My tomatoes outside succumbed to blight a couple of weeks ago but the plants in the mini-greenhouse appeared to be unscathed until this morning.
I've cut off two or three leaves which are showing signs of blight so I'm hopeful they'll be OK for a while longer.
My garden is probably around four five times larger than yours. I do have a garden waste bin. However I try to compost a lot of stuff in my garden rather than use the green waste bin. I still use the garden waste bin for stuff that won't compost easily (prunings from large shrubs/small trees, ivy, bindweed, diseased trimmings, etc.) but I find my usage is variable over the course of a year. Sometimes I have too much for the bin but more often than not, I don't have enough to fill it.
Last few years I was growing outdoors in a microclimate where I'd already have blight before the first blightwatch email even went out, so I only grew varieties I knew wouldn't be badly affected. It's made me really complacent and this year I've lost some fruits because I didn't bother cutting a few leaves off and it spreadMy tomatoes outside succumbed to blight a couple of weeks ago but the plants in the mini-greenhouse appeared to be unscathed until this morning.
Not the end of the world though, I've been jealously guarding my ripe tomatoes from people who want to make chutney and now I can rip out a couple of plants and let them make green tomato chutney with what was left on those.
Thanks. I reckon I’ll leave it for now.
I think I might have made it more elaborate than it is by saying composting system. What I should have said is that there's different ways of composting from just piling it up in a corner to various types of container.
www.surreyep.org.uk
attempt is doing well and I'm about to hire a shredder (really need to buy one but I have plans to diy one out of a brushcutter and plastic barrel for now...) to start a second heap. Thinking I might stick it in one end of the polytunnel to act as a kind of low tech radiator.
Thanks, I’m not sure a compost bin is the right call then, the place where it would go isn’t ideal and I need to do some work in they spot anyway.Compost is usually my answer for everything but grass clippings aren't especially good for compost tbh, you need to mix them in well with other stuff (ideally stuff high in carbon like dead leaves or even shredded paper - think I remember Elpenor mentioning having a shredder?) or they tend to just mat together into a soggy, smelly, yellow mess.
On the subject of compost, I know most people here won't have the time or space or enough waste for this - you need about a cubic metre or slightly more to build it in one go, then it needs turning every 48 hours or less - but I've been super impressed with the Berkeley method since trying it out recently. Even my first, very half-arsed
Diverter kit off the drainpipe (probably obvious but where I live now there's just cut off down pipes wedged into a hole hacked in the water butt lid with no overflow
), you can buy connector kits to link multiple butts together. Make sure the surface you're standing it (plus any more you plan to get in future) on is properly flat and solid, and that there's enough space underneath to fill whatever watering cans you have without catching them on the tap.
Nothing obvious I know shit all about this so it's YouTube and other tutorials lol. I have a 20ft x 6 ft concrete surface for water storage. Want to do drip feeds and all kinds but not had the time to check lol. Think thus year is going as experiment and setup mainly. My chives even look like grass? Lol. Not the fun kind.Diverter kit off the drainpipe (probably obvious but where I live now there's just cut off down pipes wedged into a hole hacked in the water butt lid with no overflow
Mine took 6 months to arrive lol.
If you want to store loads of water and have the space then might be worth looking at IBCs or something rather than the domestic water butts, at some point.
You need a pump for it? Just sold one I had for watercooling a PC lol. I keep making more beds so thats a, thing. I have not looked into it but figured it was tubes and stuff.
Does that mean they're stealing the rainwater from your roof?
Depends. You have to move the water from the storage container, through a pipe and whatever irrigation e.g. drip tape, and into the soil. If there isn't enough pressure, you won't get an even flow through the whole system and some stuff will end up not getting enough water.
I suppose they areDoes that mean they're stealing the rainwater from your roof?
Doesn’t seem worth having a fight about. Maybe I should get a downpipe my side and the gutters rebalancedHalf of that drainpipe's contents are yours tell them
I’m making a different tomato sauce from each of the four varieties as I have too many to eat or gift to neighbours.
I feel like you and I must have different ideas about what counts as too many tomatoes to eat
That's the best thing ever right, making something and being able to say you produced most or all of the ingredients yourself. Hoping I'll have some dried beans ready at the same time as the last sauce tomatoes finish ripening, and I have a load of tatties that are damaged and won't keep long which I'm planning to freeze as part-done roast potatoes (in fat rendered from the ducks that are responsible for half the damage, which feels fitting)
Looking much better.
