Vege patch lovin'

I'm loving all the produce coming out of our vege patch at the moment, although I am having trouble keeping up with preserving those tomatoes! This is todays harvest, as well as yesterdays preserves.

We've been harvesting tomatoes, beans, beetroot, capsicum, silverbeet, rocket, lettuce, cucumbers, zucchini, the odd apple, a few lemons and chillis.

 The vege patch is the only green area of the whole place- it is so dry and we really need rain to green our pastures.

I'm so pleased because we also have local raw honey, local lamb and beef, and our own chicken which we dispatched recently.  This week the co-op order is coming which will stock us up with organic grains, flours, nuts and dried fruit. No supermarket required for me for a while :)

Around the "farm"...

Actually, I took these photos a few weeks ago and didn't get a chance to post them. At the moment we are experiencing hot westerly winds frequently and have had very little rain. The paddocks are dry and crispy and we really need some rain soon.

I harvested 2.5kg of beetroot and pickled and bottled it. We have been loving it with salad for lunch and I'm hoping the new crop grows quickly as we are charging through the bottles I made!

The apple and pear trees were flowering and now have fruit growing. They were here when we came so I have no idea what variety they are or when I should expect them to be fruiting.

We have five new chicks- supposedly Black Australorps but in reality a cross breed by the look of the mix of feathers they have. They have grown so much since I took these photos. We deliberately bought large, heavy birds this time, so that any that turn out to be roosters will be good for dinner. 

Our lambs have also grown.  They have gotten out a few times lately and caused trouble trying to catch them, so I have been thinking how plump and juicy they are looking! But...we are keeping these ewe lambs as our new breeding stock, so no roast lamb yet. It turned out that the other ewe we bought was not actually in lamb (just fat!!) which is disappointing. If she doesn't lamb next season she will have to go.

 We got rid of the other rooster, who was a bit cranky, so now Shadow rules the roost. He is an Ancona, and most handsome!

Hope your garden is growing well, and your animals thriving! My thoughts are with all those whose homes, gardens and animals have been affected by the NSW bushfires.

Grow. Harvest. Eat.

For the first time I am making an effort to really grow all our own vegetables, rather than just have a few growing to supplement what we buy.  I need to dig more vege beds so I have enough space, and I know I still need to sharpen my skills in seed raising, succesion planting, pest control and so on. That's "Grow".

But what about Harvest and Eat?  It may seem strange to you, but I realised that I was leaving things in the garden longer than I really should instead of picking it.  Perhaps because it's so nice to walk past and see a plant producing successfully and I want to savour the success? We have lovely soil here at our new house, and after struggling to grow veges for years in hard-packed-clay-with-no-top-soil, having veges grow well is still something of a novelty. 

So I have made some conscious harvesting expeditions in the garden.  If I pick it and it's inside ready to go then I will use it. I have also stopped buying most other vegetables, except for a few staples like potato and carrots.  This forces me to use what I have growing in new and creative ways. 

 Just how many different ways can you eat brocolli, kale and spinach?  How many lettuces can we get through in a week?  How many days will little girls refuse half their dinner, because it's green, before they realise there's just more greens coming?

 What are you harvesting at the moment? Got any recipe suggestions for kale?

In the edible garden- July

The veges have grown so much since the photos I took for this post back in mid-May!  I've had some success and some not so great results, but I am learning more and more all the time about growing edibles well.  I'm really stepping up vege production, aiming to supply most of our veges.  I need to learn how to get a good succession of crops happening, rather than having a glut and then a famine.

This long bed was supposed to be for a hedge of blueberries (to help keep the dogs out of the garden) but I ran out of room and took it over for leafy greens. It has Pak Choy, Silverbeet, English Spinach and Raddichio.  Something is eating the Pak Choy, but I'm not sure what as I haven't found them.  I suspect snails or slugs as I haven't found any caterpillars.

 

 

The garlic seems to be growing well.  I haven't grown it before so I don't really have any idea what I'm doing with it.

Rain drops on snow peas are one of my favourite sights in the vege patch!  The snow peas are growing like weeds, and I can see that I need to improve the support structure as it's not tall enough and the tall, unsupported tops fell over on a windy day. I also think they are planted too close together as there are lots of flowers but not many peas, possibly because they are so jumbled together.  They were crowding out the garlic at the bottom so I ended up trimming them back. 

I've planted some sugar snap pea seeds in the long bed and you can see the reo wire support  in the background of the photo below. Hopefully they will do better with the better support.

The rocket has started to flower but I still like to eat it even with it's fairly strong flavour.  The lettuce in this bed is probably past it's prime and will go to the animals.  I'm trying to get some carrots to germinate under the hessian - they suffered a setback when the dogs ran through the bed just after I planted the seeds!

 Beetroot coming along well...

Under the netting I have Wongbok cabbages, Kale and Brocolli. Slugs are eating the cabbages, possibly because I planted them too close together...

 New crop of Cos Lettuce...

 My onions are growing so slowly. This bed may be a little too shady this time of year.

We've been clearing up some old wood piles and found this snake skin in one of them.  It's most likely a brown snake as that's what we seem to get here. I want to clear up as many snake friendly spots as I can before summer comes again and I'm trying not to freak out about them!

The main thing I've learned this season is to plant less and give each plant more space.  I need to sow less seeds so I have less seedlings at a time and therefore am less tempted just to cram them all in.

I think it's time to get some more seedlings under way. Are you sowing seeds at the moment?  What kind?

Growing

There has been so much happening here the last few weeks! New arrivals, renovations, gardening, homeschool...

Here's a little of what's been growing and developing in the vege patch... 

After being neglected during very hot, dry summer weather (before we moved in) and then receiving lots of rain, many of the plants set fruit very late in the season. The passionfruit vine is absolutely covered in big passionfruit, but alas I think it is getting too cold for them to ripen now.

 The chooks have been in the dome getting our new vege beds ready...

 

 We used old bricks we found here as edging.

 I ended up digging up the whole berry patch in order to remove all the grass and weeds. I replanted the cane berries and strawberry plants. Here is is before and after weeding.

 One of the many barrow loads of weeds I pulled out. Better than a gym membership!

 I've planted garlic for the first time ever: three varieties- Glen Large, Red Rocambole and Italian White.  A few weeks ago only the Italian White had sprouted.

Now all three varieties are up and growing nicely. The red rocambole was the slowest to get going by far.

 We built a compost bay and filled it with horse manure, straw and lawn clippings.  It has composted down already to half the size it was.  We've never really had much success with composting so hopefully we are set for better compost now.

 

 We have the best soil here- far better than anything I've attempted to grow in before so it's quite exciting to see the veges thriving.

 I built a potting bench from timber we had around the place. I'm very proud to say that I did 90% of the sawing and construction myself! Some of the timber is now serving it's third purpose having already been turned from old shipping containers into shelving and now a potting bench.

 I attended a seed raising workshop at Purple Pear Organics last year, so, following their directions (or at least as much as I remember them!) I've been sowing seed and planting out tiny seedlings, and making newspaper pots.  I haven't ever tried raising seeds on this scale before and so mistakes are inevitable- namely a gazzilion pakchoy seedlings and about fifty wong bok cabbages. Hmmm...sow less next time!

 Pak Choy anyone?

 

 Newspaper pots...

 

 Brilliant helper...

 

It has been so much work, but the garden is flourishing and it's so worth the effort.  I just need more vege garden beds now...