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Grow Your Own

Everyone can benefit from a bumper crop of own home grown fruit and vegetables, even planting this late in the season, says Drusilla Stewart 

Before you go crazy at the garden centre think realistically about how much you can eat. You may love runner beans, but can you eat 50lb in a month? Plant a little of several different, interesting varieties that will be ready for picking at different times This will ensure that you have a ready supply of delicious vegetables throughout the growing season.

Also make use of all the space available in your garden. I used espalier trees (grown flat against a wall) as I didn’t have the space to have an orchard and planted asparagus and artichokes within flower beds as they have such decorative foliage. The thriving plants that resulted when I threw some rotten tomatoes on the compost heap mean I now grow all my toms there, hiding an unsightly corner.

If you want to plant just one crop in a very limited space, go for strawberries. They take up hardly any room, produce attractive flowers and delicious fruit, and are easy to maintain, and lets face it, they are quintessentially English. In my book that’s the end of the argument.

If you have some space in your garden, sprinkle beetroot seed now, and you’ll see results in 90 days, when the baby beets will be between golf and tennis ball sized, the same with early carrot and parsnip varieties - although they do need light, sandy soil to do well. You can plant beans and peas as late as July, but purchase bean shoots in small pots. Sunny, dry and well drained spots in patio beds and smaller gardens are ideal for planting with these vegetables, and they can also be grown in pots. They’re worth considering planting yourself as they’re so expensive and so much sweeter when freshly picked.

Who doesn’t like the idea of pulling up their own lettuce, washing it off and tossing it in a salad? To put them in this late in the season you really need to buy seedlings, and they do well planted in grow bags and large pots, as do fast growers like small squashes and courgettes. Harvest courgettes when they are 10cm long. Squashes are more variable in shape and size, so keep the seed packet for harvesting information as you don‘t want them to get too large and watery. Give it a go, you‘ll be amazed by what you can grow, even on a balcony!