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Gardeners World blog

Grow & eat

Autumn feast

Posted by: Pippa Greenwood, 27 September 2007, 12.29PM

Horticultural fleece protection It's great. The canes on my autumn-fruiting rasperries are whipping around in the incredible wind we're having, but they're absolutely laden with fruit. It's amazing that the local bird population isn't all lined up underneath with their beaks open.

To top it all there's very little raspberry beetle damage - those horrible little browny maggoty things that sneak out of the top end of the fruit. I can't seem to pick the fruit fast enough and the entire family is going around with bright red stains down the front of their clothing. Mind you, if the weaather carries on being as bitterly cold, I'm going to have to think about putting some fleece over the canes because, so far, only a fraction of the crop is ripe.

Fortunately, the wires I'd put in place when I'd originally intended to grow summer varieties, are still there, so I think I'll probably tie the fleece onto the top wire, pull it down over the crop and anchor the other end into the ground. Lucky the wires are there, otherwise I don't know how I'd tie it down with all this wind.

Comments

  • Keith Powney

    27 September 2007, 05.40PM

    Tent pegs are useful for holding any sort of netting/fleece down. I need to know how to prune my raspberries,(I am new to this game) the leaves are begining to alter colour now, but still cropping heavily.

  • Edell Armes

    28 September 2007, 02.25PM

    I too have had a great year for raspberries. I cut out the old canes on my early crop but canes supposedly for next year have cropped again, not that I'm complaining. Does this mean I will not have an early crop next year?

  • BizzieLizzie

    28 September 2007, 07.43PM

    I Have a lot of tomatoes but they are still green should I pick them and put them in a bowl with a banana to see if they will ripen?

  • Shelagh

    01 October 2007, 04.16PM

    I too am relatively new to raspberry growing having moved to a house which has them in the garden. I have some very large rasps with thorny stems. Are these Loganberries and are they pruned as rasps?

  • elizabeth

    01 October 2007, 08.26PM

    can i grow onions in my greenhouse now for next spring

  • Linda

    02 October 2007, 08.50AM

    Hi Pippa Can you remind me - in one of your garden shows. You stated that bi-cab was good for (and I can not remember) but did say to myself - great I could do that. Also what would the mix be. Sorry to be a pain but I do know the mix would treat my .... Thanks in advance.

  • Dave B

    02 October 2007, 04.39PM

    How can i get rid of the weed called mares tail on my allotment?

  • david

    02 October 2007, 11.16PM

    I have 3 early rhubarb corms which are still giving sticks of fruit, should I pull it all to ground level, as its now October or leave well alone...Thank you for your help.... David

  • Petal

    03 October 2007, 07.20PM

    Why in the greenhouse, Elizabeth? Overwintering onions will grow perfectly well outside in a normal UK winter. Buy some sets now ('Radar' is a good variety) and plant them just like summer onions, and by next May, you will have very usable onions. Leave them longer and they'll be bigger. They certainly fill the gap before the summer onions are ready. Watch out for bird damage over sinter, though, cover them with wire netting!

  • Joyce

    03 October 2007, 11.07PM

    I have grown Autumn Bliss raspberries for several years and the crops have never disappointed me. The summer temperatures can be cooler than we would like up here in Scotland but with all our rain the fruit has great flavour

  • Joan

    04 October 2007, 12.06AM

    Tomatoes need heat to ripen. Typically at the end of the season all that is needed is to bring in the green tomatoes (of ripening size, not tiny ones of unmature size) into a warm room to ripen. Some people will put 1-2 dozen or so into a papersack to ripen one by one. I've never heard of bananas or any other thing but heat needed to ripen them. I currently have one from my plant, picked green, and now turning a nice red after 2 weeks or so in my kitchen on the counter.

  • Pippa Greenwood

    04 October 2007, 01.55PM

    Good to hear there are so many other fans of autumn rspberries, for me and mine they are THE best! Certainly a lot of peculiar fruiting and flowering has gone on everywhere this year, and some of my few remaining summer raspberries started unusually early....and yes, with new canes of autumn varieties it is quite usual for them to give a bit of a crop in their first year, an added bonus to keep you waiting in anticipation!!

  • Karen

    08 October 2007, 12.00PM

    Hello from Brittany!

    I grew my first veg last year & was so inspired by the results & encouraging comments from my elderly French neighbours (who garden from birth to death), that I tripled the size of my veg patch for this year. I lost most of my lovely pink fir apple crop & all my tomatoes to blight, & the courgettes have been poor. I understand that the unusual weather has been to blame for these occurances, but can anyone please help with another problem I have? .

    I was given a raspberry cane & a blackcurrant bush last year & planted them next to each other against a corrugated iron shed where they've grown big & bushy, but produced no fruit whatsoever. They receive full sun for the first half of the day and shade the second half. What should I do? Thanking you in anticipation.

  • Valley

    27 May 2008, 01.54PM

    I am a new gardener with an allotment.I would like to know how to store my potatoes,beens,carrots and onions red/white over the winter do I use sacks made of paper or sacking.I also moved a gooseberry bush in Feb and it appears to have died should I leave it to see what happens next year

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