Sunflower Growth

You’ll have to click on the picture to see it in a better size. I thought I would show the sunflower growth of the like couple of weeks. The tops of the sunflowers all look like they will be producing flowers soon, but they are still growing. The tallest is around seven and a half foot tall! I don’t know if it will get much bigger, but its definitley the tallest around

Sunflower Still Growing!

The sunflowers are still growing well and at pace. The tallest is now half way in between the top and middle  bean wires, probably around 4-5 foot. I’m hoping they by the time they flower they will be twice this height! They look pretty strong and doing well. The beans how ever have stuffered badly from slugs. The area they are in this year is just too hard to keep free of weeds and slugs for a crop like beans. It would have been better to put them in the main plot area. I’m trying to grow some back up, maybe I’ll buy some plants if a get really desperate.

Sunflower Update Continued

It has also been only a few days since I last took a photo of the sunflowers, but the growth is incredible! They must be growing at a foot a week. I would if they will keep growing to the 12-15 foot they are supposed to, at the moment it is looking pretty promising.

The first of the beans is now starting to climb. They’ve started to wind round the stem of one of the sunflowers, and what a stem it is! The race is on to see if the sunflowers can keep ahead of the beans as they climb!

Sunflowers growing a pace!

The sunflowers have been loving the sunny weather recently and shooting up a pace. I’m guessing the tallest may have grown a foot in a week! The beans are just starting to look to climb, so by the time they do, there will be a good sunflower pole for them to grab hold of.

Sunflowers Growing Pace Looks Good

So, reporting on the Beans Growing up Sunflowers progress. After a bad start, with sunflower seeds rotting, or seedlings being eaten, finally the test sunflowers were planted along with their beans. I was a little worried that the late start on the sunflowers would have meant a problem with the beans growing too fast for them to act as usable poles. However, it appears there is no need to worry. As the photo shows, the speed at which these three sunflowers are growing compared to the beans will definitely ensure they will be of a good size by the time the beans start looking for something to hold on to. The key to the sunflower growing seems to be to keep them protected and in a deep pot until they are of a decent strong size before planting out. After a certain size they have strong, hairy stems that protect them from slug attack, too young and they are easy prey.

I’ve got a couple or so more sunflower seedlings in the box, so I think in time I’ll replace a few more poles with sunflowers in the bean row. However, this has all got me thinking. What else that needs pole support would work like this..?

Tomatoes? … Cucumbers?

Its worth a try… I’ve got lots of spare tomato and cucumber plants. So I’ll find a spot on the plot to experiment with them.

I’m really looking forward to seeing how this all work out. At the very least I’m excited to see how tall these sunflowers can get! Hopefully, at the end of all this, I’ll be able to collect plenty sunflower seeds to grow them again next year.

By the way, the small plant in the forground is summer savory. It’s not only supposed to help protect the beans from black fly, but as a herb served with cooked beans is “a useful digestive aid against flatulence”. Nice

Beans and Sunflowers – The Start

So here we go with the beans growing up sunflowers experiment. I’ve got about 5 sunflowers planted out with either 2 or 3 beans planted next to each of them. Three of the sunflowers are planted along with the bean poles put as direct replacements for bean poles in that group. The others are scattered at different places around the plot. I wanted the sunflowers to be of a much more healthy size before planted, but after the failures of rotting seed, slugs and mice, the got a bit delayed. I’m growing some back up sunflowers in the box just to make sure. So the race is on between the sunflowers and the beans. Can the sunflowers grow fast enough to act as a pole for when the beans start needing them? We shall see..

Not Slugs, Mice!

Yes, I had jump to blame the humble slimy slug for eating my seedlings over easter, but after sowing pumpkins and squash I came back the next day to find the dug up and chewed to pieces! Kind of cuter thought than slugs, but never the less, they wiped me out of giant pumpkin and sweetcorn seeds! I’m going to have to start again, again again.. but a lesson learnt that this can happen! Cute little furry buggers. Luckily, being mice and not slugs the seeds that had grown were left alone, just the ones waiting to germinate had been eaten. I found the most likely place the mice were getting into the box and blocked it off best I could. Re-ordered giant pumpkins and sweetcorn and re-planted some sunflowers and squash that had be attacted too. Hopefully this will be the end of it and we can get on with growing the damn things!

Slugs Suck!

Ok so slugs don’t suck they just eat everything! (except “conveniently” not weeds)

Somehow they are getting inside the box and when they did while I was away over Easter, they ate almost everything insight. So much so that you wouldn’t have even known that seeds had been planted. I had to sow yet another round of pumpkins, squash and sunflowers and I’m going to have to buy another round of sweetcorn seeds. Luckily the tomatoes are still ok as are the beans and cucumbers.

Bastard slugs.

Looking at the plot in general there are weeds every where, there is going to be a great deal of work needing done to stop them growing over.

Sunflowers Take 2

So, after investigating the seeds planted in The Box before the frost, it appears that the squash and pumpkins survived and are growing well, the popcorn is not germinating as yet and the sunflowers seeds have started to rot. This may be due to that sharp spell of snowy weather or it may be due to the seed being bad. One, however, has started growing out of that batch, but one is not enough. Therefore, I have bought I new set of sunflower seeds and have now just planted 15 of them! These Russian Giant’s are supposed to reach a height of 4.5 metres (15 foot in old money) with flowers 30cm across. I need to get the sunflowers started so they have a headstart on the beans that will be growing up them. Hopefully this batch will grow well and fast because the beans will need to be sown soon, and I’d like a long growing season on these to see how tall we can get them!

Investigating the box further I found small slugs have managed to get in, the only way I could think of is that maybe there is a gap in the lid on the hinge side. I’ll need to detective it further, but I placed some beer traps inside and scattered the floor with (organic) slug killer to be sure. They’ve managed to wipe out the first seedlings of lettuce and nibbled a few other plants, something with have to be done to ensure the next batch of lettuce survives!