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Vegetables growing really slowly

I had some landscaping done in the spring and a new part of my vegetable bed was created and filled with new topsoil. I sowed carrots, chard and turnips there and they germinated beautifully with a lovely row of tiny seedlings. But this was weeks ago and they haven't got much bigger and now I've realised that I should have improved the topsoil, which is very sandy, before sowing. Is there anything I can add now to rescue these seedlings and what would be the best thing?

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  • DovefromaboveDovefromabove Posts: 88,139

    Seedlings don't need a lot of nutrients - I'd put slow growth down to the low temperatures we've been having.

    If you want to give them a bit of a boost without frighteneing them to death (remember you don't give babies a steak dinner) a weak solution of seaweed fertiliser watered into the soil won't do any harm, and a light scattering of chicken manure pellets will perk the soil up.

    In the meantime make your own compost and buy bags of organic farmyard manure from the garden centre when it's on 3 for 2 and store it to dig into the veg patch late next winter/early spring image


    Gardening in Central Norfolk on improved gritty moraine over chalk ... free-draining.





  • Thanks for the advice - I'm already storing up the compost ready for the autumn! I know that it must be at least partly due to the soil because my existing vegetable bed has also been extended at one side with this soil and I have a row of spinach beet growing across the bed. The seedlings in the new topsoil are tiny compared to the ones at the other end. I was so thrilled to have beautiful, new, crumbly topsoil that I never thought that it might need compost adding.image

  • There is a device used for hydroponics, I haven't used it but it looks good. http://easyponic.com/en/

     

  • Steve 309Steve 309 Posts: 2,753

    I was about to reply that it's a bit early in the year to expect stuff to be growng fast - and then I looked at the date...

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