Seedy Saturday!

The Saturday before last we took the children along to an event  in a local village on the edge of Dartmoor, Bovey Tracey.  The event was called 'Seedy Saturday'.  It had been organised by the village's Climate Action group, to promote growing your own veg etc and to encourage people who have unused space in their gardens to share it with people who do not have any growing space.

We were invited to take seeds along to swap, and you could also buy other seeds to add to your collection.

There were helpers on hand to advise the children what seeds to buy, when to plant them and then a little workshop to let them plant some seeds of their choice in eco-friendly seed pots.  There was a lovely community atmosphere there, were every one was doing something for the greater good.

It was a lovely day, and the children were totally engaged by it.  Their faces lit up when they were asked to plant some seeds and draw some pictures.

Once home we ordered one of the eco-friendly seed pot makers.

Its called a Paper Potter.  Its an amazing little device that helps you to make little seed pots out of old newspaper, so once grown you can put your little plants into the pot or ground without having to disturb them as the paper is bio-degradable.

So this weekend Issy, James and Lauren have been kept very busy planting!

 

 Lettuce and cress ...

To the point where we are running out of windowsills!

But their enthusiasm is infectious.  And it fits in just nicely with our economy drive!  Home grown veg will be quite the money saver if it works.  We are putting potatoes egg boxes this weekend, we have never planted these before so any advice would be gratefully received!  We are planning to plant them in a large dustbin or something similar as we are restricted on planting space and have heard that Good Friday is traditionally the day to plant them out.  We are all pretty much novices when it comes to growing vegetables, we have grown tomatoes, corgettes and herbs before, but thats about it. This year we plan to be much more ambitious!

Roll on the spring, lets get some sunshine going on!

Hope you have a good week x

Comments

[Helen Lambert]

morning sweetie...Pete is obsessed with his paper potter and makes pots while waiting for the kettle to boil...I can send you a link to a wonderful seed company that sell seeds for salds and herbs that go back to 'the olden days' some of the varieties are very very old...purple carrots! they were not always orange!.....Pete is a keen veggie gardener so email if you ant any advice....let me know if yu want the seed link...they are very reasonable and come in little envelopes.....love H

[Tracey]

What a wonderful project! And that Paper Potter is a great little invention. I live in a small townhouse and would love to have a program like that in our area. Very exciting to see your garden grow!

[Gayle]

I put my seed potatoes in egg boxes to 'chit' on saturday past. I will leave them there in the cold conservatory for 2 weeks, and I have a raised bed ready with only a bit (8inches) of soil in it. I covered it in fleece that I didn't use last year. The fleece warms the soil, so that when they are planted I will be off to a head start. When the leaves come up I will keep covering them with soil (called earthing up) as this will make the plant produce more potatoes. Eventually, when I am up to the level of the top of my raised bed, I'll let the proper plant grow, and when it flowers I'll harvest them. Now that is the theory. I plan to do extra pots like you, but as yet don't know what to use! The date of planting does depend on whether the potatoes are earlies, 2nd earlies or maincrop. Good luck!

[sheila jones]

What a lovely way to spend a Saturday! Oh, to be in the country...
Just to let you know that Agatha and Dorothy are making a special appearance on my blog today as part of Tuesday Treasures!! I do love them!
As for potatoes, I have grown them in a converted dustbin for the last three years and been very pleased with the results. I made holes in the bottom and then just filled the dustbin a third full with compost and planted the seed potatoes (I didn't even chit them!!) and then as they grew, added more compost until it was just under the top. It's amazing how many you get from just two or three seed potatoes. I'm sure the Gardner's World website will have something on this.
love
Sheila

[Anne Donald]

The key thing to growing them in any sort of bucket is DRAINAGE - my husband ignored my advice to put holes in the bottom of his plastic bucket last year and we ended up with slimy rotten potatoes! You can grow them in a compost bag - tip most of the compost out into another container, plant the potatoes, then as the leaves appear, use the set-aside compost to earth them up. As we have no room to grow veggies, I have requested some posh boxes (home-made) to put grow-bags in and I hope to swap for, or buy, surplus plants from friends.

[Gemma]

This event sounds fantastic. It is brilliant that the kids are so involved. I think you are right, their enthusiasm will keep it going too. I have vowed to do the veg thing next year so I'll be keeping an eye out here to see how you get on and pick up any tips :)