Super Salad!

I've said it before, I'll say it again and I'll keep on saying it – salad leaves are one of the easiest and most rewarding things for any urban gardener to grow! A large proportion of food waste comprises of bags of mushy brown salad leaves that have sat in the fridge and turned to mulch. When growing your own is this easy, those wasteful bags could soon become a thing of the past!
This is the third batch of salad leaves I've grown in this window box on the London Vegetable Garden this summer. Were I not experimenting with all sorts of crops in pots and vegetables, I could have dedicated the whole balcony to salad leaves and even in this small space, have been self-sufficient in terms of salad leaf needs.

In addition to how easy these plants are to grow, they also grow very quickly, making them ideal for people without much space. They also only really need soil, sunlight and watering, so even if you have no outside space whatsoever, an empty ice-cream tub on a windowsill will work just as well.

It's a fantastic feeling eating your own produce; and when it's as easy as lettuce, there's really no excuse for not giving it a go. Great taste, growing satisfaction and it will save you throwing away money each time you dispose of a brown salad bag from the supermarket. Why not give it a go?

For urban growing advice and to see how you could start growing your own salad leaves, come and visit the London Gardeners' Network today!

Pests Ahoy!

One of the (few) real benefits of high-rise urban gardening is the lack of pests. Many gardeners I've spoken with recently have all bemoaned the rate at which snails, slugs and various garden pests are converging on crops and causing a nuisance of themselves.

Luckily, living away from the ground in urban London means that the only pests I have to deal with on the balcony are horses – as in clothes horses, laden with wet clothes and competing for space alongside plant pots, grow bags and watering cans!

This said, I did see a tiny slug on one of the leaves a few weeks back, which I presume must have been secreted in amongst some recent bedding plants that are brightening up a window box. Whitefly has also been a problem, but again, these pests were imported with some potted herbs that remained in the kitchen; luckily none of the outside plants were infected.

I was looking through my runner beans a few minutes ago when I came across this chap:


I've seen these insects before, but not on the balcony. Can anyone identify this creature and if so, is it a friend or a foe? Is it some form of aphid?