April Update

Howdy doody....

Hope everyone is good and getting lots done in the garden while the rain subsides a little, it has been so wet again this year, we are really sick of wet feet and the lawn... well thats another matter :(

I made some more bottle pots today. Making them is really easy, get a 2 litre soft drink bottle, cut the bottom 1/4 off, put a small piece of shadecloth on the spout and fix with a zippy tie, then make 2 holes on opposite sides to thread some twine through so you can hang them, and your done... I think they are going to be big enough for some garlic it if it grows...I tried some last year but they never formed a bulb so here's hoping this year will be better..

The sweet potato is taking off but I dont know where it's going to end up. I'm trying to contain it in the tyres but it's growing up the wall behind them :)

Broccoli is just starting to get some heads so I have escaped the white butterfly and grubs this time..yay.. The beans in the same bed are doing really well, I have got about 2 kgs off them so far, they have a bit of water damage from the rain but they still taste ok..The zucchini are not long for this life, they have done really poorly again...

In the other big bed there are some snow peas just starting to bear, tomatoes so far are also looking really healthy so fingers crossed there, the lettuce as always has been brilliant, and carrots are just getting a move on too. There are some pansys under the carrot tops, dont know if they will flower yet, hope so cause thats what I planted them for..lol..

The lemon and mandarin are ok, I sprayed them both again with pestoil to get rid of the leafminer, and I gave the lemon a bit of a trim , the mandy has some decent size fruit on,and hopefully next year there will be more growth and more fruit, we love our mandys..

Max got into the garden and trampled a couple of the corn over, I tilted them back up and they haven't died yet so hoping they will be ok..the ginger is going really well, it's starting to form the bulb so I took a close pic to see if I could show it here.

And the strawbs,the ones in the wicking barrel have really loved this weather and are starting to send out some runners,and I bought some plants from a local man, 10 plants for $4. A couple have died, and I replaced them today with some runners of mine, they dont look too bad so far..

This is a quick tutorial on how to make the wicking beds we have. Please be careful as where you make the cut in the tin it is really sharp...
We got 1 piece of 2400mm x 900mm roofing iron, cost about $25. cut in half lengthways,so you have 2 bits 2400 long by 450mm wide. then cut one long length off at the 900mm spot, that will give you 4 bits , 2 sides 1500mm long x 450mm wide, we had some angle iron for the corners so we drilled and screwed them to make a rectangle, we had some old garden hose, split down the middle and attached to the top of the bed with small drilled holes and then zippy ties to hold the hose on.
Put the beds into position making sure they are level if you want to make them wicking beds, this is really important for drainage.
I lined the bottom with old magazines so the plastic liner was protected from sharp rocks.The liner is a heavy builders plastic ,I put 2 layers in just to be sure and about 20 cm up the sides as well.
Next was the drainage pipe, I covered mine with weedmatting so the sand couldnt get into the pipe and clog it .
Next the sand went in , and it was about 100 mm deep, just enough to cover the pipe.
I put a layer of weedmatting in here on top of the sand to separate the sand and soil.
To stop the bed from getting waterlogged it has to have a drainage point, I put a small hole in the bed just above the sand and put a small irrigation pipe with a grommet to hold it in place, and a piece of shadecloth over the end of the irrigation pipe thats in the bed to stop the soil from clogging the pipe.You could also use a piece of hose with a little bit of shadecloth over the inside end to do the same thing.
Then fill with soil and you are done.

More informationa about wicking beds can be found here :
http://www.waterright.com.au/wicking-bed-history.html
http://bitsouttheback.blogspot.com.au/p/wicking-barrel-construction.html

March update

Hi all,

First off I think I might have finally conquered seed raising.I received a voucher at Bunnings for Christmas and just got around to getting something. I have been wanting a seed thingo for a while so they had them for just under $8 , I bought it and planted corn and beetroot seeds in it and they are starting to come up already and its only been 4 days so I am pretty happy with that.

The strawberry planters havent been as good as I thought they would , I've killed almost 12 plants so far. Not sure if I over or underwatered them , or gave them too much worm wee,anyway, I have some more runners so I will try again :)

The shallots and ginger are going great guns as are the herbs and my rhubarb, well, i've picked 2 lots from it and stewed with apples to mask the taste for hubs..lol..

I've planted the big wicking beds with heaps of things, in one I have beans, broccoli, and zucchini while in the other there is tomatoes, snow peas,lettuce, beetroot, carrots and for a bit of colour I planted some pansys as well. The reason why they are so crowded is those darn seed's didnt all come up so I filled the spots with other things .

The mandarin is loaded so we are looking forward to them in a couple of months, the lemon is doing well too, still having a problem with the citrus leaf miner and because we have had a lot of rain the spray just washes off...

I made some pots out of some old drink bottles and they have got some tatsoi in them, they are doing really well :)

And last but not least is the sweet potato, I did have some ordinary potatoes in the tyres but they were finished so I thought why not, I didnt plant the whole spud, just the slips that I took off the spud and it seems to have worked.

Happy gardening :)

After the rain...

Well after all the rain we've had nothing much has been happening in my garden other than everything getting waterlogged, I pulled down the choko vine as it was going over the fence into the neighbours and I was actually getting sick of them , we had them baked steamed,I made some jam and used them in slices in place of zucchini but they just got too overly abundant so out it came. Looks much better too..

I bought some 90mm pvc pipe and me and hubs got to work yesterday and made them into some strawberry planters, i bought some potting mix with water crystals and also put some worm castings ot top as well, added about 6 plants to each pipe and watered them in with some diluted worm wee. I will have to keep up the watering for a while as I think they will dry out pretty quick due to the size of the pipe.

The rhubarb is coming along pretty good again, it must like wet feet..

And the last one that is starting to get a move on is the ginger. I planted about 6 bits but only 2 have come up so I will see how that goes..

That's about it until the seeds I planted start sprouting , fingers crossed, havent had much luck with seeds before, I planted them in worm castings this time and put them in some peat pots so they can be planted straight into the ground. When they come up I'll take some pics and do an update here...

Until next time..Happy Gardening :)

Just a quick update

I would like to wish everyone a Happy New Year and hope it is a good one :)

I have so many ideas going around in my head as to how I want to improve my garden, I have been thinking about some options for my strawberries, besser blocks, pvc pipe, extending and putting in some more wicking beds.....what to do..... the strawberries have sent out heaps of runners and I want to do something with them as they have a really nice sweet taste and the bushes are really healthy. Maybe it's because I've been feeding them with a combination of worm wee and seasol. I'll have to decide what I want to do this week I think as they need to be separated so more thinking coming up...

I tore down the choko vine today, it was starting to encroach too much over the neighbours fence and I didnt think I would say it but I am sick of them..lol.. I made some veg slice, jam, baked them,boiled them, and I advertised the leftovers on freecycle but no takers...

I have 5 zucchini plants just starting to bear , 5, yes, I planted 5 and they all came up and I was going to let them grow for a couple of weeks and pull out the weaker ones but I didnt , so I will soon have them coming out our ears too...

I have finally got 3 capsicum almost ready to pick, I haven't had any luck with them as the grubs always got them before we did , but not this yr...

Looks like there will be mandarins in a few months, about 10 have stayed on my little tree so happy with that.The lemon is growing but hasn't got any flowers yet, fingers crossed though.

That's all I can think of at the moment..until next time..Happy Gardening :)

Plateau time.

Hi all, it's that time in my garden where I have started to plan my next planting so at the moment the garden beds look a bit bare.

I'll post a couple of pics up of what has been picked since the last blog post, the snap peas for two weeks I had just stacks of them and then nothing so the plants went west.lol. Beetroot was probably the best I have ever grown, I pickled all of it and got six old large promite bottles so we are really happy about that.The carrots were so so, still got a lot but they didnt grow as much as the last lot, i did plant a heap of purple carrot seeds but none came up....Potatoes in the tyres went ok, didnt produce too many but they were still tasty. Cabbages went ok, got 4 out of six as the bugs ate the others. Think I bought mini ones too because they fit in the palm of your hand.And I grew my first onion.lol.

Strawberries are going great, I think it's because of the worm wee i've been putting on every week , cant believe the size of the leaves, I put my hand under as a comparison. The strawbs are a bit on the sour side though.

Both fruit trees are going good, the mandy has kept most of the fruit on so looking good for next yr, and the lemon is getting a lot of new growth too, yay.

I planted 2 tomatoes and they arent going very good so I though I might get rid of them,dig some compost in and replant some more, I have a basil plant to try and ward off the fruit fly possibly. Corn is good, a bit patchy but I still have about 10 plants growing and just starting to flower.

Spring onions are still growing, they are he same ones I have had for ages now , just keep chopping the tops off and they regrow, I planted some lebanese zucchini near them and they are pretty poor , not sure if anything will come off them yet.

Rhubarb is taking off again, much to hubs disgust,lol, and the garlic is almost there, I read on Simple Savings to fold over the leaves to make the plant put all the energy into the bulb so i'll see about christmas .

The single capsicum is still growing,might get one yet if the grubs leave it alone.

Choko vine has gone crazy, I can see lots of jam being made soon, and I have a twin one as well, I want to leave it as long as possible to see how big it will grow.

The single brussel sprout plant is finally getting little sprouts, it's been a long wait, not sure if it's worth it, dont think I'll be putting in another one. Broccoli was disappointing to the last lot ,just small flowerettes and they flowered quickly too, not that we couldnt eat them like that though.I cut off the main stem and they are sprouting from the sides again.

I have my first cucumber on, it's to keep hubs happy as he loves them and I dislike with a passion, it's growing amongst the herb barrel with rosemary, parsley and chives.In the other barrel I did plant some ginger but it isnt up yet.

And this is a photo of the flower on my frangipani, my late 93yr old aunty gave me a cutting about 8 yrs ago and it has flourished, I think thats where I got my love for gardening from :)

Worm farm is pumping at the moment, got 5 litres last week, just waiting until I the new plants go in and they will get a good dose as well as seasol and powerfeed, the combination has worked well. I'll be putting in some lettuce, beetroot,zucchini,peas and tomatoes on the weekend.

Until next time, Happy gardening :)

Spring growth.

Hi all.
Isn't spring wonderful, almost everything grows and looks great without too much effort.
To start with , my worm farm is going great, stacks of eggs and lots of baby worms. I have been using the worm wee with seasol and powerfeed about every two weeks, might be an overkill but I will see how it goes. So far, so good, the beetroot are actually getting bulbs, unlike the last few lots of them.

In the same bed as the beetroot , the red onions seem to be struggling, havent grown them before so I dont know what to expect.I also planted some more broccoli, the broccolini was disappointing,only one flush of stalks before it went to flower. Up the back I put some sugar snap peas, and in front of them is some dwarf beans.

The other big bed has some leeks, and the brussel sprout plant is still in there as well, it's not taking up much room so I'll leave it as long as I can to see how it goes. I put some sugarloaf cabbages in and they are just starting to get a move on, with some more carrots at the front.

In the barrels , the spring onions are still going strong, I put a couple of lebanese zucchini in with them as they were really nice last yr. Garlic seems to be still growing, the rhubarb seemed to die off and now has 2 new leaves on it.The mixed lettuce is doing great , but the capsicum in the middle of them is a bit sad.I bought 2 new strawberry plants and they have been doing good, the fruit is a bit tarty so far, hoping it will sweeten up as the plants get older. I put 2 chive and 2 italian parsley plants in a barrel and put some cucumber seeds in as well as if they grow, the fence will be a good trellis for them.

The cherry tomato is still loaded and I put 2 more plants in beside it,hopefully the grubs wont have them before we do.The corn came up spasmodically, should be enough if they all survive.

And the mandarine tree looks promising too, the tree was loaded with buds and most of them have stayed on as little mandys, I know I will probably lose a lot of them but just so long as some stay on I'll be happy. The lemon tree is doing ok too, not sure when it flowers.

I had some sprouting pontiac potatoes so they went in the tyres again with some more soil and chook poo compost, they seem to be growing well so far.

So in wrapping up, everything seems to be doing well, I'll keep up the fortnightly fertilizers and I have had some white cabbage moths around so the brassicas have been powdered to try and save them.

Until next time, Happy gardening.