Theo Markettos wrote:
:: I've been posting here a little for a while, but I ought to do a
:: proper introduction, so...
::
:: I'm a student and, for the first time I'm living in a house that
:: a) doesn't have wall-to-wall grass or concrete or someone to
:: maintain it and b) I don't get chucked out of in June (bit
:: annoying from a gardening point of view, that). With much learnt
:: from this group and not much help from the weather the vegetable
:: plot is in full swing and I'm trying to work out what else has
:: been left by previous occupants.
::
:: AFAICS the garden has once had gardening efforts applied given
:: there were a few self-seeded lettuces around, some things that
:: look something like wild carrots (they're feathery but have a big
:: taproot but not really rounded like a carrot) and a large patch of
:: rhubarb. It's about 1m wide by 8m long at
:: the south east end of the garden so that it gets sun for a large
:: proportion of the day, but up against the shed on the SE side and
:: a fence on the SW side.
::
:: Last year we moved in in July and it was heavily cropping: I don't
:: think the people who were here before us for 2 years touched it.
:: So we were eating as much rhubarb as we could and it was still
:: going in October. I covered it with maybe 1-2cm manure and come
:: March it was peeping up again. As far as I could see the woody
:: bit of each plant was maybe 1ft across.
::
:: It's been growing vigourously since then except about three weeks
:: ago there was a storm in which what appeared to be icecubes fell
:: from the sky - they were solid clear ice, not white like
:: hailstones, maybe 7mm across. Having this pelted at it flattened
:: the rhubarb quite considerably and it's looking rather unhappy
:: now, like it's been sat on. We haven't been eating very much
:: since then. There are lots of thin (1/2 inch) shoots at ground
:: level, but fewer thick shoots going upwards.
::
:: I pulled some of the broken stems yesterday (there were some with
:: ants
:: living inside) and took about 8 more good ones to eat. So I'm
:: wondering what's the best thing to do: pull more so new growth
:: comes through or thin out to allow existing squashed ones to
:: fatten up? Does it matter, from the plant's point of view, that
:: the shoots are flat against the ground with thin stems since I
:: assume they are still receiving sunlight OK?

My rhubarb is very prolific although we eat very little of it[1], it's
fairly sheltered having walls to the North and West of it so it can be
picked as early as March, I have never given it any kind of fertiliser,
watered it or anything else and it just keeps getting bigger, the one plant
must be 2 metres across, it invades the path and I keep chopping about 15 -
20 sticks and leaves off but I have to do this about every month from late
April through to about September.

Only if we have apple & rhubarb crumble (with the obligatory custard of
course), which is about five or six times per year!

--
If God had intended us to drink beer, He would have given us stomachs.