HELP - what can I plant now?

[invisiblepiper]

OK - I was too lazy at the beginning of the year to really plant much. I have herbs and tatties ok - but the snails ate my seedling beetroots and cabbages and radishes. (We're having a plague this year!)

So - what can I plant now! For autumn/winter?
Its been warm recently - and winter is not usually harsh - but VERY windy and sea side location.

Also - an organic way to stop snails?

[Penny Lane]

There's plenty that can be sown in Autumn ready for next Spring, if I can get my arse in to gear I'll be doing the same.
Hopefully will be sowing spring onion, cabbage, calabrese, peas, board beans, garlic & onion and I'm sure there's a variety of purple sprouting broccoli & kale that can sown this month.
Need to buy the seeds now!

eta - you can still sow salad crops & beetroot now too :)

[Odsox]

Also - an organic way to stop snails?

Copper rings work well, but they are very expensive to buy ready made.

I made a load of them out of an old hot water cylinder and I have slug free cauliflowers for the first time since moving here.
What I intend to do now is make a threshold strip for the polytunnel out of flattened 1" copper pipe, to stop them moving in for the winter.

Apparently it gives them a slight electric shock, although I've never asked them if it's true.

[boboff]

If you can get to a Market, a traditional one, with Farmers and all that, you can get Bare Root Brassicas and Leeks, and you wouldn't be any further behind than anyone else. Last year I saw these at Hatherliegh Market, and the were very Cheap, 50 plants or so for a couple of quid.

[Clara]

It's hot here and I'm still sowing....cabbages, lettuces, spinach, chinese leaves (was a leaf day yesterday) and beans today (fruit till 11am wednesday). I've just got some pumpkins come up too,so if you can find any pumpkin/squash plantlets they'd be good to get out now along with any brassicas.

[Muscroj]

I just sowed some carrots yesterday after reading the lable & finding out they can be sown until the end of July for harvesting in November, so I filled in the gaps where the earlier sowings weren't so successful

[prison break fan]

Salad leaves, beetroot, carrots, leeks all going in on my plot in the next few days! pbf.

[Mrs Moustoir]

In the past week I've sown turnips (navets as they are called here - little white ones with purple tops), kohl rabi, more French beans, peas and carvello nero black kale. In this warm weather, the seeds were up within a day or two.

The kohl rabi is quite a good one to sow as the pests don't seem to like it much. The slugs and snails have a nibble but the cabbage white butterflies and flea beetle don't seem to like it much. It tastes like a mild swede/neep and grows quite quickly. If you plant it now, you could be eating them by September and they look like some alien vegetable!

[invisiblepiper]

Thanks everyone - that's a bit more encouraging!
As for the snails - the plants weren't getting high emough for copper rings - they are just being razed overnight - even the bit of radish which showed above soil level were eaten
I've taken to batting the wee b*gg*rs into the sea with an old tennis raquet - is that organic?

[ina]

Also - an organic way to stop snails?

Eat them?

I've got the same problem - huge snails, climbing up the sunflowers and all...

Have just sown swedes and purple tops; planning to do spring onions, lambs lettuce, rocket (the first lot bolted) and radishes. I think there's something like winter lettuce, which might be worth looking at... Possibly a few more peas in a pot.

[Peggy Sue]

I have sewn radish & winter radish yesterday, there's a great variety of quick Broccoli you can sew next month from realseed, also Pak choi, corriander have to be after mid summer, and land cress alos best sewn after mid summer. Carrots and beetroot you an still sew and ofcourse lettuce.

I got my allotment at this time of year so in the excitement I grew lots of late-in-the-year stuff

[Millymollymandy]

I grow coriander all through the summer Peggy Sue - why do you say not to sow them now? You need to sow successionally every few weeks or so to have a continual crop. Lots of mine self seed anyway!

[ina]

I grow coriander all through the summer Peggy Sue - why do you say not to sow them now?

I think if you read more closely, what she means is it has to be sown after midsummer - which would be now! Coriander is less likely to do well earlier in the year - I think it needs a bit more heat than we usually have...

[Peggy Sue]

I grow coriander all through the summer Peggy Sue - why do you say not to sow them now?

I think if you read more closely, what she means is it has to be sown after midsummer - which would be now! Coriander is less likely to do well earlier in the year - I think it needs a bit more heat than we usually have...

Well what I was told, and seems to be true in my experience is it runs to seed v quickly sewn in spring, and lasts long enough to use a bit if sewn late summer. My guess is different country, different climate, who knows!

[Millymollymandy]

It doesn't need heat Ina - your climate ought to be ideal for it . It grows best in a temp of about 15C when it doesn't run to seed so quickly. It grows all through the winter and can be picked all year round. It goes to seed quickly which is why I keep saying that you have to keep sowing seed every few weeks. I grow it all year round.