Having grown cabbages for a few years, this year i have decided for a change to try Sprouts. I need some advice on growing them please; best variety to grow (compact if possible), seed or young plants from nursery, planting distances cropping, care etc
Thanks
As new to the allotment game I grew BS I didn't do too bad got a crop for two dinners as alot of them blew which I have since read make sure they are well packed into the soil so thats my tip ! Not sure if its true of not of course.
I have been having some mixed results over the last few years and have been trying different varieties. Trouble is you have to wait another year before you know if you have found a 'good un'
I tried 'Maximus' last year and I am quite pleased with them. They are not too big i.e. up to about 1"-1¼" diameter and quite solid. ( see picture)
This is how I grow mine; http://tinyurl.com/yb5wcn
Incidently my soil is fairly light hence the canes.
(http://www.thegardenersalmanac.co.uk/Web%20pics/Sprouts.JPG)
PSB (Purple Sprouting Broccoli) is a better return on time and effort if you are branching out into other brassicas. Sprouts do need a lot of time and a heavy soil...
:-\
Those look great TG
Thanks.
I should add that I do have quite heavy soil, and have an area 1.5m x1m to grow them in.
Also i dont like broccoli, but really like sprouts!
Do i get the feeling though that they are the brassica equivalent of broad beans - you need to grow a lot of plants to get a decent crop?
Thanks for that Saddad
I have gone off Purple sprouting and gone on to Calabrese I have found that Chevalier & Samson keeps me in Heads and spears for 6-8 weeks, and sometimes more.
I find Chevalier heads just a bit quicker than Samson meaning that by the time I have eaten the primary heads from the Chevalier the second batch (Samson) is ready, then by the time I have finshed these, the spears are ready on the first lot, followed by the second batch.
Then if I ensure they don't flower I can be picking for weeks.
I hate to disagree with anyone, but I can't agree that Sprouts need more care than, say, PSB.
Both, when home grown, seem to need staking thoroughly. PSB even more than Sprouts. Good, solid, long-lasting stakes. Both need repetitive picking.
Yes, Sprouts are more prone to crawlies than PSB, but plant for plant, weight for weight, surely give as good a return, or better?
And while we are about it, why always PSB? Why not WSB? Much sweeter, & a nicer colour!!
Finally - was just going to say http://www.fothergills.co.uk/en/brussels-sprouts-maximus-f1-848.aspx - but TG beat me to it. With some pretty damned good examples!
And having just seen (can't type fast enough) the follow-ups, surely Calabrese doesn't overwinter & into the Spring? Different kettle of fish??
we grow early half tall sprouts and falstaff, a red one, and red bull, another red one, we got brilliant results, weeded the ground, limed it, raked the lime in, stomped on it, planted the sprout, already grown, stomped it in, put a cabbage collar round it, staked it and kept stomping them in if the wind was very bad
we got loads, off 5 plants, the red ones did nothing, don't know wh :)
also covered with netting, didn't stop the whitefly though :)
Maybe it's all this 'stomping' that Dad's going on about??
What, please, are 1/2 tall Sprouts? Worth it??
well, ours were 4 feet tall and covered top to bottom, a few of the bottom ones blew so we picked them off and the rest were fine, just called early half tall, nice taste :)
Just to say I echo Tim's words another good variety that I have grown is F1 Doric I have found with sprouts that you can plant them at 2ft apart where PSB needs 2 1/2 ft.Thats about 60cm and 75cm for them that do not know English.
If 4' is 1/2 tall, I'm back to the drawing board!!
We do White sprouting and 9* perennial as well. You can still find it but I find it only lasts two or three years...
;D
Firm ground and staking, in my opinion, are most important with sprouts. They you should get nice full stems of tight sprouts. I grow red and green. Last year we had more reds than greens, and funnily enough manic, this year the reds haven't done as much.
I think everyone will have a different opinion of what is their fave sprout. Harvest dates might be something to think about if you want them for Christmas dinner, or November, or February for example. You can get sprouts to cover several months. And you don't need masses of plants for masses of meals. You see how many sprouts are on each of TG's plants, and they will be good sized sprouts which need little cleaning up, will be crisp and nutty. One plant will do several meals, and you have the brussel tops which are a delicacy in themselves.
I also do 9*, WSB, PSB and calabrasse. I do love my greens. Had the last of the romanesco tonight, delicious, although don't shout, but it was in a veggie curry. :P
Grown peter gynt 2 years running. Not too good a crop on my old plot. They're a dwarf variety.
Gonna try Fill Basket this year. Large sprouts!
Sprout varieties:
Peter gynt - Crops Sept-Jan
Diablo - early crop
Igor - vigorous plants producing good yields
Wellington - Very hardy. Crops Dec-Mar
Braveheart - Crops xmas to spring
Seem to always have lots of white fly round my brassicas. This year I took advice from EJ and grew "Brilliant" brussel sprouts and they were brilliant! I have still plenty left and had masses for the Christmas dinner. They were nice and firm and were a lovely tasting sprout, so will be doing the same variety again this year. :) busy_zlizzie
A good dwarf sprout that I grow is Seven Hills:
http://www.eseeds.com/c-4027-brassica-oleracea-var-gemmifera-seven-hills.aspx (http://www.eseeds.com/c-4027-brassica-oleracea-var-gemmifera-seven-hills.aspx)
http://www.kingsseeds.com/kolist/1/VEGETABLES/B/BRUSSELS+SPROUT (http://www.kingsseeds.com/kolist/1/VEGETABLES/B/BRUSSELS+SPROUT)
Nice compact plants that fill nicely with sprouts that can be planted closer together and don't get blown around so much. None of mine have blown ulike half my full sized plants and the only trouble I had was slugs and snails when they first went in and white fly as a cosmetic problem from late summer.
I grew brussel sprouts for the first time this year - tried to grow some red ones but they were pretty feeble. Perhaps it was a bad year for reds and not just me! Will try green ones next year!
I don't want to think of having no brussels sprouts in the garden. My vegetable garden is at the bottum of the dunes, so always strong westen wind (storm at the moment ;D ) and I have of course so close to the beach sandy soil. In november I dig in lots ans lots of manure and just before planting I stamp the soil a lot. With all that manure and compost ( from the compost bin) it feels like clay ;D. I plant always in the direction south- north and in 2 rows. No staking at all is needed.
Thanks for replies. The whole matter seems a lot clearer now (i think). I think i had better start cross referencing this thread with a seed catalogue, and try to decide what one i want to grow!
Just a note on growing brassicas; as i mentioned above i normaly grow cabbages, usualy spring and summer croppers> However last year i had trouble with my winter cabbages (they bolted), and whilst the summer ones grew OK (once protected from caterpillars and pigeons), they crop at a time when we dont really want to eat them! Salads are the norm in summer not cooked veg, so while we ate some of the cabbages, a lot went to waste.
Thus i have decided to try something different. I dont like broccoli and cauliflowers are too like cabbages in terms of cropping. So having recently discovered sprouts to eat, I decided to try them out. Later cropping means they should be ready at a time we will want to eat them. They also strike me as a good, long term crop needing minimal attention aother than staking and watering. Which i a plus in my book!
we grew a cabbage this year for salads, called kalibos, lovely and crunchy, also steamed some, that was nice as a veg, good luck with your sprouts, we love 'em :)
Some of the Summer cabbage stand really well.. we grow Minicole and have literally just eaten our last ones this week... cut from the lottie, not even stored.
;D
Quote from: saddad on January 11, 2007, 12:00:15
Some of the Summer cabbage stand really well.. we grow Minicole and have literally just eaten our last ones this week... cut from the lottie, not even stored.
;D
Surely those would be technicaly 'Autumn' Cabbages? The seasonal prefix really only refers to when they are cropped, not grown.
mmm, I love cabbages in summer for coleslaw or crispy shredded cabbage with a dressing and cracked mustard seeds drizzled over them.
Sprouts are a great winter crop and I woudn't be without them ;D
GC,
Now they've all had there natter, I note that in your earlier post, you have a 1.5m by 1m space to offer the sprout plants?
Bearing in mind the general spacing requirements for sprouts there won't be many plants.
Is this an issue? A dwarf variety like Peer Gynt is an option, but the seeds are very expensive now as the strain is coming the the end of it's life.
Telboy: Yes I dont have much space - the dimensions i gave are about half of one of my deep beds. I would say a fairly compact variety is preferable but not essential. We are a small family so to have too many plants would mean more sprouts than we could eat!
Just received my Marshalls veg catalogue. They sell quite a few sprout varieties as seed. The also have a chart of the varieties showing which ones crop when. I found this particularly usefull. A variety called 'Breeze' crops from november to february, which is ideal. Can anyone tell me if this is a good variety to grow? Thanks.
Just one more thing on growing. I am assuming that sprouts are just as vunerable to the same pests and diseases as any other brassica? So I guess I will still have to protect them against the pigeons and the cabbage whites? (dont have problems with clubroot or root fly).
Still not sure :-\ about growing Brussels my neighbours plants seem to take up so much room for so little crop and the whitefly could fill a skip and they were still in the ground long after the plants were gone last year. ??? ??? ??? :-\ :-\ :-\
Regarding numbers in a bed 1.5x1.0 I would say at a push you can get 12 plants (3 rows) in but at least 8 (2 rows).
Have a look at the picture I displayed. My beds are 1.5m wide and I grow 4 plants across the bed. The first plant is 150mm in from the edge and there is roughly 400mm between the plants eg.
150x400x400x400x150
Now I know the books will say 600mm apart but I have found over the years that growing them in this block fashion allows them to support each other, wheras when they are further apart they need support.
The crop does not seem to be affected either, If there is any difference I would say the sprouts are slightly smaller but tighter when grown closer together.
Regarding growing 'Breeze' I have never grown these but the write up seems quite good, worth a try I suppose.
I don't rate 'United' Marshalls issued them a couple of years back as a freebie trial.
On my lightish soil they tended to 'blow' perhaps due a combination of size & soil conditions.
I tried them for the last two seasons they were slightly better last season perhaps because of the cool wet end to the season i.e. they were in wetter soil.
I hope this info helps with your decision making
I'd certainly agree about staking- I got a much better crop this year than last by making sure I staked early and firmly. I was interested to see Carol Klein saying that cauliflower plants should be planted deeper than in the pots they come in- does this help with all brassicas?
Quote; cauliflower plants should be planted deeper than in the pots they come in- does this help with all brassicas?
Basically yes!
What I find with brassicas is the stems of the seedlings are generally bent/distorted where they emerge from the soil/compost, so I bury the bent section when transplanting them. Then I find that the plants grow vertical rather than in the direction of the bend.
Other than that I don't know if it is really an advantage ???
i thought the purpose of planting them deep was because root grow from the buried stem taking in more food and making them more stable
Yes I have always planted my cabbages a little deeper than they were in the pot, usualy because I tend to let them go too long in the pot before planting out ant they get a little leggy. I reckon they are more stable this way.
Re planting distances; I like to plant things a little closer than the 'reccomended' distances, which are really designed for growing the 'old fashioned' way in open rows on the plot. In beds (especialy deep beds) I feel the plants can be grown slightly closer together in a grid arrangement. I cant really explain exactly why this makes a difference but as the rops grow well it would appear to work. In the case of many plants closer planting means they support each other rather than having to be staked.
Thanks for the advice on the Sprouts by the way. Very interesting and usefull.