Once lined with the moss I filled the base with potting mix. I thought with its larger parts in it it would help to drain away excess water. Then I put finer compost on top. In basket One I have planted...
 * mint - this can grow a little crazy so I hope that by confining it to the basket it will be more manageable. I can't wait to have home grown spuds boiled with fresh mint leaves for Christmas dinner!

(My mint is not growing crazy but there is alot of it!MW8EF,PS I did not write this whole page I only wrote this.)
= If I had Sage in there then I could call it my "Scarborough Fair" basket LOL.
 * thyme - I don't use this herb a lot but I'm sure it will be yummy in potato and leek soup and on pizzas.
 * curly parsley - I love parsley in everything, especially scrambled eggs!
 * rosemary - be good to have some sprigs of this with raost veg and roast lamb.

In the other basket I have seedlings of wild/alpine strawberries x2, a normal strawberry, and the alpine strawberry seeds i got from Trade Me, which should have (fingers crossed) germinated by next weekend.


 * Next weekend I am going to plant potatoes** that I have sprouted in a dark warm box, into the tyres that came off my car. These take 90 days to make [[image:Potato_bed.jpg width="287" height="193" align="right"]]tubers or potatoes. I will put 10cm of soil into the tyres, then the seed potatoes, then another 10cm of soil. When the sprouts show through the surface I will layer on another 10cm of soil. Apparently if I do this then it will grow more potatoes. Each seed potato should make 5 more eating potatoes. Potatoes don't like animal poo in their soil because it can burn the eyes off the spuds. But they need good drainage, frequent watering, and good compost to grow delicious spuds.

I have sown seeds of **Carrots (red, yellow, orange, purple) and Radishes** into seed trays. The radishes have quickly germinated and next weekend I'll try to transplant them into my vegie bed. Because they grow large roots they don't like to be disturbed when they are growing so they might not survive in their new home.

Mum gave me a **Rhubarb** crown in a pot with lots of cow poo. I have topped it up with compost and in less than two weeks it has grown from a tiny leaf to three large leaves and many more coming up.

The **Raspberry** canes I planted in the holidays have grown new green leaves. When I got them they were sticks about 20cm long with roots at the bottom. Francky dug one of them up because I naively put blood and bone in the hole I dug for them and she thought it was like ice cream, so that plant is not looking too healthy at all. They need to have wires attached to any new shoots so they can crawl up the fence, so that will be a holiday job for me. I can't wait to have fresh raspberries this summer.


 * AUTUMN** is the season to get dormant fruit trees in the ground. I have planted a **Cherry Tree**, a **Meyer Lemon** and a **Mandarin**. Both the citrus trees Francky ripped out again because I put blood and bone in with them. My lemon is looking very very sad and yellow. So this weekend I put some Epsom Salts (Magnesium Sulphate) and Citrus fertiliser around them, topped them up with more compost and gave them a good water. Hopefully by next weekend they will have perked up.

So what are you growing and sowing and how are they going?
Feel free to edit this page and add what you are growing. Leave your initials beside your comments so we know who you are, or write in italics so we can clearly see additions to the page. Gosh my mouth is watering at the thought of all this food! =**//Garden Dangers//**= //Be ware and be careful because your garden is in great danger. Birds, dogs and Franckies Are a threat to growing gardens (especially Franckies!). Cats could possibly be a threat as well. You should protect it. Unfortunatly it won't stop the Franckies.//( wwecomm9 (C.M) )