Winter peppers

I was very surprised to see that my pepper plant, growing on the kitchen window sill, has 3 small peppers developing.

Especially as the season is a snowy winter. It seems that the warmth from the kitchen and from the sun through the kitchen window has fooled the plant into producing fruit.

Flowers started to appear a few of weeks ago.

The pepper plant was the only plant out of the 5 or 6 I grew last year that I kept indoors. The others were left in the greenhouse and as the weather grew colder the plants eventually died.

This variety of pepper will produce only small peppers and so is suited to growing in a small area such as the window sill.

These pictures are more recent than this post (end of March 2009) and shows the peppers near just as they have turned red and close to harvest time.

You can see down edges on one of the leaves. Im not sure what that is caused by by I am trying to water the plant more often and feeding it with Baby Bio. Not sure if the Baby Bio is the right thing to feed it so I shall research this a bit more.

The leaves go pale and drop off every so often but other leaves are a deep green and the plant looks healthy.

New year - new veggie plans

I cant believe how long its been since I last wrote in this blog. It just goes to show how busy I have been as I honestly havent had a spare moment to myself for that long. I dont make resolutions but I do intend to plan a bit of time for the blog from now on.

Since the last post I have harvested 6 peppers (5 small and 1 large). A fair crop which help to make two dinners. 4 of the 6 plants fruited. I grew 5 of the plants in the greenhouse which have all died now. They produced green fruits.

I grew 1 on the kitchen window sill producing red fruit and this plant is still going string. I have even noticed new new flower buds. Its needed a bit of nitrogen feed as the leaves had gone light green but its looking healthy and strong.

Almost everything in the garden has died, especially as the last 2 - 3 weeks have been the coldest for 20 years. Even the lake froze over completely. So Ive put a few tendy plants in the greenhouse. It really makes me realiase I must do more with evergreen plants to make the grarden more interesting all year round. As soon as the first frost hit the Cocmos died straight away.

Autumn has arrived

With a chill wind and darker nights autumn has certainly arrived. My first casualty of the frost are two potted Bolero's. The tomatoes have all been cut down and the remaining green fruits are ripening rapidly in the kitchen. Although the main crop of tomatoes were hit by blight I have still managed to get a good amount of fruit (I haven't bought tomatoes for a good number of weeks). An added bonus was the later sown tomatoes. I cut those plants down last weekend, before the frost got to them.

Peppers are starting to ripen too. There are 5 small peppers and 1 large pepper. I'm pleased to have got some fruit as least. They have certain not saved me any money though.

Sweet peas are in bloom still. I watched Gardeners World a few weeks back which said "cut down your sweet peas, they have now finished". As I move my secateurs closer I noticed new growth and though that I might wait for a few days to see what might happen. To my amazement the sweet peas have put on a brilliant display since.

I have noticed a few different birds visiting the garden during the last few weeks. 1 Coal tit and what I thought might be 4 long tailed tits. Chaffinch and blue and great tits. There is always food available for them, seeds, peanuts and water but I may try fat balls too.

The Cosmos plants have grown to a staggering 6 feet tall this year, twice as high as last year, with masses of flowers.

Peppers growing strong

There are now 4 peppers growing and are looking really strong. The largest is about 2 inch's long. It will be some time before they are close to being ready to eat though.

The tomatoes have improved since the dreaded lurgy hit them a few weeks ago. Ive kept a close watch over them, cutting of anything that looked bad. At various times there have been warm dry days which has helped them to recover. Over the last few days the other two varieties have started to ripen giving me more hope of a reasonable crop.

Tomatoes - Not a complete disaster

Just when I thougth all was lost a glimmer of hope has glistened on my tomatoes. Of the 3 varieties I have grown this year, the cherry tomatoes are starting to ripen. There has only been leaf damage on this plant so far and no fruit loss as yet. Lets hope they stay clear of it and are tasty once ready to eat.

Not to forget the carrots. They are doing really well. Getting bigger with loads left to pick. The second sowing are coming along brilliantly as well.

Tomato blight! Arghhhh

After days of rain and only to shortest of visits to the garden, Thursday was finally a nice enough day to inspect the vegetables. Sadly one of the larger pots is showing signs of the dreaded blight. So far I have found 3 fruits with softer, paler tops which if left would certainly go mouldy. The stalks had shiveled up too.

Im now wondering if some other tomatoes have it as well. These others have developed dark brown tops at the stalk. There is no sign of mould and the stalks look fine. Ive left them on the plant to see what happens.

All thats needed is a good dry spell. Maybe September may bring one.

On closer inspection later, there is far more mould infection than I first thought. Each day I look at the plants and each day there are shrivelled leaves, fruit with soft pale tops and Ive also found that some main stems are dying. Ive just removed one stem were the leaves were wilting. It wasnt due to lack of water to the plant but the stem had completely die half way down. Squeezing that part it was hollow inside. Photo 2 shows it eating away at the stems, creeping nearer to the tomatoes.

Photo 1 shows the soft pale tops to a couple of tomatoes. The stem has died showing a pale growth.

Photo 3 shows the dark brown top. Its hard and dry and only affecting the variety that was supposed to be blight resistant. It may have a different desease.

Photo 4 shows the shivelled leaves. This has occured on all three varieties and can appear overnight.

Beetroot harvest 2008

I dug up the beetroot crop this week. How disappointing it was. There were plenty of beetroots but, with the exception of two, they were all either tiny or long and thin. The two that looked a bit better were barely golf ball size and because they had been in the ground so long I thought it best not to chance eating them.

Since growing this crop of beetroot I have learnt a few things that I will do differently next year. Firstly that when you sow a beetroot seed you are actually sowing a pod containing 4 seeds. Therefore (and secondly) these 4 seeds must be thinned out once they have germinated. I had read about thinning out seeds, for beetroot, carrots etc, but I did not take any notice thinking everything would be fine. I now know how important thinning seedlings is. And thirdly because each pod contains a number of seeds, less seeds needs to be sown.