July 2010 Blog Posts (15)

Ok, so I've put in the elevated garden beds - 3x 4Mx1Mx60cm. The idea of these being that they will be easier to garden as I get older and find it harder to bend over, the soil inside will end up deep and rich and the dogs can't get in! I'm very happy with the beds I bought from KISS Products and will put in a matching rainwater tank as soon as $ allows.

The beds were delivered around the beginning of December 09. I asked quite a few people…

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I thought that digging a swale near the macadamia would create a healthier tree. More water, more flowers, more growth - It did!

I thought that building the soil microbes with compost and humus would create a healthier tree - It did. And both of these measures saw a massive growth in the tree.

I thought that my hive of native bees would help to pollinate the flowers so we had more fruit. - It did but not enough.

The result, a huge tree in a small garden that shed shade across the… Continue

Applying permaculture principles to the suburban sized block is possible and even fun.

Do you need some help or inspiration to get your suburban patch of permaculture and organic productive garden started or stimulate it to flourish?

Come along to the suburban permaculture workshops starting Saturday 31 July. Small group, different locations and plenty of good, sensible yet creative ways to have a permaculture oasis at your place.

Happy to have a chat and tell you more…

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I rather liked our old fence. It was really rustic looking and had timbers that reminded me of my grans place in Eltham Victoria- ancient as ever, a bit of intrigue and rough around the edges, yet still celebrating the life of a tree.…

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I was inspired by vanessa and finally dug through my worm farm and salvaged the stupid ones who wouldn't go into the new layer. I planted some cherry tomato, cucumber, golden nugget pumpkin, peas and spring onion seeds. Fixed my weeper hose so that its ready for summer when I can't keep up with hand watering anymore. Dug in the worm compost around my capsicum and eggplant seedlings, multigraft citrus (see I told you I was gonna take better care of it !!) and around my broccoli seedlings and…

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Ok, I just went nuts cutting-and-pasting from the DIgger's catalogue. I know this massive list might be over-the-top, and some stuff might not be possible, but it's a list of stuff I like from the catalogue. I'll do more research about the suitability to our climate, my soil type, etc., but it's a starting point. I'll use it as a bit of a menu to choose from when planning what to plant/buy in the coming year... or at least until the Spring catalogue comes out in August! Comments always welcome… Continue

Well, I found some wood today for the raised bed. It should end up about 9m long, 1m wide and 30cm high. I think I am going to bite the bullet and get a bobcat to dig the clay out of the whole yard, and I'll get some fruit trees in as well. So much work to do.



Around my sole garden bed, I'll leave a 1 metre gap and then put up a chicken wire fence to keep out the beagle and the rottie. I'll use star pickets as the posts, and thread some heavy gauge wire between them to hold up the… Continue

Hope everyone enjoys the pics of my garden.. I love it most of the time but best of all when I've weeded everything and its all neat and tidy an has beautiful rows of stuff planted everywhere.

This is my first 2 paths. I've still got to put one more in on the right of this picture but my tomatos are too close to the edge and I'm not willing to sacrifice them at the moment. I've also got to put a front edge to each of them and them my kids should have no excuse for stepping on…

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Hi everyone,

I am a keen but amateur gardener living in south Brisbane. I was looking for some gardening blogs from people in Brisbane to keep me motivated and came across this site. I think its wonderful and will have some photo's of my latest project coming soon but basically I am trying to put in some garden edges to my vege patch as I am sick of my 9, 7 and 2 year old going into mummy's garden to chase bugs but never staying on the paths and crushing all my poor little…

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I might have planted my winter veggies too late, so I am not harvesting anything yet.. except for some self sown lettuces in my tomato bed.. Other then that I've only got eggplants that are still producing consistently, oh and also garlic chives.. Continue

we finally harvested the sweet potato driveway

and we got tonnes of them! you can see the foliage had died right back and new sprouts were starting - so it was time to harvest the tubers before the plants started to take their goodness as a growth source (which after all is why plants make these storage organs - so they can draw on a sort of 'bottled summer' during lean…

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Comfort food gives us the snuggled-up feeling of fresh, rich flavours and smells that evoke a sense of belonging and happy memories. I may nopt go for the heavy English style food that Jamie Oliver suggests otr that Nigella touts, but I have discovered that our family really has developed our own comfort foods.



Since their school days, when my girls return home from travelling, their comfort food has been ‘a fresh green salad with olives and tomatoes please mum’. I’d head into the… Continue

I'm overwhelmed by the kind advice people give here.

It's truly appreciated. Thank you :-)

Daniel.

I'm about to go shopping and buy some chicken legs (thigh and drumstick still joined), some duck fat, and a few other goodies... Tomorrow I'll be making confit chicken legs, and a white, French sausage called "Boudin blanc" which I haven't tried before - it's basically stale bread, eggs, milk, nutmeg, a poor cut of pork cooked in a stock of onion, bay leaf and cloves, white pepper, and stuff like that. It's then roasted in the oven until cooked, allowed to go cold, chopped into discs and fried… Continue

Today I managed to clear the remainder of (most of) the clay from a small bed (about 1.5m x 3m) and turn the soil down to about 20cm deep. It has taken me about 3 or 4 afternoons... stubborn stuff. Today I bought a couple of bags of aged horse manure from a local horse owner, dug it in, and watered it.



Tomorrow I intend to cover it with some grass clippings from the top of the compost bin, maybe dig those in a bit, and find check out some green mulch to sow. Once it has grown, I'll… Continue