Sowing Broad Beans

Latest post from MARKSVEGPLOT – a blog about food and gardening in England”

Look at this and tell me what you see…

Jane thinks “Laundry pills”. I think “Seed-container”!

I’m sure we all get through loads of containers like this, and most of them end up in the waste-bin, but with a few minute’s work they can be made in to very useful seed-containers.

The blue top bit comes off very easily – you just unclip it:

Drill a few holes in the bottom to allow for drainage:

Then simply fill with soil / compost and sow your seeds!

Containers like this are eminently suitable for big seeds that produce big roots, such as Broad Beans or Runner Beans. It’s too early to sow the tender Runner Beans, but February is a good time for sowing Broad Beans. This year I am going to grow a new type called “Robin Hood”, kindly provided for me to review by Marshalls.

The packet says “Neat and compact plant growth makes these perfect for container gardening as well as in direct soil.” Sounds perfect for my small veg-plot.

I have sowed 18 Broad Bean seeds, 6 in each of 3 of these containers. By the way, the seeds are shown on the surface here, just to give an idea of spacing, but after I had taken the photos I pushed the seeds down into the soil, with a thin edge uppermost in order to minimise the risk of rotting.

The containers are now in one of my plastic mini-greenhouses, on the top shelf. I just hope the mice don’t find them!

To read more articles like this, on Gardening and Gastronomy, please visit * http://marksvegplot.blogspot.com/ *