Nah, only if you've  over cooked them.   You include the five minutes 'resting' time with the mint in the overall cooking time.

Do we need a 'Cookery' thread in parallel with this one?

I have to say the recent warm and wet weather seems to be helping my vegetables along - now I've managed to find a way to stop the local wildlife digging holes over the patch and ripping out some of the seedlings...

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Too late! 

I've got 8 plants in a container and 4 have bolted - the flowering stalk has grown about 6" in two days. Apparently it's the heat - I needed to keep the roots cool or they bolt.

Oh well, spindly, woody brocolli it is, then.

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Keep picking seems to be one of the answers Saint. Have a look in this link here.

 

http://www.no-dig-vegetablegarden.com/how-to-grow-broccoli.html

 

Moving onto basil, I've grown it for years and it's grown but never would I describe it as really flourishing until this year. A tip I was given was to water it from beneath, so I've got a pot of it sat in a dish and I've been filling the dish every day to the extent where the pot is sat in an inch of water for most of the time, the basil seems to love it. You can't beat freshly picked basil with a thinly cut and freshly picked beefsteak tomato still warm off the vine, a generous dollop of good quality olive oil, loads of freshly ground black pepper with proper crusty bread as a starter.

It is mid winter down here in Australia but under a strong southern sun I can report that I had the following plants in flower on mid winters day -

Nasturtiums

Marigolds

Camellia

Winter rose

Poinsettia (massive bush covered in red leaves, not like the little things you get in the UK shops at xmas!)

Lavender 

I haven't been here long but in the vegi patch we have the following -

Chilli

Silverbeet

Lettuce

The hardest thing to get used to is the fact that there is no frost where we are in winter. This means that the growth is never killed right back. Growth slows right down but even in winter there is weeding to be done it seems.

I have plans to get some citrus going, the garden already has a lemon tree, picked a lemon last weekend.

It is going to be a real battle in the summer keeping moisture in the ground. I am going to try using sugar cane mulch later in the year and put a good layer around all the plants. Sugar cane mulch is good for the soil as it breaks down well. I am looking at getting a good sized rain water tank as using tap water on the garden in Oz isn't good.

I haven't found any nasties in the garden yet, spiders don't bother me much mind. It is snakes I can't stand, but you don't see many of them in the burbs.

Cheers, Geoff 

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Edit: Cheers, Grant  

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Big excitement here - picked our first cucumber today and it's really brilliant - sweet, juicy, and the skin is quite soft. Was a bit worried because the spiel said you had to keep the greenhouse temp above 16C day and night so with the cool nights a few weeks ago i wasn't sure if the cumbers would be affected but not a bit of it.

Now, keepy a beedy eye on the chillis and melons . . .

(actually, it's the other half who does most of the greenhouse pottering but it makes a great fag shelter when it rains so I have a vested interest in it LOL)

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Our first ever attempt at a veggie patch is yielding some pretty decent returns. Had some spuds/beetroot/lettuce some peas (petty something) salad rocket, spring onion, radish and spinach. Not to mention the herbs, mint, dill, chives, and corriander. Basil and rosemary are also ready. Fruit trees are in (have to wait a couple of years for those) Apple, Pear, Cherry, Plum, Peach, Nectarine, Clementine (most grown from seed)  Had some strawberries from the plot which were very sweet Got loads more veggies and fruit on the go as well

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Sounds like you've been busy Jon.   Petty something wasn't 'petit pois' was it?

Managed to pick some figs earlier today, this is the first crop and if we have a decent Indian summer I might be lucky and get a second crop as well.  Apples are doing well and I've even got some pears, but the Newfoundlands will have those as they can tell when have just got to perfect ripeness by mouthing them whilst still on the tree, they don't damage them but I've never fancied them after they've been sucking on them.  

Yeah thats the ones Very sweet to taste. My only failure so far were to leave the radishes in too long (after picking some rather large ones compared to the supermarkets). They came out with scabies, so we bined them and started again. The new ones are almost ready (probably a couple more weeks) and having checked, are disease free.

Busy's not the word. If I ever find the swine that buried a coal shed and thick broken up concrete path right in the area I chose for the veggie patch, I wont be held responsible for my actions

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Anyone got any good ideas of what to do with Dill?

(Besides eat it)

 

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As a first timer, I have mine in with the carrots. The foliage of the carrots should protect the roots and keep them cooler, only time will tell, but I don't appear to have any bolting going on

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What I need, being about to go away for the last two weeks of July, is something to put the French beans and courgettes on hold. Still, looking at the charts, the weather may well come to my aid in that respect (not that it looks any better in the Baltic, where I'm going)

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I had a very large Cordyline that was destroyed in the winter cold and I cut it right down to a low fork in the trunk hoping it might sprout again.  It didn't, so today I decided to cut the remaining trunk down but found 7 baby Cordylines sprouting from the ground around it!! 

I've also decided to cut down a kiwi plant that is doing nothing but trying to lift the guttering off our deck roof and shading the hanging baskets.  It had two flowers last year that lasted all of a week, then they fell off leaving no fruits to follow.  This year it hasn't flowered at all but it's a very quick grower and needs constant pruning.  It has to go!!

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What weedkiller do folks recommend?

We tried some cheap "Doff" stuff (should that be Duff) but it hasn't done a thing. Their slug pellets work a treat but the weedkiller is bla! I had much better success using some old Sodium Chlorate that was in the garage and by the next the sprayed weeds were dead. Problem is Sodium Chlorate is banned which is a pity as it was a cheap option.

Bayer is on sale at our local Wilkinson, but wanted to get some opinions before wasting any money. With our poo summers most companies recommend spraying the weeds when rain is not in the forecast.

I have my own lawncare business and the stuff you get from garden centres is mostly rubbish. I'm, not touting for Business as you are far away from me but i'd recommed getting the professionals in as the stuff they use is only available commercially (you need to be qualified to use it). I use 3 different kinds depending on the type of weeds - the easiest to kill are the likes of dandelions i.e. single roots. The most difficult are those that spread under the ground, generally they will require 2/3 applications.
Don't put any liquid down if it is going to rain within 4 hours as it will get washed away.
If you let me know how big your lawn is I'll give you an idea as to how much it should cost

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Hi

Yes I was talking to a local council landscaper and he said pretty much the same thing. Is there anywhere online some of the better stuff can be purchased from?

On another note, why was Sodium Chlorate banned by the EU? When I used it the other day, it killed the treated weeds in hours and by the next days I pulled up the weeds and all the roots were damaged/dead too. I can remember my old man  using it years ago on his allotment and it always worked a treat and was much cheaper than branded weedkiller. Seems most available weekillers are Glyphosate based now-a-days.

Sodium Chlorate was banned as it is highly toxic to both humans and animals. The stuff you get nowadays is as you say mostly glyphosphate based and not as detrimental to the envirmonment - though you do need to keep it way from ponds.

A website you could try is www.amenity.co.uk, I buy all my products from them. The best general purpose weedkiller (at a reasonable price) is Re-Act 

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I was convinced my Callistemon had gone for good but hadn't got round to digging it out. When I did find time, I noticed some little weeds around its base. Only they weren't weeds, they were ickle callistemon shoots from the rootball. I've hacked the deadwood right back and it's coming along nicely now.

I lost two eucalyptus trees last winter, too. Same story - now vigorous growth from the base. Still have to lumberjack the 30'+ dead trees though

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I have had a hugh crop of Blueberries, Boysenberries, Blackcurants and Jostabrries. and Raspberries, Strawberries, Pine berries were not  as good this year.. Blackberries are starting to ripen a month ahead of time

I've grown potatoes, carrots, spring onions, broccoli, sprouts & peas in containers around my patio.

Mixed results....

Had my first dig of the potatoes yesterday. Absolutely delicious. First time I'd grown them since being a kid and they tasted fantastic. Only used about a quarter of the crop, too.

Carrots also yummy. I don't tend to eat carrots cos I don't like them - but these, dug straight from the 'ground', are sweet and fresh.

The spring onions are much bigger than last year - probably due to less crowded planting.

The sprouts look to be coming along well, strong stalks & healthy leafage.

Most of the broccoli plants have bolted, after I couldn't stop the roots getting too hot. Shan't be growing brocolli again

My peas have also been a bit of a failure. I bought about half a dozen small plants and only 2 have in any way thrived, and even then not to the extent I'd envisaged. 3 plants have now withered and another looks decidedly poorly. There haven't been enough pods ready at the same time to give enough peas for an accompaniment.

 

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Our blackberry crop is in its final stages already, and we have had tons of them, right from early July. I don't know what variety we have in our garden, but they're very vigorous, very early, very big and very juicy! It's a constant battle to keep them under control as they want to take over the whole garden, but we get more fruit than we know what to do with...

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We've decided, that as reliable as they are, this year will be our last for petunias. Masses of flowers in the hanging baskets, but masses of flowers = masses of dead heading to keep them looking their best; additionally they're so vigorous that they swamp everything else that's planted in the baskets  Next year we'll be going back to fushias and begonias, also last year we had some double nasturtiums in baskets at the front of the house which were a great success.

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Cleared the garden 2 months early this year as I removed the rotten plants and the wild sweet peas that was growing onto the patio edge had kept it the patio parts damp all the time from the recent wash out days, is now all cleared away and dug up well to allow to dry out properly as it haven't been dry since May.  Only 3 plants left and one of them is vine plants which some are already ripen but very slowly due to lack of warm sunny weather around.  I normally clear the garden in mid October as we often get warm dry spells in the past but to be in the safe side after this poor summer I decided to do it early and finish for this year.  It also in the safe side in case we may get very wet and cool start to Autumn so it would be difficult to use the garden by then.  Latest record of clearing away was November 1995 after a very warm Oct allow the plants to florish longer.