Wednesday, July 28, 2010

product placement time

The patch is chemical free. It does not make sense to use any type of manufactured chemical around food, let alone in the soil where it does untold and unseen damage.

The issue for me is that the patch is surrounded by kykuyu grass which has long runners that are determined to invade the friable soil in the patch. In addition to the chickweed and cobbler's weed that is already in the patch, constant weeding is required.

I hate weeding. So I looked for an alternative to back-breaking work.

Beat-a-weed and beat-a-bug are the way to go!

The Beat-a-weed works wonders and it keeps many of the 'pests' of my previous post out of the patch as well. Based on salt and vinegar, it suffocates the weeds and makes it easier to rake them all out.

Love it.

Tuesday, July 27, 2010

bandicoots et al

Possums, bandicoots, bush turkeys, birds and cats. They all love the patch and each has a special relationship with it:

cats - roll in the mulch and sit on the seedlings... because they can!

birds - pick off the young tomatoes or pea pods...because they can!

possums - scamper all over the beds as they make their way from one place to the next...clearly I am at fault for putting my plot in the middle of their busy highway!

bush turkeys - wait till you mulch eveything then relocate all the mulch to the other end of the garden...because they do!

bandicoots - dig for gold every night making sure to rip up every plant. While they are at it, they munch on the leaves of my broccoli....

Ultimate bandicoot protection weapons?





I think I am starting to win the war!

Saturday, July 24, 2010

comfrey

This is a wonder plant. I first bought it because it was labelled as an 'heirloom' plant. I liked the sound of heirloom - a plant that has stood the test of time. Little did I know how much I would come to rely on comfrey for all manner of things.

Comfrey is great as a compost activator - it encourages nitrogen growth and decomposition. You can pull off a few leaves and just throw them into the compost bin. I do this all the time in summer when I struggle to keep up with growth. Click here to read about composting comfrey.

As it is a good source of nitrogen, I have been planting beans or peas (legumes) in the same bed. The crops seem to do very well indeed - as does the parsley, a permanant friend of comfrey in my patch.

In winter, it looks like the plant dies, but it goes into hibernation. Usually, I cover it lightly with mulch to protect it from frost and it bounces back next season. As it rots, it releases nitrogen into the ground. Click here to learn about growing comfrey

Historically, comfrey has been used for many reasons. Click here to find out how comfrey has withstood the test of time.

strawberries

My first strawberry adventure began with a bag of potting mix. I planted straight into the bag and as you can see, it was fine.... until the summer rains came, and came, and came. It is hard to move a bag of potting mix without the contents spilling out all over the ground. Since starting my vege patch, I have struggled to manage the wet season and it all began that summer with my strawberries.



Since then, I have planted locally sprouted stawberries into a deep pot. I am sure to surround it with mulch and feed it as regulalry as I should. Ideally, strawberries like acidic soil and pine needles are a good source of acid. Which reminds me, I need to get a supply for my hungry berries......



Click here for information about growing strawberries. Click here for information about wild strawberries

vigorous growth

The first season was particularly spectacular. With no clear idea of what we wanted to do long term, we simply planted what we liked to eat and what we thought looked nice. The result was a cottage garden mix of herbs, flowers and vegetables. Within weeks, the beds were bursting at their seems and we realised we would have to expand our site.


So in here we had: pineapple sage, comfrey, parsley, wormwood. Obvioulsy, all this went nuts living on a diet of solid chicken poop! The pineapple sage has gone and the wormwood too (although, I confess that I may have prematiurely removed it instead of pruning it hard), but the comfrey and parsely are still thriving. They seem to love being next to each other, so there they will stay.



Incredibly, I planted a pumpkin in the middle of all this. Obviously, I soon learned how much room a pumpkin needed. If you look closely, you may see that the tomatoes are looking a bit crazed... I am scratching my head in puzzlement. I am yet to master the art of growing tomatoes. Either it is the climate here, or I just don't have it in me to grow a consistent crop.

first among roses

We decided to plant a rose - every vege patch needs a rose, said my mum. So, meet Playboy. This has been such a vigorous grower, although I am sure it has everything to do with the years of chicken poop in the garden!

Since our sucess with Playboy, I have planted roses in other beds... meet Playboy's friends:




Wednesday, July 21, 2010

first harvest


The first basket of produce. It all seemed so easy then.... little did I know what was to come!



the first season



Standard planting of silverbeet, parsley, tomatoes, celery

the site

This is the site of my vege patch.

Before it was a vege patch, it was a chook run. There was a huge corrugated iron water tank that was cut in half and turned upside down. This was the chook shed.  As you can see, there was also a green shadecloth potting shed.

I wanted a vege patch and this was the perfect place for it. So the work began!

In total, the site is about 10x5m. However, we tackled it in two parts. These are pictures of stage 1.

All the broken terracotta tiles were moved out, a huge Monsterio plant was removed (back breaking work) and all the rubbish raked up. We used the bricks that were lying around to for the garden beds. As you see:



Finally, we started planting the things we thought would look and taste great.