Amateur Gardening – 13 July 2019

13 JULY 2019AMATEUR GARDENING 19

Next week: Allotment rules and regulations, growing

callaloo, harvesting cherries, sowing quick-maturing

crops in gaps, second-cropping potatoes.

IF you don’t have room for a few of

these plants in your vegetable garden,

just pop one in a mulched sunny flower

border – they are beautiful things!

Their impressive silver foliage comes

back year after year, with those huge

jagged leaves making them excellent

statements plants.

But for cooks, it’s the edible flower

buds that really excite. Picked when

the size of a golf ball, the whole bud

is tender and edible, but usually it’s

allowed to grow larger (roughly the size

of a grapefruit) before being harvested.

At this point, the leaf scale tips (known

as phyllaries) will have become hard and

inedible, but the bases are soft, buttery

and delicious, and the basal plate upon

which the leaves sit – the ‘heart’ – is

also edible. Submerge and then

SOIL pests and diseases can be tricky to control. Gone are the days of applying

armillatox, lindane or chlorpyrifos to the soil to control the likes of club root, root

flies and honey fungus, so what are your options? Crop rotations help, but if your

plot or allotment has cultivated edibles for years, all your beds may be struggling.

Sowing Mustard ‘Caliente’ now may help. It acts as an organic biofumigant,

releasing natural gases that kill off many soilborne pests and

diseases. Needing two months to grow, it can be sown

now on any bare patches (you can also sow in spring).

Add a high-nitrogen granular feed before sowing,

then broadcast-sow as you would lawn grass.

Keep well watered and then, just before the

flowers open in autumn, strim down the whole

lot and rotavate into moist soil straight away; it’s

essential to do this immediately – otherwise, the

fumigating gases are lost. Cover the whole lot for

14 days, then remove and plant up with crops

whenever you’re ready.

Sow mustard as a soil fumigant

Harvest globe artichokes

WHILE the Latin name of this fast-

growing hardy annual might be a

mouthful (Atriplex hortensis var.

rubra), that’s nothing compared to

the abundant pickings it will give

you for the kitchen. Sow directly into

warm earth (full sun is preferred) in

mid-spring, and the resulting tiny

seedlings will quickly develop into

spires of wine-red growth.

Glaucous-grey on top and felt-like

underneath, the leaves themselves

are highly ornamental, and they

make an excellent dot plant on

veggie plots and allotments. Salads,

too, are immediately given a visual lift

if you pick some of the young leaves

to scatter among the greenery.

The taste is spinach-like (well,

it is called mountain spinach, after

all), and if they are left to their own

devices the head-height plants will

flower and self-seed in late summer.

How to take herb cuttings

1

Look for non-

flowering shoots

from healthy plants. Trim

1in (2½cm) lengths of

these using a sharp

knife, placing them in

a tray of water.

2

Carefully remove

around one third of

the leaves, taking them

from the lower end of the

cutting – otherwise, these

could rot when placed into

the compost.

3

Gently insert the

lower ⅓in (1cm) into

pots of moist compost.

Water in lightly, then place

in a propagator positioned

out of direct sun. Pot up

once well rooted.

Step

by step Bulk up herbs in high summer with ‘semi-ripe’ cuttings – ideal for

mint, lemon balm, oregano, thyme, lavender, rosemary and sage:

Inset: Alamy

Red orache

simmer the whole head in stock

until tender. Then, along with plenty

of crusty bread and perhaps a glass of

white wine, simply dip each leaf base

into Hollandaise sauce, and enjoy.

releasing natural gases that kill off many soilborne pests and

diseases. Needing two months to grow, it can be sown

now on any bare patches (you can also sow in spring).

Alamy

5 quick

jobs

1

Cherries will begin ripening over

the next few weeks. Rather than pick

them while red, wait until they are

almost black – the flavour is superb!

2

Shallots mature earlier than onions

and will be full-sized now. Slide your

fork prongs underneath each clump

and lever out of the earth to aid drying.

3

Raspberries, strawberries and

blueberries ripen over a long period,

so keep harvesting your plants

every few days to ensure you pick

at perfection.

4

Are trailing squashes making a

takeover bid on your plot? Train

meandering stems into a circle or

up a tripod to ensure they keep

within bounds.

5

Keep sowing short drills of lettuce,

radish, rocket and other quick-

maturing salad crops. This helps

to avoid gluts, instead offering a

steady trickle of produce.

‘Caliente’ releases

natural gases to kill

off several pests

Grow mountain spinach in your garden

Why

not try..?

Marshalls Seeds

Inset: AlamyInset: Alamy

Globe artichokes

will produce a

succession of

delicious heads

(inset) in summer