Gardening Week with Bob Flowerdew, AG’s organic gardening expert Your
Bob’s top tips for the week
‘Boltardy’ is very tolerant of extremes in weather, which makes this beetroot ideal for early sowings and longer harvests
With monogerm beetroot varieties. such as ‘Moneta’, there is little or no need for thinning – good news for the time-poor
Beets are the best If you’re after quick, reliable crops that are high on taste
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and nutritional value, you can’t beat beetroot, says Bob
“They are so easy and reliable to grow”
16 AMATEUR GARDENING 19 JUNE 2021
1
When watering, be careful not to splash the flowers of cucumbers, courgettes, marrows and squashes, as this will often start rots.
2
Tie sweet potato vines off the ground as they will root anywhere they touch and divert energy from your crop.
3
Thin fruits of big beefsteak-type tomato plants like ‘Marmande’ (pictured) to something achievable – say, one per truss, three per plant.
4
Since it’s Father’s Day, why not ask if there’s a job in the garden your dad’s been avoiding and then do it for him?
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O you remember Woolworths, was (and still is) so popular is due to it the chain that sold lots of small being so easy and reliable to grow. You household items? Among its just sow the seed (there are a number lines it sold packets of seeds of seeds in each husk, though you can and annually announced the largest veg now get ‘mono’ sorts with one or two number sold, which, if I remember seedlings) and then thin them. rightly, belonged to beetroot. Then you just keep off the birds with a I found this odd, but on bit of bent chicken netting, scarers or examination it made sense. whatever. Birds just love the Other than birds eating their small leaves and will razor leaves, beetroot doesn’t these off. You might even suffer many problems. sow beets literally ‘for the Sure, they seldom do well birds’ if you did not want if overcrowded and may them for yourself. be miserable in poor, dry If you want decent soil. However, they are beets, though, don’t It’s important to thin easily grown to moderate forget to thin those multigerm beet size with little care and they seedlings, seedlings. Fortunately, you but you can are highly productive when can eat the thinnings (try fed and watered well. Also, in eat the thinnings! them stir fried) and the small the days before refrigeration, beetroot beets, from young and tiny until really crops stored for months (and years large, though eventually they will when boiled, peeled, sliced and get a bit fibrous. submerged in vinegar). Try beet baked, especially the yellow I reckon the main reason beetroot ones. You can also eat their leaves as spinach, and there are even improved varieties. Chard has the same beet ancestor, bred to give thick, wide chunky stalks that can be stewed. Then there is sugar beet, a super-sweet white beet. Most impressive of all are mangolds or mangels, which are giant beets for feeding stock. These have been grown to over 130lb (59kg). Beet that!
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Striking ‘Burpees Golden’ is a vibrant-yellow multigerm beet that is very sweet and can be harvested from July until November
