Vege Garden Dreams

Last September Mr Gadget built me a dedicated vegetable patch. A raised garden bed in a sunny corner of the garden. Prior to this my vege plantings were rather haphazard. I brought and planted punnets of seedlings in any vacant spot I could find in the garden with not much success. The seedlings were competing with other plants, in poor soil, or getting too much sun or not enough.

With the new vegetable patch I developed an interest in growing my own vegetables from seeds and also in saving seeds for use in the future.

Last summer I had great success with basil, cucumbers, eggplants and cherry tomatoes.

This winter I have a great supply of carrots, parsley, radishes, lettuce and chinese cabbage.

I have dreamt of the day I can go off to my vegetable patch and pick all the vegetables I need for the families dinner. Well yesterday I did. We had fish with lemon juice from the tree out the back and rice with home grown carrots, parsley, radishes and tomatoes. Such a small thing but to me it represented a great success and I am feeling rather chuffed at being able to provide my family with home grown fruit and vegetables.

But now I am in need of more room for vegetable growing so I have a vege patch in the front yard. I have large pots growing more carrots, Styrofoam boxes from the fruit and vegetable markets growing chillies, capsicums and more vegetables.

I have a potting area near the water tank for growing cuttings and more seeds and another seed raising area on top of the bunnys cage outside the kitchen window.

My vege garden dreams are coming true and I am happy.

SUMMER DAYS

What a dry summer this one is compared to last summer and what block buster temperatures are hitting parts of Australia! Luckily here it is hot but bearable.

So what's been happening here in suburbia?

We are lucky to have a swimming pool and it gets hours of use. I know they use too much money, too much water, too much power but we love ours and it is here to stay. This year we have put into place some methods to make our pool a little less of a water and power guzzling pit. The first thing we did was get a cover for it. The cover reduces water evaporation by over 85%. It also keeps the pool cleaner as leaves, dust and dirt aren't blowing into it. This means we can get away with cleaning the pool less and running the filter less too. We have also connected a water diverter to the gutter near the pool. When it rains we attach a hose to it and this goes straight into the pool. Hopefully we will be able to put a tank in this area soon whijch will keep the pool topped up and water the gardens in the pool area.

Summer veges are growing well. I have been harvesting okra, capsicum, tomatoes, beans and cucumbers. Also plenty of herbs too which I use prolically in cooking - sage, mints, rosemary, basil, oregano.

The vege patch is looking good.

I have buckets of cucumbers. I pick them when they are really small and deliciously tasty.
I have also been saving seeds. The first few okra I left on the plant too long. Okra are nicest if harvested and eaten when 4 inches or smaller and these ones were probably double that. So I picked them and harvested the seeds. I have been drying them on a plate on the trampoline (along with a plumcot pip.) In the paper bag I am drying parsley. I have found the simplest way to dry things with small seeds like parsley and lettuce is to cut off the stems with the seeds and put the seed heads in a paper bag with a rubber band around them. Then leave them in the sun until dry, give a shake and the seeds fall off and are in the bag.

Popped into the local nursery today for a browse (walked out empty handed). They have some dwarf fruit trees in stock - avocado, mangos and banana. As well as blueberry plants, olives, rasperrys and nuts. I have a birthday coming up so will send the hint to Mr Gadget.

M xx

Vegetable Patch Dilemma

The new raised vegetable patch is full of seedlings but the growth of the veges seems to be very slow! I think there is something wrong with the soil that Mr. Gadget filled the patch with. The soil was a special soil for new turf and with the excess we filled the raised vegetable patch. I also added compost, blood and bone and fish fertiliser too. I was so excited to have a dedicated vegetable patch that I went out and brought seedlings from the nursery and planted into the garden bed.

And some of the plants have something that has been eating them. I have applied snail bait which has seemed to have helped. I have some sugar cane mulch that I will mulch around the seedlings tomorrow. I don't know what else to do so for now will just hope that with time the veges start growing.

There is only one plant growing well - a zucchini plant. I planted about 8 seeds and while they all came up only this one has thrived. The others are tiny with just a few little leaves. You can see the other little plants overshadowed by this larger one. I think I will transplant them out of this garden and into the no dig garden and see how they grow there.

Else where in the yard vegetables are growing well. I have the first beans on the climbing beans and celery and silverbeet growing well. All my herbs are growing at great guns. Four out of eight gourd seedlings I have planted are growing really well and tomatoes, eggplants and okra are all going fine. But I have such high hopes fro the raised vegetable patch. Ahh, the dilemmas of growing veges!

M xx

LITTLE FROG

How cute is this little frog! Zippy found him while pruning the plant he is sitting on - not sure what it is (the plant that is, but I think it related to the ginger plant somehow).

Zippy and Superboy helped me in the garden today. They pruned for a while then made swords from the prunings. Then they helped me build up the no dig garden for the pumpkins and to plant them out. They helped water the pumpkins and then made up this funny game with a bucket of water - they asked each other questions and if they answered wrongly they had to dunk their head into the bucket. It was hot today - 29 degrees so perfect way for them to cool down. They even went for a brief swim in the pool in the afternoon too (along with 4 other boys from the neighbourhood).

I really haven't got anywhere for the pumpkins to grow in my garden. So I decided to try growing the pumpkins outside our boundary. There is a walkway betwween our house and our neighbours running along around two sides of our house. The land is never used and is maintained by us. We mow the grass/weeds and have planted natives out there. The soil is clay so the only way I can see them growing is in a raised patch. There is plenty of space for pumpkins to ramble out there. I will just have to remember to water them -hose wont reach so will need to bucket water them.

While Zippy, Superboy and I were doing this, Mr Gadget and Guitar Dude were around the back finishing off the raised vege patch. I posted about the dilemma of the treated wood for the raised garden a few posts ago. We decided to seal the wood on the inside and then also covered it with black plastic. As a further safety measure I wont be growing any root veges there. But I am much happier now with using this garden as a vegetable patch.

M xx

VEGE PATCH DILEMMA

I have been asking Mr. Gadget to build me a raised vege patch for a while, not weeks, not months, more like years. A few weeks ago I saw a colourbond raised veg patch http://www.greywaterreuse.com.au/index.php/Greywater-Reuse-Systems/Steel-Vegie-/-Garden-Beds.html and told MrR Gadget that I was seriously thinking of getting one or two for the garden. The mere thought of me buying one spurred him on because last week I came home to find he had brought the wood and started. He has even designed it with a higher section at the back and it goes another few metres around the corner than the photo shows.
Very happy as now I will have a dedicated place to put my veges and herbs. Up until now I have just planted them where ever there is a space in the garden. And the place with the most space doesn't get nearly enough sunlight. This new corner where the raised patch is going gets heaps of sun.

But the big problem is that Mr Gadget has brought treated pine sleepers for the vege patch. The thought of what will be leeching out of the timbers into the soil where veges are going to be grown distreses me. What to do! Mr Gadget will not be impressed if I don't use it and it won't be good for marriagal harmony for me to make a huge fuss (even a little fuss will cause friction).

Does anyone know if sealing the timber by painting it will work or lining it with black plastic? Might do both. I have also read that root veges should be avoided where there is treated timber.

Oh what to do?? Help!

M xx