More Pott(er)ing

Tuesday afternoon pottering in the garden is fast becoming a habit. This week, some of my tomato plants were getting a bit big to sit on the greenhouse shelves, so I decided it was as good a time as any to get planting them in growbags, where they will reside for the rest of the summer.

Unfortunately, this meant that I had to go and spend some money at B&Q on two grow bags, a large bag of compost and some tomato/plant feed, as I'd run out.  It didn't turn out to be too expensive as I got everything for just under £10, so I was pretty happy.

When I got back I reduced the growbags down to a size that would fit in the greenhouse by breaking up the soil inside, redistributing it and folding over the end.  I punched some holes in the bottom and then planted the tomato plants into two holes that I cut into the bag.  I always put bottomless plastic pots into the growbags and then plant the tomato plants into them. This just stops the water running off and also gives them a bit more depth to grow in.

I then removed the lower shelves in the  greenhouse and put the growbags into place.  As you can see from the photographs, I didn't put out my spare plants for people to take on Sunday at the Jumble Trail event, mainly because I decided to hang on to them and donate them to the local primary school fair which is coming up in a few weeks.  This way they can make a bit of money from them. I'm sure they'll still be glad of them, even though LB has now moved up to secondary school.

This does leave the greenhouse rather crowded for the time being, but I will be removing some of these plants to the allotment soon, so hopefully it will thin out eventually and whilst the tomato plants are still small, it doesn't matter so much.

I did make some makeshift planters for some of the tomato and one courgette plants, out of some small used compost bags.  Theyr'e not the most asthetically pleasing sight, but I don't have any large planters to use and I didn't want to buy any more as they just end up being more garden clutter in very small garden, so these bags will suffice for this season, and will enable me to grow a few more tomato plants to full size and perhaps get a slightly bigger harvest.  We'll see what happens anyway.

Another productive afternoon.  I like that I can do a bit of gardening here and there in the summer. It's good to have an excuse to get outside and enjoy the sunshine.