On 30/10/2010 18:39, Rusty Hinge wrote:
Spider wrote:

Thanks Baz, that is hugely reassuring! It's good to know it will take
a bit of winter punishment. I went out yesterday and had to *drag* a
huge slug off R. Victoria. UGH! (Have you ever seen a flying slug? :~})

Yes, often, and usually retreating very fast in a graceful arc.

:~)) They make pigs look quite clumsy.


Because slugs often chomp on frost damaged plants, and this slug was
in a hollowed stem, I was convinced something was very wrong. These
two crowns are so precious that I'm going to be paranoid until they
sprout in spring.

They will. It takes a lot to kill-off a rhubarb crown, though it will
reward you if you cosset it.

Most reassuring, but it will undoubtedly be cossetted due to its provenence.


You have made me feel much better, thanks, and I may even sleep tonight.

I have been advised only to dress the soil with bonemeal at planting
time to encourage rooting. In spring, I will feed it on chix poo
pellets .. then stand well back :~)

I'd be careful - chicken litter needs about two years' composting before
it's safe for use on some plants. If it pongs, it suggests to me that it
hasn't been composted long enough. The urea in it scorches, I believe.

The chicken poo I'll be using is the commercial pelleted sort which, I
believe, is fairly slow release. That is to say, it shouldn't burn the
plants.

I would give it a mulch of well-rotted horse, cow, or pig manure and
cover it with dead leaves or something similar, and feed the slugs with
some nice tasty pellets...

I'd rather feed the slugs on tarmac and hot tyres.


If you want smelly rhubarb fertiliser, wait until it starts sprouting
and steep nettles in water. When it smells absolutely disgusting it's a
fit meal for rhubarb (and tomatoes). Use sparingly and often, and
assuming you *WILL* leave the crowns unpulled (my advice would be to
leave them to their own devices for the first year), nettle sou^h^ugh!
is a good foliar feed - diluted.

I intend to refrain from pulling stems the first year. Should I let the
stems die back in their own way, or cut them back at the end of the
season? Also, do I pull or cut out any flower stems, please?

Just remember, rhubarb is a damp-ground plant, and it's difficult to
give it too much water when it's in growth. It likes humus in the soil
too, so dress it regularly with compost. leaf-mould, well-rotted muck etc.

It will have plenty of humus, being next to my compost heaps, but it
will be watered religiously during the growing season.

When you come to divide the crowns, lift them and replant some of the
satellite crowns, discarding the centre - or better, use the centre(s)
to force early rhubarb in a warm humid place in the early spring, *THEN*
discard them.


Sounds like good advice. Thanks.

I lost a previous crown of rhubarb to Honey Fungus. I never saw the
toadstools, but the dead crown and the earth reeked strongly of
mushrooms. Since rhubarb is prone to HF, I assumed the worst. I hope
the same doesn't happen to my new crowns. They are not planted near the
original site, so fingers crossed.

--
Spider
from high ground in SE London
gardening on clay