Category: Gardening

It’s Time To Re-Group

Published on by HeleneAnne3 Comments

So we got a few things wrong with this vegetable garden like planting tomatoes before the trellis was built and planting too many cucumbers and zucchini’s. plants need air around them to breathe and without air circulating around them fungus forms. Our zucchini’s ended up with white mould but they still continued to produce. The other thing I found very different between store bought and home grown is that the home grown don’t last as well as store bought. As soon as you pick home grown you want to eat it straight away or it’s starts to wilt especially the zucchini’s and cucumber. Not sure why this happens but it’s another thing we have learned.

I have thoroughly enjoyed this trial garden and we are determined to go again. This coming weekend we will get out there, pull out and re-fertilise the beds and get them ready for another round of planting. I also bought rockmelons and watermelons the other day so I need to get them in the ground ASAP!

The other thing I have learned is that a garden of this size takes a fair amount of work, which I have not been able to do over the past couple of weeks. The heat here is insane and menopause has not been kind lately. I just need to get more organised with stuff and get into the garden late in the evening once it has cooled down. Organisation is key and I have never been great at that but there is always room to learn new skills!

The Asian greens and lettuce have gone to seed and the corn is all but done.
The Shallots have done really well but need to be weeded.
I have a rosella bearing lots of fruit but not too sure when to pick them. There is also pineapple sage flowering madly.
The Zuchinni’s have taken a bit of a battering from the heat and white mould.

Back To The Veges

Published on by HeleneAnneLeave a comment

Well the vege garden has been growing madly and we have had some great harvest especially with the cucumbers, they are proper insane and we cannot keep up with them, we are even giving them away and still can’t keep up! The exciting part was we can finally start harvesting the corn and we ate some last night. It is next level, the best corn we have eaten, not being biased but it is.

Here is our first harvest and my hubby picking some tomatoes! I think this week we will be pulling out the peas that are off now, most of the zucchini’s and re plant some corn and whatever else I can plant in this heat.

Check out the vege garden now!

Published on by HeleneAnne2 Comments

It’s been quite some time since I have posted but it’s 2020 and nothing is easy, straight forward or even normal and things are just getting in the way. But, after giving myself some space over the last couple of days I have had time to get some pics of my flourishing vege garden to share.

I think it’s been about 6 weeks since my last update which is super slack I know but life just keeps twisting around doesn’t it, but anyway, we are now eating out of our garden and the taste is quite different. We have zucchini’s ready to eat, cucumbers, peas, beans, asian greens, parsley and basil. Almost ready are the tomatoes, corn, beetroot and capsicum. We have decided that at some stage in the future we are going to extend the garden and always have things planted, ready to go. I have to say this garden is a lot of work, a lot of water and a lot of power running the pumps to water it, but it’s the most wonderful place to sit and de-stress which is exactly what I have been doing over the last couple of days. Sitting amongst the veges, eating peas, talking to God and escaping the massive crap show the world is right now! The other awesome thing about my garden is there are literally no pests. We have not sprayed the veges with anything, I hand weed, (we did spray the edges with an organic spray), and no pests. I put it down to really healthy plants, good soil preparation and a prayer on my tongue! Anyway here it is, what do you think?

Peas aren’t supposed to be growing this time of year in our area it’s too hot but look at them!

The Vege Garden – FINALLY!

Published on by HeleneAnneLeave a comment

Well it’s been 2 years in the making…..a simple vegetable garden, my husband and I have fought over, my frustration at him not wanting to get it done but FINALLY he got the fence finished, the soil dug up and we are now preparing beds. In his defence though, this job is very demanding, 7 days a week and when he gets a spare minute the last thing he wants to do is more work and I get that.  So far we have 3 beds dug up and planted and it’s so exciting for me to have a vegetable garden this big. The last time I had a vege garden was in the suburbs, even though we own small acreage in town the house yard was relatively small, well not really, actually I don’t know why our last vege garden was so small?  Anyway it was, 4 small beds that barely fit anything in them but it was still awesome to grow our food.

Fast forward to today and in comparison, this garden is a beast!

Having heavy machinery and tractors at our disposal has been such a blessing throughout this whole process. It just makes life a lot easier than having to go to the nursery a thousand times buying dirt to fill the garden. Fortunately this farm is laden with beautiful topsoil so there were zero trips to nurseries this time round.

Once we got the dirt in place the fence went up, well, half of it and that’s where the project ended for 12 months, so instead of a thriving vegetable garden I had a great toilet for the dogs!

 

 

FINALLY, last weekend, hubby got some spare time to finish it and what a shit fight it was!  He worked so hard to get it back to where we started and it literally took all day. We hired a rotary hoe to make life a little easier but man that thing was challenging to drive and super hard work.

 

He finally got it to the stage where we could start conditioning the soil. We bought bags of Dynamic Lifter which is an organic fertiliser in pellet form. I think we used about 5 bags of that and then we put about 5 bags of organic mulch over that. Hubby then rotary hoed that all through and he was done! We put the sprinkler on to break down the organic matter over the next week and BAM ready to form up the beds!

So far we have 3 done and in those 3 beds we have a heap of different varieties of tomatoes, corn, shallots, cucumber, capsicum and lettuce.

I have herbs to go in, basil, parsley, pineapple sage and then I have thousands of seeds to germinate so it should be a good season. Whether or not I have enough room for everything remains to be seen!  I will keep you updated on what we do, and what is working well, and who knows, maybe I can inspire you to start your own food garden!