Speaker 1: Welcome to Gardening with Ben, your go to podcast for
all things green and growing in twenty twenty five. Whether
you're a seasoned gardener, a budding enthusiast, or just curious
about cultivating your own slice of nature, you're in the
right place. Join me Ben as we explore practical tips,
inspiring stories, and the latest trends in gardening to make
your outdoor space bloom with life. From a lotment adventures
to wildlife friendly gardening. I'm here to help you grow
your passion and read the rewards. So grab your gloves,
roll up your sleeves, and let's get started on this
year's gardening journey. Hey everybody, and welcome to Gardening with Ben.
Today is Saturday. The weekend is here. Hiphip, hooray. The
weekend is here. And hopefully we'll get some sunshine this
weekend because last weekend, as you remember, we had them
downfalls of rain. Wow did we get some rain last week.
I've not had to water all week outside. It's been
absolutely fantastic. But I missed out on being outside in
the garden because I couldn't do anything because of how
much rain we were getting last weekend. I was stuck
inside the polytunel. But I got loads of jobs done
inside the polytonel last weekend, so I was so happy.
I got on my tomatoes sorted, I got my peppers sorted,
I got my melons tied up. I gave everything a
good watering and a good feeding. I also set up
my irrigation system last week. If you've not seen that video,
go over onto my Facebook on my Instagram and check
out how I set up my irrigation and that has
been a godsend this week. It's worked fantastic and hopefully
it continues to work all the way up to October,
keeping the watered, keeping them hydrated, and hopefully getting a
lot of food, because that's one thing I always do.
I start off good with watering and then come towards
the end of the year, I can't be bothered anymore
and I give up. So hopefully all this irrigation system
will work and we'll keep getting tomatoes all the way
through to the end of the year. So the question
is what are we doing at our allotment this weekend?
That is the big question I always have. What am
I actually going to do this weekend? And what am
I going to tackle this week? So I think this
week's job is going to be going around my strawberry
beds and looking at all the runners, because at this
time of year, all the strawberry plants start sending out
all the little babies. And if you've never seen this before,
what it does is like you've got your mother plant,
which is a strawberry plant, and then it will send
shoots out from the side of it, and on them shoots,
you'll get two to three plants coming and growing. And
it's fantastic it because strawberry plants are expensive to buy,
and if you're getting three plants per sue, you're absolutely
doing fantastic. And what you can do with them three
plants is you don't just chop them off straight away.
What you need to do is pin them down into
the soil while they're connected onto this I call it
an umbilical cord. While it's connected to that, push it
down into some soil, peg it down so that it
takes root and the mother plant is still feeding it
and giving it what it needs. And once the roots
start to appear on the bottom, that is when you
can snip it off and it'll survive for itself and
it will get growing and then obviously you'll keep it
growing and then if you're going it in a pot,
then you can plant it out. I usually plant them
out around March time. I keep them watered in my
polytomol all through winter, and then I plant them out
about March time. But if not, if you're growing them
straight into the ground, then you can just plant them
straight into the ground and they will survive throughout the winter.
And it's sometimes good just to put some frost proof
netting over over them, just to give them that extra protection.
But they are strong plants and more often than not
they can survive throughout the winter. So that is one
thing I'm going to be doing. It's sorting out almost
strawberry plants. I've got about two hundred strawberry plants in
Some of them failed this year, so I need to
replace the ones that have died or not grown. And
there's some gaps in some areas, and I'm just going
to fill my bed full of strawberry plants. Honestly, I
can never have enough strawberry plants. I've got so many
strawberry plants and I could just have them. If I could,
i'd have them all the way down the sides of
the plots off the ground in like either guttering or
in tubs off the ground so that they hanger over
the edge and the sugs don't get them. Obviously, I
need to let them from the birds. But I see
so many new farms that are getting started where this
growing strawberries off the ground in guttering and stuff like that.
Now they're getting fantastic produce. So I'd love to give
that a trif I could. Maybe one year I'll try
and set it up, but for now they're staying in
the ground and we're planting more and more plants, so
I'll definitely be filming a video on that. And also
I just need to tidy up all my beds. Really,
that's one job that I do every single weekend. All
my beds I will weed every week. I don't weed
them in the week so don't get a chance for
being at work, but every week I will go around
and weed my beds in between all the vegetables and
dig the compost over so that if it does rain,
it'll go into the ground pretty easy, and even if
you're watering, it'll go into the ground easier if you've
dug it all over and that's what I do every
single week. If you keep on top of it, you
can It'll only take five minutes to do a bed
each week, and it's fantastic. Keeping on the top of
the weed is brilliant. It's when you go away on
holiday for a few weeks and you come back and
it's like jungle, and then it's hard to get back
on top of it. So if you manage to keep
on top of it and do it once a week,
you will keep your allotment pretty much weed free. And
another job that I need to do is trim back
all the bind weed is growing mental. Obviously, all the
rain that we've had has made it grow so much
this past week, so I need to go around and
start snipping back the bind weed. I'll never get rid
of it, that is one thing for sure, and it
keeps me a bit. It keeps me on my toes
and keeps me going. But yeah, that's one job that
I'm going to be doing. And then possibly next weekend
what you'll need to keep it eyeut for is I'll
possibly be planting my Christmas potatoes. Yes, the word Christmas
is coming and I usually plant them at the beginning
of August. In my polytunnel in boxes and then keep
the watered and they'll usually be ready around middle to
end of December, around Christmas time, so you gain fresh
vegetables on your table for Christmas Day. So if you
wanted to plant Christmas potatoes, get online get ordering your
see potatoes you can find online. They call them Christmas potatoes.
They even branded them in garden centers as Christmas potatoes.
Now they're that popular and they're trying to sell them,
so they brand them up as Christmas potatoes. So have
a look around. Get ready to get them planted in August.
Don't plant them outside. If you plant them outside, plant
them in boxes and have the boxes outside, but then
move them into your polytunnel or your greenhouse around September
October time when it starts to get colder, as that
will kill the plants off if we get a cold frost,
So keep them in the polytunnel. It's a lot easier
and you don't have to move them once they're in there,
because they do get pretty heavier once they're filled with
compost and filled with water obviously as well, but make
sure you've got plenty of draining in the bottom of
your boxes. So that they do drain away and they
don't make all the potatoes goy and rotten. So that's
the job that I'll be doing the week after. But
I should be saving all this for my podcast next week.
Not telling you all now what I'm doing. They meant
to keep it as a surprise. But yeah, hopefully we're
going to have a busy Saturday down at the allotment
today and hopefully tomorrow we'll be sharing with you everything
that we've got up to down at the Allotment, as
that's what I like to do. On the Sunday, You'll
hear what I've done on the Saturday, and on the
Monday you'll hear what I've done on the Sunday, if
that makes sense. But yeah, I hope that you've all
had a fantastic week at work, and I hope that
you all do manage to spend some time in your
gardens this weekend. Try and make the most of it,
Try and get some fresh air, try and get your
hands dirty, and enjoy being out in the garden everyone.
So until next time, everyone, remember keep smiling, keep shining,
and keep gardening with bet everyone. Thanks for tuning in
to today's episode of Gardening with Ben. I hope you've
enjoyed our chat and picked up some tips to help
your garden and allotment ride. Don't forget to stay connected
with me on all social media for even more gardening inspiration,
updates and behind the scenes content. You can find me
on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. Just search gardening with Ben.
Hit that follow button or subscribe button and join our
growing community of garden lovers. Until next time, everyone remember
keep smiling, keep shining, and keep gardening with Ben.