Somewhere in England there is an attractive woman called Claire who has an insatiable desire to tell you what she plants in her allotment and how she goes about it. Claire is a really hard worker. In this, Part 6 in the Claire’s Allotment series, she shows us how to clean a greenhouse. It’s common sense really. You sweep it, removing any excess grass, paper, plastic, bits and pieces. Then you take out the shelves and wash them. You also wash the walls of the greenhouse (don’t forget the door) with disinfectant to kill any bugs that may be harmful to plants in future. And you are ready for spring.

Our “little bit average” Ozzie presenter, the same guy who took us through the basics of tomato growing in a previous video — without telling us a whole lot — now takes us to the suburban garden of a friend to show us — a distant tomato plant in a pot. This is a cunning way of showing us that we can grow tomato plants in a pot at home. Just in case we didn’t get it, he told the audience: “You can grow a tomato plant in a pot at home.” An interesting little bit of wisdom did come out of the video though. You don’t do anything to plants except water them until they start flowering. Just stake it as it grows. That’s it.

This video is a punt for an electronic product called Rapitest. Although it’s an advert it is well worth the 1 min, 26 seconds it take to watch it. It is interesting to learn that a small electronic device can tell you this much about the environment in which you have planted or are planning to plant lawns, shrubs, flowers trees and even plants in containers.

As the spokesperson rightly says, “Healthy soil and the correct soil for the plant in question are key to successful gardening and lawn care.” This little device tests a whole range of factors, including the soil quality. First it measures light so you can be sure you are planting the plant in the right spot. Then it tests fertility so you can see whether composting is required. It also tests the pH so you can ascertain if the soil is acid or alkaline. Some plants are sensitive to pH. Finally it tests moisture. Is the soil too wet, too dry, just right? I like this last feature for house plants, or any plants in containers, which are notoriously susceptible to dying of thirst. This Rapitest electronic soil tester is a neat device for keen gardeners who like accuracy and dislike failure.

Here’s Tomato Gardening for Dummies, or Tomato Planting 101.

The blurb says: “Are farm stand tomatoes still not fresh enough for you? If so, then you will probably want to grow your own. There are many varieties of tomatoes and the good news is that you do not have to choose just one.”

It sounds promising but all you really get to see is a tousled lady sitting in an ancient armchair in a garden shed (one assumes this is a garden shed as this is a gardening show. It might be her house for all we know.)

And yet some interesting things emerged from the video, such as an insight into what made the early tomato breeders tick. Some of the extraordinary names they called the old classic varieties include Brandy Wine, Burpees, Green Zebra and Zorba — not a single one of which makes you think “tomato.” In fact, they make you think “disease,” as they are highly susceptible to tomato sicknesses.

The number of modern hybrid tomato varieties available is startling. You get plum, cherry, stewing, drying, bottling, salad — and all of them are disease-resistant (bred for resistance) and many of them bear fruit all year round. Get advice from your nursery before buying a selection of plants. And — this is important — when buying the plants you should buy the staking materials you will need. It’s best to have the stakes in place before the vines grow, then train them up the stakes as they grow.

Our Lady of the Shed says you can use things like hockey sticks and fishing rods (?) to stake your tomatoes but you should avoid your garden looking like a junkyard.

Gardenmagik spokesperson Melissa Allman says there are two types of folks in the South: those who plant their own tomatoes and those who will plant their own tomatoes. This is an 8 min, 7 second “audio visual” (Melissa talking to camera) giving us a kind of overview of tomato planting for amateurs.

Prospective tomato growers need to consider your garden size when thinking about planting tomatoes as the bushes can be determinate or indeterminate. This refers to their size. Determinate vines are predictable. You know how big they will be. But the indeterminate types can be really huge — only you don’t know just how huge! They might need caging or staking.

You also have to decide what size fruits you want. You get the small cherry / grape sized fruits and then at the other extreme some types that can weigh 5 – 7 lbs! And when do you want your tomato plants to bear fruit? Their are spring types, summer types and autumn types.

Melissa says it’s better to prepare the soil in the fall when you can plant other crops. The soil needs to be acidic (pH about 6.5) but it’s good to add lime when getting the soil ready. This is really important for the calcium that tomatoes need so much. A lack of calcium leads to all kinds of disorders, from rotting fruit through to leaf curl.

When planting tomato plants you need to fertilize the soil at a ratio of 15:15:15, referring to Nitrogen, Phosphorous and Potassium. As the plants grow you can change the ratio to 5:10:15. Melissa says that too much nitrogen might hinder the plant’s ability to absorb calcium — this you don’t want to do.

Young SprinklerDaddy over at YouTube sums up the difference between spray and drip irrigation quite nicely:

SPRAY IRRIGATION Here a spray head is attached to a pipe for widespread water about 6′ to 12′ in all directions. “This method is good for watering a large bed of flowers or perennials that are all the same size,” says SprinklerDaddy. And lawns, he might have added. It is not suitable for a bed where there are different sized plants as the larger shrubs tend to block the water and the small shrubs get nothing.

DRIP IRRIGATION SprinklerDaddy really likes drip irrigation. He describes it as “cool.” He says: “This is for localized type of watering where you want to get water to the root of each shrub. There is no blocking out of smaller plants and no wasted water. It is a really good option when mulching. Once you have put down the bark or rocks, lay the pipes on top and cover with mulch. No need to dig a trench for the pipes.” And no need to watch the 1 min, 48 sec video either. All you will see is a talking head repeating what I have written above.

Somewhere down in Texas one winter, a man looked at the camera to tell us about the two types of irrigation you can use for your raised garden bed. According to the man with the winter grass stretching out behind him, compliments of ExpertVillage and YouTube, you can have Precision Button Irrigation (for directing water to a specific area) and Laser Drip Irrigation (for soaking a wide area).

Button irrigation involves small pipes leading off a main hose with a button at the base to control the flow of dripping water. Laser irrigation is a long, thin pipe with laser holes drilled all over it allowing water to leak all over the required area. If you want a short visit down south for some contrasting visuals and some very basic information, spend 1 minute, 53 seconds checking out Mr. “Lone Star” Irrigation.

At 40 seconds, this little tomato plant selection guide is short and sweet. You get two types of tomato plant: vine and bush. Some are big, some are small. Consider the size area available before buying a tomato plant. If you have very little space, consider choosing cherry tomatoes. Above all, ask the experts at the garden center before making a decision.

Seeing a couple of survivalists and their bad old truck somewhere way out in the country where they have cultivated squashes and zucchinis raises all sorts of questions. If these people had to live off the land, why would they want to live at all? They seem to live such tortured, suspicious lives as it is. An international conflagration is what they live for. What would be left for them if it actually happened?

Anyway, this country boy tells us that tinned food and MRE’s (Standard USG issued, preprocessed enclosed meal, including a balanced mix of foods, for consumption during wartime by US troops) is all very well but what if you have to feed yourself for six months? A year? Two years? A vegetable patch is the answer. The video shows how the squash and zucchinis grow practically wild in a field. They are affordable and a certain number are kept for seed production. Seems a bit of a sad idea really, planting vegetables for Armageddon.

Somewhere in England there is an attractive woman called Claire who has an allotment and an insatiable desire to tell us what she grows there and how she goes about it. In this — Part 9 in the Claire’s Allotment series — Claire takes 5 minutes to show us how to avoid carrot fly in carrots and onion fly in onions. You simply plant onions and carrots together in one bed. This is because onion flies hate the smell of carrots and carrot flies hate the smell of onions. Therefore the flies stay away in droves.

You plant the little onion bulbs (you buy them ready to plant) and the carrot seeds in rows (“drills” they call rows in England) about 3″ to 4″ apart, with the rows themselves a little further apart — about 8″ to 12″. Remember to turn the soil over really well, breaking up the clods and removing the stones, as carrots need soft soil to grow. If they hit a rock or a hard place they tend to produce “prongs” and then you get carrots that look like alien vegetable matter. For the record, Claire quite likes these extraordinarily shaped carrots…