A Beginner’s Guide to Growing Vegetables

Did you know that there are a number of vegetables suitable for growing indoors in your conservatory? Many can be planted all year round, and you can keep them inside to brighten up the conservatory or transport them into a veg garden outside. If you’d like to try your hand at growing your own vegetables and herbs to use in the kitchen, follow this beginner’s guide.

Tomatoes and Peppers

A sunny conservatory windowsill is the perfect home for baby tomatoes and peppers. The crops can be grown from seeds and will produce tasty produce for months at a time. You can plant in a windowbox or a hanging basket, but for training varieties such as the Sweet Million tomatoes, make sure you support them with a cane. They will naturally decorate your conservatory with colour!

Peas and Beans

Most beans and peas make ideal house plants and love a sunny conservatory. Dwarf French beans, runner beans and broad beans do well indoors and can be sown in pots from late winter. Tall runner beans are tasty and also serve a double purpose, as they grow up a conservatory window on string as some budding décor!

Rooting Vegetables

Many root crops simply can’t be grown indoors, with the exception of round carrots and radishes. Seeds can be sown from late winter and grow best in window boxes and troughs.  

Potatoes

That’s right – you can even grow your own potatoes in a conservatory! Seed tubers are easily grown in buckets, large pots or sacks, which are great for rolling up or down as required.

Creating the Right Environment

If your conservatory does not receive enough light for example because of the direction it faces or because of a closed roof, you can use artificial lighting to help your plants grow. You can buy specialist greenhouse lighting but normal fluorescent lighting also works just fine to give the plants the amount of light they need.

You also need to consider the temperature of your conservatory. Heating and ventilation play a big part in growing vegetables so you need to get it right. In the summer, the temperature inside the conservatory can become too warm for the plants and kill them off. You’ll need to open windows and doors or invest in a fan to circulate the air. In the winter, the room may not be warm enough for your veg, so you can do the opposite and use a heater in the conservatory.

Follow these tips and you’ll soon turn your conservatory into a professional greenhouse!