| Have you tried these lazy tricks to grow more | | | | outer leaves, so the white pith stays in the |
| organic vegetables in your garden? In my | | | | ground to regenerate. It will give you a second |
| experience, even the strangest ones do work in | | | | crop. Then leave the roots in the ground to |
| the sustainable garden! | | | | flower and produce seed next year (plus pretty |
| Beans: runner, common and broad. | | | | seed heads for flower decorations). |
| Plant half your runner beans in mid-April under a | | | | This works with onions too. Take the outer layers |
| cloche. Then plant one quarter in mid-June and the | | | | off an onion and eat them. Replant the core and |
| rest at end-June. Why? It minimises the risk of | | | | you'll have another onion. Or plant it indoors to get |
| beans not setting due to poor or variable | | | | continual onion greens. |
| weather. It avoids a glut and gives you the | | | | Onions. |
| maximum successive yield. | | | | Plant shallots or onion sets in a trench eight inches |
| The principle of staggered planting also works for | | | | deep - far deeper than the textbooks say - then |
| dwarf beans, sweet corn and, of course, brassica | | | | earth them up as they grow, like potatoes. You'll |
| and salad crops. | | | | get thick necks so they won't store, but this |
| Here's an even lazier idea to grow more | | | | method yields nearly double as much onion. Onions |
| vegetables. It works with most large seeds like | | | | will also flourish if crushed washing soda is put |
| beans, peas, squash and cucumbers that you've | | | | around them then watered in, or so some |
| saved from last season. Segregate the seeds into | | | | Victorian gardeners believed. |
| large, medium and small sizes. The larger ones will | | | | Peas. |
| mature earlier. So plant a calculated mix of all | | | | Peas buried 6-8 inches deep will take longer to |
| three sizes together and they'll mature at | | | | show but produce twice as many peas as those |
| different times! You'll have a longer season and | | | | covered conventionally just an inch deep, it's said. |
| fewer gluts. | | | | Would this tip work for beans too? |
| Another idea for broad beans is to let them | | | | Potatoes. |
| flower again after the first crop is picked. You'll | | | | To get bigger potato crops, cut a big chitted |
| get a further small second crop in October. | | | | (pre-germinated) seed potato in three. Plant just |
| And here's an idea I wager you've never read | | | | the rose end (the end with the most 'eyes') and |
| before (yet it works) to grow more vegetables. | | | | the middle bit and discard the haulm end, that with |
| When it's late in the season and your climbing | | | | the fewest 'eyes'. It crops late and gives smaller |
| beans look tired - and you've taken off every | | | | crops. |
| pod - strip off all the leaves. Pour manure water | | | | To boost the yield, remove the flower heads and |
| lavishly around the base. And stand back. | | | | seed pods from the potatoes as they grow. |
| Provided there's no frost, you should be rewarded | | | | Another idea... more potatoes can be grown from |
| by a second bloom of flowers - and beans. | | | | one seed potato by, first, pre-germinating it in the |
| Runner beans are perennials! This idea succeeds | | | | usual way. Then remove each shoot with an apple |
| outdoors in temperate climes only if you've | | | | corer thrust into the potato. Each sprout plus plug |
| started your beans very early. But greenhouse | | | | of potato should be dried for 24 hours then sunk |
| and polytunnel owners should have no problems. | | | | in a pot of compost. When leaves emerge, plant |
| Brassica. | | | | the plug out. This can produce six plants per |
| 'Heel' the roots of cabbages - or of any brassica | | | | tuber, albeit with a smaller yield, as opposed to |
| that have had their stems cut - into a trench. | | | | one plant. |
| Mulch the trench heavily with leaves over-winter, | | | | Pumpkins. |
| and set the roots out again in spring. They burst | | | | Grow giant pumpkins by putting a rubber tube |
| into new life to give early leaves, which can be | | | | into a pumpkin stalk attached to a bottle of milk. |
| eaten like collards. | | | | Capillary action draws in the milk and pumps up |
| A tip: to give brassica transplants a good start, | | | | the pumpkin, or so it's claimed. Sugar water is |
| dunk them in thick manure water or kelp solution | | | | used in this way to bloat exhibition marrows, and |
| before planting. This also deters club root. | | | | it's less offensive if you dislike pumpkin cheese. |
| Brussel sprouts. | | | | Tomatoes. |
| Cut off all but the top foliage of Brussel sprouts | | | | To get more fruit from a tomato plant, place thin |
| when the buds are forming to give firmer, bigger | | | | wire mesh over the tomato seedlings when |
| sprouts. | | | | they're 14 days up. Leave it for 12 days. The |
| Kale. | | | | stems bend over at a 45° angle, grow thicker |
| Plant offshoots of kale in soil and they'll grow into | | | | stems and don't become leggy. When |
| new plants. This is useful, if you want to conserve | | | | transplanted, they grow erect into bushier plants |
| rare specimens. (So if you plant out a Brussel | | | | with higher yield. |
| sprout bud, does it grow into a cabbage? No.) | | | | Do these odd ideas work? They work for me. |
| Leeks. | | | | Try them for yourself! |
| Don't pull an entire leek. Instead, cut off just the | | | | |