| Here's
some advice from other gardeners to the team
at MACS. If you have something to add please
fill
in the form.
Your
Name: John Martin
Your Advice: Just watched the
July video about blight. If you want to be more
organic choose blight resistant varieties of
spuds. As soon as you see any blight pull the
tops off the plants but leave the spuds in the
ground. This can be a bit awkward but if you
put one hand flat around the base of the stem
and pull firmly but slowly with the other, the
spuds should stay in the ground.
It is important to leave the tubers in the ground
for about 3 weeks after the blighty tops have
been removed. This protects the tubers from
exposure to the fungus as you lift them. Lift
them on a dry day (we do have some) and dry
the tubers in the air before storing. Don't
leave the tubers exposed to light for more than
about 24 hours as they will start to turn green
and inedible, some say poisonous.
Store the dry tubers in paper or hessian sacks.
I find that used feed bags as for sheep or horses
do well and are free. I hang the bags up for
storing as this keeps them dry and away from
vermin.
The gent who was advising you to spray is correct
that this will control blight but it will also
harm lots of invertebrates and helpful microorganisms
that make for a healthy soil and good natural
food.
Using chemicals will initially give you bigger
crops but your allotment will become dependent
on the continued use of toxic chemicals to keep
producing. Using chemicals that kill off the
organisms that harm your plants also kills off
the useful predators. Let nature strike a balance
of predators and prey species and you will be
surprised how your plants seem to look after
themselves. Last I grew a few lupin plants in
my vegetable garden. They quickly became covered
in greenfly. They still flowered but looked
pretty awful. I was advised to spray or wash
the off with soapy water. I did neither. The
lupins died back but so did the greenfly and
none of my vegetables of fruit were infested
at all. The lupins were sacrificed to allow
the vegetables to thrive. The greenfly were
happy; so were the ladybirds which ate them;
the bees loved the lupins while they lasted
and I have reasonable vegetables for such a
bad year. Everyone was happy.
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Your
Name: Ian Butler
Your Advice: Just wanted to
say I think your site is great!
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Your
Name: David Hamilton
Your Advice: Keep up the good
work.I have a gardens blog and have posted about
this project.It will be read by people from
all over the world. I would like to see what
the young people think about the project in
their own words! My blogs address is
Keep on growing!
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