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All about brassicas

Growing great kale, cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli, mustard greens.

Winter veges like broccoli, cauliflower and leeks need to be in the ground before the end of March to build up size before growth slows down in winter.
These do best with lots of good compost and seaweed. Add plenty of nitrogen (eg manure) for leafy cabbages and kale, with extra potassium (eg wood ash) for `headers’ like caulis and broccoli.
Plant a variety, for different harvesting times – you may not be picking sprouting broccoli until spring, but you’ll be glad of it then. Purple frilled kale, or purple caulifowers, add some colour to the bed. If you’re not growing from seed, the newspaper parcels at the supermarket are good value, but plant the next day if possible.

Sometimes it’s hard to find space for the winter crops when summer ones are still growing, but getting in brassicas early (March at the latest) is crucial if you want to be eating them before spring. Make new beds if needs be.
Plant seedlings lower than they were in the punnets, firming them in `up to their necks’ (ie right up to the lowest set of `leaves’ - actually the seed leaves or cotyledons.) This reduces wind rock, a common reason for crop failure - it’s hard to grow big when you’re being shaken back and forth by every gust. Compost can also be piled up around brassica stems as they grow.
Water in each seedling with a cup of liquid feed (seaweed or manure tea). Keep watered in dry spells.
Protect from cabbage white butterflies and their green caterpillars using netting or a bT spray. bT is an organic bacterial spray that interferes with caterpillars appetites, starving them to death without affecting other insects. Derris Dust, formerly organically approved, has now been linked to nerve damage and Parkinson’s disease.
Mustard is a great, easy cover crop over winter. It can be broadcast-sown (sown directly onto beds) in autumn; young leaves are picked for salads (delicious with something sweet, like grapes, and a squeeze of lime juice); older leaves can be cooked in stir-fries or boil ups and any leftover leaves and stems can be dug in as green manure or put on the compost heap. Mustard is rich in sulphur, a natural steriliser, so it’s good to grow where you have had disease problems.