My failures so far

Every gardener loves to talk about their successes and what worked so well, but I believe we can also learn even more from our failures. And with gardening, sometimes our failures happen due to circumstances out of our control (weather, pests to name but a few).

“There are no secrets to success. It is the result of preparation, hard work, and learning from failure.”

Ginger
This was my second time trying to grow ginger and again it was a total failure. I bought the bulb from B&Q and tried it on a hot windowsill - but absolutely nothing happened. May take some more advice from the link below before trying it again with some suitable store bought ginger - but if it fails again, I will just have to resign myself to buying it!
Growing ginger

Garlic
Approximately 50% failure on my garlic this year due to rust. I had some store bought garlic and this is still growing strong - but the old garlic that I used from last years bulbs that I grew myself all got heavily infected with rust. In future I will be buying new supplies of garlic for sowing each year. 


Pumpkin
This was my most annoying failure - all was going so well - it germinated well, grew quickly on a windowsill, adapted well to life outdoors after hardening off. And then came the storms last week - and the two pumpkins I had sown were snapped off near their bases. If I had known they were at risk, I would have covered them with a cloche ( I will be doing this next year for sure until they are too big for the cloche). The most annoying part was that it happened too late in the season for me to germinate more. I was so looking forward to having my own grown pumpkin soup for Christmas dinner starter as I had last year.

Potatoes
I forgot my potatoes that were in the pot when spraying for blight (thankfully remembered all the rest, and they are doing well) just before the last batch of wet weather and sure enough - they were covered in blight this weekend. I immediatedly emptied the pot - the potatoes were still usable, but tiny - still nice addition to the salad that evening for dinner. Blight will mean that the potatoes won't store. The leaves etc have been removed off site. Photos below.

Click on the images to see them in full size.  

These are just my failures so far - I am sure that by the end of the season that more will come along with a lot more success (hopefully!!).


"Expect the worst, hope for the best, and take what comes"

The good, the bad and the aphids!

Very stormy weather last night and today, but managed to get a quick look out at the patch this morning where I discovered the good, the bad and the aphids!

Was delighted to find my first cauliflower curd had appeared overnight - looks nice and healthy too. I had began to worry that it was a cabbage plant ( as I had bought them as plug plants) and I thought the label might have been put on wrong, but happy to report all is good! We don't eat much cabbage in our family.

Also my Purple sprouting broccoli has been growing very well (on sitting room window, will put outside in the greenhouse when this bad weather goes away) - only one of the seeds didn't germinate.

The bad was my pumpkins getting snapped by the wind - didn't think they would be affected as they are so low to the ground to begin with - just shows how bad the weather was overnight. If I had known I would have put a mini cloche over them. Wonder if its too late to try sowing another batch - I knew I should have kept one on standby!

On my second cauliflower curd I discovered some aphids - will have to get out my washing up liquid mix now to get rid of them. How did they find it - when I didn't even know the curd was there - nature is always one step ahead!!

Pumpkin

Great to eat - great to carve - good to store - why not try growing them!
You just need a decent sized area as the plant does like a lot of space to send out its vines. Not one for the balconys or pots I'm afraid!

Just started my pumpkin seeds two weeks ago. Spent about 7-10 days in the hot press to help them germinate and this is them just out of the press about 3 days. Its amazing that such a small plant now will take over such a large area of the garden!

Last year we were very lucky with the fabulous big pumpkin we got from one pumpkin plant. Most rotted on us despite lifting them and putting wood/straw underneath them(Irish wet weather!!). We used it in two batches to make a gorgeous pumpkin soup - the second batch was for the starter on Christmas day ( we just froze the roasted pumpkin and garlic until Christmas eve) which everyone raved about!

The recipe I followed was from an Australian website - delish!
http://www.exclusivelyfood.com.au/2006/07/roast-pumpkin-soup-recipe.html


A brief history I found online for those interested - apparently the Irish emigrants to the US were responsible for starting the tradition of carving of pumpkins for Halloween.
http://www.pumpkin-patch.com/about.html

Growing:
Pumpkins are very heavy feeding plants - they grow extremely quickly and as such use large amounts of nutrients and water in the process. Failure to provide the right conditions results in poor size, low yields or even failure to crop. The soil should be very rich, well supplied with well-rotted organic material. Pumpkins need a fair amount of sunshine, so a sunny spot is a must. They also require quite a substantial area as the plant can grow very large.

I wouldn't recommend planting out until late May or early June. You can plant directly into the soil or start them indoors and harden them off before planting outside.

Pumpkins need a lot of water and only water at the root of the plant taking care to minimise the water you get on the leaves and flowers/fruit. Keep an eye on the moisture level of the soil as over-watering can also do damage - just to try to keep the soil moist.

There are male and female flowers that will appear with only the female actually growing into a pumpkin - you can tell the difference between them as there is the mini bulb on the female flower. The male flowers I believe are there to attract the insects to pollinate the plant - transferring the pollen from the male flower to the female flower. If the female flower doesn't get fertilized, it will just fall off the plant.



Male flower on the left - female on the right ( Note the flowers are edible though I haven't tried them myself as yet)

As a general rule of thumb expect to get about two pumpkins off each vine - a good number of the flowers will not succeed.

When the pumpkin has formed and is growing - make sure that it doesn't come in contact with wet soil - this can lead to the pumpkin rotting. 


Harvesting:
You can tell that the pumpkin is ready to harvest when the shell has started to harden( and before any frosts). You can cut off the vine about six inches from the pumpkin ( note - don't lift by the vine as you may break it at the base, so the pumpkin won't store).

If the weather is good, you can leave it outside to colour or ( as is usually the case in Ireland) you can bring the pumpkin indoors where it will continue to darken to a beautiful orange shade.


I will update the details on how my pumpkins are growing through the year - feel free to leave comments or questions.

Nutritional value:
http://urbanext.illinois.edu/pumpkins/nutrition.cfm

Hand pollunating pumpkins:
http://theorganicsister.com/hand-pollinating-pumpkins/

Or a nice video to help you "Pimping the Pumpkins!"