Muintir na Tire School Garden Competition

  Celeriac If you like the taste of celery, but find it a little cumbersome, then celeriac is the vegetable for you. Celeriac has a similar flavour to celery, but is grown for its knobbly, turnip-shaped swollen stem. As vegetables go, celeriac is ugly as sin, but don’t let that fool you – it tastes delicious. It’s very hardy and stores extremely well. A decent crop of celeriac can see you right through the winter months to late March. Celeriac is also referred to as knob celery or turnip-rooted celery. SOWING Celeriac needs a fertile soil, so add a general fertiliser a week or two before transplanting. Celeriac and celery are the only two crops that need to be sown in an open tray and ‘pricked out’ – this is because the seed is very small and slow to germinate. Sow the seed in March, inside in a warm place. Scatter seeds thinly on an open seed tray – the seeds should only be lightly covered with soil, as some light is required for germination. When the seedlings are about 2cm ...

  Brussels Sprouts While many people will only associate Brussels sprouts with Christmas dinner, you can (and should) enjoy this veg for most of the year. Not only are their tons of nutritional benefits from eating sprouts, they also play a vital role in the winter veg garden for many GIYers. While they do have a long growing season (8 months), they are extremely prolific – just three or four plants will produce a mound of produce in the lean winter months, with each healthy plant producing up to 2kg of sprouts. SOWING Dig in some well-rotted manure or apply a general fertiliser a week before sowing. Do not grow Brussels sprouts anywhere that you have grown any member of the cabbage family the previous year (cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, kohlrabi, collards and kale). The best way to manage all these veg is to create a crop rotation scheme prior to growing. Sow in March or April in module trays indoors. Sow one seed per module, 2cm deep. GROWING Transplant when p...

  Yacon Yacon looks like a very large potato, but it has a surprisingly sweet, apple-like taste and a juicy texture. It’s creating quite the buzz among nutritionists because of the unusual way it stores its carbs, as indigestible sugar (insulin) rather than starch. It is therefore highly promising as a way to introduce sweetness into the diet of diabetics. SOWING Yacon will grow in any reasonably fertile soil but will be most productive in soil with compost and a general fertiliser added a week or two before. Yacon is grown from tubers from last year’s crop. There are two types of tubers – the knobbly ‘stem’ tubers that grow just under the surface around the stalk of the plant and look a lot like Jerusalem artichokes, and the large, smooth edible tubers that grow outside of these. The former are the ones used for propagating the following year’s crop, while the latter are for eating. Separate the knobbly tubers in March, making sure you have a growth point on each. Plant each one i...

  Potatoes Where would the GIYer be without the humble spud? Spuds can be grown pretty much anywhere, produce a high yield from a relatively small space and store well. No wonder they have been a staple diet for Irish families for centuries. Digging for your first new potatoes will be like Christmas morning – we promise! SOWING Potatoes thrive in a good fertile soil to grow well. For best results add compost and a general fertiliser a week or two before planting. Potato leaves are frost sensitive, so if you intend to grow an early crop we suggest buying some fleece to protect your plants. Potatoes are grown from last year’s potatoes, known as seed potatoes. These can be potatoes you save yourself or purchased certified seed potatoes. Buying certified seed potatoes guarantees the potatoes are virus free – these can be found in garden centres and hardware shops from January-April. There are two types of potato variety: earlies and maincrop. Earlies are for harvesting in the summer an...

  Leeks Leeks are quite easy to grow and will withstand even the harshest winter. For many GIYers they are the only crop left in the soil during the winter months. They are another of the classic ‘stockpot’ vegetables. We eat the white part or stem of leeks – it is more accurately a rolled leaf rather than a stem (if you want to be pedantic about it). SOWING Leeks are heavy feeders so it’s best to grow them in fertile soil that has been enriched with plenty of farmyard manure or compost. Spread a general purpose organic fertiliser before planting out. Leeks can be grown in modules before being transplanted, but are probably easiest to grow in a seedbed outside. For early leeks, sow in March. For maincrop leeks, sow April. If sowing outside, sow thinly, 1cm deep in rows 15cm apart. If sowing in modules, sow one or two seeds per module, 1cm deep. GROWING Leeks will be ready to plant out about two months after sowing when they are about 1cm thick and 20cm long. To transplant, mak...