Young Gardeners: Growing gardeners of the future - March 2012

One minute we had 12 degrees, then we had minus five; but as I write at the end of January, it’s still relatively early in the season and we have plenty of time to get our preparations done. Besides we have an exciting year planned so the weather can take a back seat as we plan for the year ahead.

We did have a spot of very good news recently; one of our kind sponsors, D T Brown, sent us seeds, fruit and other goodies through the post. This always causes much excitement among the students and this occasion was no exception. We didn’t have a strawberry bed last year, but this year thanks to the seed company we will have two.

We also have leek seeds on trial which should prove interesting and lots of varieties of the fruit and vegetables that the students love to grow and eat. The seeds that arrived in our package included climbing beans, dwarf beans, runner beans, and broad beans, peas, courgettes, beetroots, organic squashes, carrots, kohlrabi, potatoes and many more, and we will start sowing many of  those very shortly.

So what else have we been doing? Painting the beds ready for the new season is always popular with the pupils and it preserves the timber for a few years longer. We always use wax based paint and we find the water runs off it better, even on the flat surfaces. We have also been clearing paths, sweeping, cutting back the shrubs and of course leaf clearing, even though we were convinced they had all gone.

Beetroot

When planted around, in and through nepeta (catmint), beetroot seem to grow much better. Mint also seems to help the beetroot along and so does garlic. One thing to avoid is planting beetroot too close to runner beans. We found that there was a significant lack of growth from the beans when this was done. The beetroots don’t seem to develop very well next to the runners either.

Carrots

We planted some carrots next to the shallots and both crops grew exceptionally well. In fact there was quite a noticeable difference. This was discovered by mistake; the shallots found themselves growing in one of our carrot beds, which was not in the original plan. No one has owned up yet, but in fact they seem to have made a discovery.

Sweetcorn

We built a three sisters American Indian bed with sweetcorn, runner beans and squashes and it worked very well apart from muddling some of the squashes with the courgettes, but again they grew strongly. The sweetcorn provides support for the beans and the squashes keep the moisture in the soil to the benefit of all. We have the technique if anybody would like to email me: john@simplygardening.co.uk If you time it right then potatoes also grow better when grown around sweetcorn. We are going to try sweetcorn and potato beds again this year and see if we can repeat our success. Apart from better growth, when planted together they produce an impressive visual feature in the tallest beds. Sunflowers seemed to help the sweetcorn grow too; we are not sure why but they look good in the mix.

Lettuce

We tried radish with our lettuces and it seemed to work very well. Also when lettuce was planted next to the kohlrabi it seemed to grow quicker and with a little more flavour than when planted on its own. One of the students says his grandfather surrounds his lettuce bed with mint to stop the slugs eating them. He said the bed looks great too, so we will try to get his grandfather in for a day to help.

Radishes

We found that this vegetable grows at a tremendous speed and we grew loads of it and in many different varieties. We found that if we sowed a row of mustard either side of the radish, the radish grew much more quickly and stronger and with a fuller flavour too. The radish that was accidently planted next to and within the nasturtium area seemed to grow very well too and as they were a little forgotten about it was a surprise to see them doing so well. That’s a good one to remember for this coming season.

Companion planting is a hit

One subject we would all like to share with you is companion planting. We have a few thoughts and results on this and we will be experimenting with it again this year to confirm our ideas. After looking at Google one morning when it was too frozen to do much in the garden, the students reported that companion planting started in China when one plant was planted next to a rice crop and made the rice grow extremely well. American Indians planted the ‘three sisters’ bed (sweetcorn, squashes and climbing beans), which we have already found works well (see below) and all sorts of other companions have been found over the ages. Here are a few of ours.

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The John Whitgift Academy Garden Project

At John Whitgift Academy the Inspiring Communities Government Fund made it possible for the school to team up with John Cavill to design and build the garden and help educate the children through gardening. It aims to lift the aspirations of all the children in the school through learning outdoors.

Follow progress each month in KG and you can also log on to John Cavill’s website at www.simplygardening.co.uk/whitgift.html to view the latest information.

If you have a school project you’d like us to feature in KG simply contact Steve Ott: sott@mortons.co.uk

Next month

We will have planted much more fruit – raspberries, strawberries, maybe even apples and more. Our beds will be cleaned, painted and ready for action. The polytunnel will be in use and we are not sure how the time over there will be divided but we will find a way. It’s an exciting spring and this year is going to be a great one.