Tips pretty please

titch7069 · Post: # 47523Post **titch7069** » Sun Jan 28, 2007 4:44 pm

Badly need some tips, veggies on the whole growing well but, broccoli, cauliflower and savoy cabbage just not happening. has anyone any tips to pass on re: those veg? we're doing well growing stuff not previously grown here but broccoli for example grows on the mainland under similar conditions but ours sprouted from seed and then just disappeared as did the cabbage, cauliflower didn't even sprout!

Andy Hamilton · Sun Jan 28, 2007 5:47 pm

Dissapeared??? Sounds like slugs or something eating them. Although slugs tend to leave broccoli. How about growing your plants indoors until they get too big for their pots then planting them out, that way they have a little head start.

Are you also crop rotating? If there has been other brassicas in that area then the pests might have built up.

titch7069 · Post: # 47540Post **titch7069** » Sun Jan 28, 2007 5:51 pm

we don't get slugs here, tanganyika trains (milipedes) but it's the wrong season for them. No brassicas grown on this ground for at least 20 years (thats how long the plots been empty), could be the heat but i don't know enough to be sure.

Wombat · Post: # 47563Post **Wombat** » Mon Jan 29, 2007 1:22 am

G'Day titch!

Brassicas are cool season crops, but I suggest the following -

1. start the seeds in punnets but then transfer to a larger pot, grow them on really well before planting out.
2. Make up a frame and cover it with shadecloth. Place the frame over freshly planted seedlings for a few weeks so that they are not exposed to the full heat of the sun straight away.

Good luck mate!

Nev

Tay · Post: # 47567Post **Tay** » Mon Jan 29, 2007 4:14 am

I too would love some tips as my brassicas have always failed. Slugs do like broccoli - I know! My cabbages never heart, and cauliflowers and broccoli, if they survive the slugs, seem to go straight to seed.