Alan Titchmarsh has issued important advice for gardeners who are "away all day at work." The gardening expert says now is a good time to start growing vegetables in your garden.
While many gardeners opt to grow straight into the ground or have their own allotment, Titchmarsh says you can still grow in a smaller space. For gardeners with the "tiniest of patios or balconies," he recommends growing in pots instead.
He himself has been using pots to grow lettuce, beans, and radishes at home. However, he says gardeners who work away need to ensure they have the right pot to plant in.
Speaking on the BBC Gardeners' World Magazine YouTube channel, Titchmarsh said: "You don't need a vast allotment to grow veg. If all you've got is the doorstep or the tiniest of patios or balconies, you can still grow things to eat."
He added: "What you need is a large pot. I say large because small ones tend to dry out and if you're away all day at work, you'll come back and find your plant is completely desiccated."
Titchmarsh says he likes to use ordinary peat-free multipurpose compost when planting vegetables. He ensures his large pot has good drainage holes so any "surplus water can escape."
Elsewhere, he says that while gardens can grow from plants, it's "even cheaper" to grow vegetables from seeds. He highlighted radishes and spring onions as vegetables he has recently planted.
When planting seeds, he likes to make a miniature drill, a type of furrow, in his soil using a piece of cane pushed across the surface. He then likes to sprinkle his seeds, "almost like salt," onto his hand before placing each seed half an inch apart.
He went on to explain: "Then pull the compost with your fingers, right the way across. I moistened this [soil] before I put them in to make it easier to do."
Titchmarsh then waters in his seeds to "settle them into position." He concluded: "It'll take you next to no time to do them but boy, will you feel proud when you're picking your first crop."
Previously, Titchmarsh revealed grow bags are a good way to turn your garden into a vegetable patch. In the Express in 2015, he wrote: "Lay two or three in a row along the foot of a wall, cut the tops open, following the directions, and loosen the compost with the prongs of a small hand fork. Then just sprinkle some salad seeds over the surface."
He suggests giving your vegetables water and food while they grow. Should you opt for grow bags, Titchmarsh says they can be reused once you have harvested your crops.
He continued: "In eight or 10 weeks' time, when your salad crop comes to an end, you can re-use the bags. Pull out the remains of the old plants into each bag, planting them in a straight line down the middle."
