I thought I'd share with you some of my favourite products here. I do like to try to use my local garden centre if I can, but while they are closed, Amazon is doing a stirling job of getting me what I need.
I bought a couple of sets of these and have never looked back! They are a little flimsy so need to be treated with love, but you can remove each individual strip as your seedlings germinate and grow.
If you're Autumn sowing your sweet peas, and they're getting too big for their 9cm pots, pot them on into these pots which where the long roots of your sweet peas will be happiest while you grow them on until planting out in Spring. 2-3 plants per pot.
Liquid seaweed - a great feed for your plants - use according to the instructions but I use once or twice a week. Avoid the leaves and flowers of your plants, unless you don't mind some slight discolouration for a few days.
I LOVE these little pots. They are 9cm wide and 8cm deep which is the perfect size for pricking out your tiny seedlings into. You get 90 pots in each order with trays that holds 18 pots each which means you can carry them around to and from the greenhouse etc easily. I have bought 2 lots of these I'm such a fan, and although I'm not a fan of buying so much plastic, I will simply use and rinse out for next year - they were sturdy and none of them broke. I prick out into these then when they fill these pots (around 4-6 weeks), they are ready to go into the ground.
Plant labels - it took me AGES to find these - rough on one side so you can use a pencil to label and simply rub off at the end of the season to re-use. Or smooth on the other if you prefer a pen.
Bigger Plant Pots for Potting On - this seller on e-bay has pots of all sizes - I have bought the 1.5L pots for potting on my cosmos that got too big for the pots above before it was time to go out and also the 3L pots for potting up my dahlia tubers. He seems to go on holiday quite a lot (!) but he's fast when he's back :)
After the birds ate all six of my nigella, I bought one of these. I put it up in less than 20 minutes - it's very simple to use. I use this out in our field where there are deer and rabbits and all sorts - just until the plants get big enough to fend for themselves!
These plant supports are great if you have peonies or dahlias - to keep them upright. If you are growing loads then you'll want to use netting or some more economical way of supporting them but as I have individual peonies in the garden - I'm trying these this year as usually they flower and then fall straight over:(
These are one of those things no one tells you about but are the best bit of kit EVER! You stick them into the ground to hold down greenhouse guy ropes, enviromesh or weed suppressant, when you're marking out your bed with string, to hold your sweetpea nets in at the bottom, to fix your cloche to the ground - I could go on.
You can sprinkle this stuff over your seeds when you plant them and whether they prefer light or dark, this seems to tick every box no matter how fussy your seeds. When you water your seeds, it's heavy enough that it just gets wet - instead of soil which can wash away, taking your seeds with it.
If you love Charles Dowding's no-dig method and want to replicate, then here's how to get hold of seaweed if you don't live anywhere near the sea. And even if you do, unless you know how to calcify it (??!)
if you need HUGE amounts of compost, you're far better off buying by the huge bag rather than the little ones you get from the garden centre. Be prepared to shift whatever they bring in a day though as they will leave it outside your front door blocking the pavement!
A 6m x 1m beds, 15cm deep will require 900L of compost to fill so one of these bags would be perfect. Also check your local compost centre.
I did a lot of research for affordable raised beds and these were the best I could find. You do have to build them yourself but it's very easy and gives you a chance to learn how to screw things together if you've never done that before (which I hadn't). Now I'm doing everything on the cheap I'm using pallets that we break up and screw together but these are prettier and mine have lasted me four years so far.
Please note: I may be paid a small commission if you purchase some of these products - but please be assured that I will only recommend products I have used and liked and it's good to know that the commissions go back into expanding The Floral Project so thank you!
