Bill Kerr
Getting the best out of beans
Beans are a versatile, easy-to-grow and highly productive vegetable. All of this makes them a handy crop for the home garden. Bill Kerr explains how to grow and care for them.
Learn how to grow carrots
So many home gardeners find it difficult to grow these vegetables, but there’s no need to give up on carrots, says Bill Kerr.
Why pumpkins need space to grow
There is no one-size-fits-all recipe for growing pumpkins. This is especially true of spacing, where many factors have to be considered.
Learning about cucurbits
Cucurbits are a group of plants belonging to the gourd family (Cucurbitaceae). They include pumpkins and squashes (Cucurbita spp), melons (Cucumis melo), cucumbers (C. sativus) and watermelons (Citrullus lanatus).
How to grow beetroot in your home garden
This vegetable is ideal for the home garden. It’s easy to grow, tasty, and highly nutritious, says Bill Kerr.
Understanding genetic chimera in a crop
Farmers often draw my attention to ‘weird signs’ on a plant, fearing them to be the start of a devastating virus. A closer examination often reveals the cause to be genetic chimera, a harmless mutation that is likely to restrict growth only on the affected plant.
Dealing with the African bollworm
The African bollworm (Helicoverpa armigera) has many host crops. The caterpillar, which is spiny when young, has a light stripe on the sides and usually turns green to match the foliage when older.
Producing onions out of season
You can trick onions into providing an out-of-season crop ready for market when the price is just about at its peak by planting small bulbs called ‘sets’.
Tips on growing Swiss chard
Dark green vegetables help strengthen bones and are generally excellent for health, especially in older people.
Seedlings: Balancing fertility & hardening
To ensure successful fertilisation, you need to do more than simply carry out a soil analysis to determine the crop’s basic requirements. You also have to consider the needs of the seedlings.
Preparing your vegetable patch
In preparing your vegetable patch, the ideal is to prepare the soil only once, and then switch to no-till.
Do your homework before starting tomato production
Producing tomatoes is expensive and can make or break a farmer. If you plan to grow this crop, first do your homework and investigate its economic viability.
How to fertilise a crop correctly
Readers frequently ask me for specific fertiliser programmes for their crops. I would happily oblige if all crops were the same!
Over-stimulating vegetative growth
The survival mechanisms that enabled the ancestors of modern crops to survive in the wild will influence the efficacy of the fertiliser we apply to these crops today.
Spacing, competition & yield
We sometimes tend to make assumptions about how a crop will react without considering the survival mechanisms inherited from its wild ancestors.
Leafy crop vs fruiting crop the balancing act
When trying to predict how a crop will respond to various situations, remember that all cultivated crops originated from wild ancestors growing in competition with many other species.
Get to know how your crop ‘thinks’
A crop has no way of ‘knowing’ or ‘sensing’ your good intentions. Instead, it responds to the prevailing conditions as a means of self-preservation.
Don’t drown your crop’s roots!
Where many farmers fall short is knowing how deep the water has penetrated after irrigation or rain.
Getting irrigation right
Farmers often ask me how frequently and how much they should irrigate. There is no simple answer, as many aspects must first be considered.
Dealing with eelworm
Eelworm is generally considered the world’s worst crop pest.
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