Kitchen Gardener Rob Smith is making more currants and boosting beans
By putting in a bit of work now my crops will flourish again next year
Earlier in the year I decided to have a go at growing something a little different and tried my hand at Chinese artichokes (Stachys affinis) for the first time. I decided to grow them in large pots due to their reported tendency to reappear each year if grown in the open garden; happily I can report this was a success! The plants grew well and produced foliage that almost looked like a cross between stinging nettles, lemon balm and mint (to which they are related) reaching around 60cm (2ft) tall. Now the frost’s killed the foliage it’s time to harvest some of the tubers by removing the plant from the pot and picking a few of the larger ones. You don’t need to harvest everything in one go as long as you leave the pot next to a wall for some shelter and protection from the rain. You should be able to keep harvesting as you need to; just remember to dig all your tubers before spring and plant a few for next year’s crop before they start to emerge as a thicket.
As the garden’s still producing lots of green waste I thought I’d put it to good use rather than simply composting it, so I’m digging my bean trenches and courgette/ squash pits now. I like to dig a trench or pit around a spade’s depth, adding composting waste from the kitchen and green waste to the hole as it’s produced. This not only adds organic matter to the planting holes (all these crops are heavy feeders) but also gives you somewhere to put the compostable matter, as my compost bins are pretty full at this time of year already! You can line the trench with newspaper but as I don’t have a daily paper, that doesn’t work for me; so I use old garden catalogues (I’m sure you’ll have loads of them!). When using printed paper, steer clear from the shiny stuff as this can be difficult to compost down.
Now they’re dormant and have lost their leaves, it’s also time to take hardwood cuttings of any currant varieties you want to propagate more of, be it red, black, white or pink! I’ve decided I’m going to add more currants to the boundary hedge and the flower slopes between the levels in my kitchen garden. However, I don’t want to buy the plants and have decided to create new ones from cuttings. Selecting healthy stems from this year’s growth, I’ll cut them from the plant just under a leaf node then remove any soft growth at the tip, leaving me with 30cm (1ft) long cuttings. Some will be pushed two
thirds of the way into a mix of sandy compost in old rose pots (the longer, square ones) and kept in the cold frame to root (four per pot), while others will be dipped in hormone powder and pushed straight into the ground where they are to grow. Come next autumn the potgrown ones should be ready to plant out where they’re needed. This method of propagation not only works for currants but mulberries as well, so why not have a go at creating your own mulberry bush, or take a longer cutting of a currant to create your own mini ‘standard’ currant?
Just remember to rub the lower buds off to create a small stem.