Stress; even plants feel it. Here’s a photo of some of our frilly pink lettuce in Big Blue. The plants on the left are where they were originally sown. The plants on the right are transplanted; the stress of it has turned their leaves a darker colour. But they still grow happily enough.
We’re eagerly looking forward to when we have more fruits and veggies to harvest from our garden, but one thing we’ve had for years is herbs. So here’s a simple recipe with herbs from our garden – which of course will one day incorporate veggies from our garden as well! The versatility of this recipe is great; it’s basically a concept you can do however you’d like. And it’s so simple I’ve taught the husband and he’s made his own specialty.
Some suggestions:
You’d think from reading this blog I enjoy destroying things! OK – well – maybe I do. But it’s for a good cause. And it’s so we can create something new.
This instalment of ‘destroying part of the house to create something new’ focuses on the archway over the front path. Since before I moved into this house it has had some not-very-productive jasmine growing up one side (how is it we can possibly have jasmine that’s not insanely aggressive?) and once had a disease-ridden unattractive rose growing up the other side. A year or two ago we replaced the icky rose for a great smelling red rose, but we’ve decided to replace the pathetic jasmine with white and scarlet runner beans! Pretty AND edible.
The problem is this arch isn’t in a good way. It’s looked a bit drunk for years:
26 September 2008
Its lean now looks like alcoholism has progressed enough that it has some serious psoriasis of the liver. We’ve asked that when the FiMBarista extraordinaire comes to build the pergola for the chinese gooseberries he also whack the arch into shape. Or upright at least. But I thought it would be a good idea to get most of the dead vegetation that had grown around and through the arch off. The rose was quite old. Because birds were nesting, when we got rid of the rose we didn’t get rid of the thick, ropey branches that had grown around the arch’s wires. But the birds don’t use that nest any more, and it was time to get rid of it all.
So here it is in all its naked glory; before and after photos both side on and from the front steps:
It looked really strange to see the arch naked when we left this morning for work. But I’m sure we’ll love seeing it with beans growing over it!
Yes, another pear tree update. The tree now has a healthy dressing of leaves:
It is even starting work on making pears:
I have been accused, by our friendly garden guru, of being obsessive. Me?! Just because I photograph our garden every day? Just because my husband and I almost compete to see who can get out to the garden each morning and evening to check on our sprouting darlings?! Surely. . .um, well, hmm.
However it can’t be a bad thing to have progress in the garden documented so well:
Chestnut 'George Sand' on 6 October 2010
Chestnut 'George Sand' on 14 October 2010
Just think how many more plants there are out in our garden! So really, I’ve actually shown great restraint. I’ve not documented each individual mizuna seedling (oooh . . . how tempting!) or documented the daily progress of potato leaves. Sure, some seedling might have been photographed often, but if I was really obsessive (or, well more scientific) I’d also have recorded temperatures, hours of sunlight, soil temperature, rainfall, watering, etc. So perhaps I could just be called ‘enthusiastic’ rather than obsessive?
10 Days After Sowing Seeds
12 Days After Sowing Seeds
19 Days After Sowing Seeds
29 Days After Sowing Seeds, Just Before Transplanting
31 Days After Sowing Seeds, After Some Transplanting
Hmm. Maybe not.
To celebrate one month since sowing them in the garden, I harvested some of our greens to have with dinner: mizuna, tat soi, and frilly pink lettuce.
Harvest: mixture of tatsoi, mizuna, and frilly pink lettuce
Although tonight’s dinner didn’t involve a huge amount of produce from our garden, I’ve decided to include it here anyway. It’s inspired by the canapés at the Tasmanian Mushroom Growers’ dinner, plus it’s an easy quick dinner. We had almost everything we needed already at home.
Top apricot bread/ walnut crostini/ whatever with some home made hummus. (Please, don’t buy hummus; it’s so easy to make and so disgusting bought at the shops). Put some grilled mushrooms on top of this. Top the mushrooms with feta (or parmesan as I did – just because it’s what I had in the fridge). Eat. You can make them small for canapes or big for mains. I added the greens our garden, which Scott said made the meal (but he would!). I like the apricot toast with it as it adds some sweet to contrast with the savoury of the mushroom and greens and the salty of the cheese. Yummy – and quick!
Mushroom on Apricot Toast - with OUR greens!
It’s been a month since the Saturday we sowed seeds and planted things out with Christina. I must say it’s hard to believe it’s only been one month when I look at everything that’s happened in the garden. I was actually surprised to see how much we even got done that day after Christina left! In the past month:
I’ve done a bit of work on this website too, tinkering with things to try to sort out what’s easiest. On Flickr, each raised garden bed and a few other categories have been set up as separate sets. These are also reflected in separate pages, which can be found by looking under ‘Garden Bed Diaries’ near the top of the page. I still haven’t played with it as much as I’d like too, but I’ve figured out how to integrate a google docs spreadsheet where I’m keeping the garden diary. Right now you can see all of it on the main Garden Bed Diaries page, but I’m trying to sort it out so on each individual bed’s page you can see the entries just for that bed. I haven’t finished adding entries to the garden diary, but I’ve had a start.
Soon Danny will be helping out getting the supports in for the Chinese gooseberry harem and renovating the arch over our front path for runner beans. And I haven’t given up the search for a good mulch that will work nicely with the raspberries and Mediterranean Zone herbs but be able to last through Hobart’s windy spring.
Of course I have a billion photos of progress over the past month. If you’re really interested, there’s links in each of the garden bed diary pages to the different sets on Flickr. As an example though, here’s Big Blue:
Today we’ve had our first Garden Craft session with Christina. It’s hard to believe, but she hasn’t been to Lottie’s Lot since 11 September when all the planting out of the raised garden beds, new raspberries, and trees (chestnut, mulberry, and cherry) took place. So much has happened since – even later that day after she left! (I do a post on 11 October looking at what’s changed in the past month – well, it might not get published until the 12th so I can include photos from the 11th.)
The first order of business was showing Christina what we’d done and what had changed. I’d noted down a few questions as well. She confirmed a few things (such as pruning the citruses would be a good idea), reminded us of a few things (such as keeping the mulch and poo away from the base of the citruses), and gave us a few suggestions (such as solving the fly-away straw mulch problem in the raspberry patch with chicken wire). She and Scott pruned a large limb off the ailing old apricot behind the shed. And we all had a look at the raised garden beds, and aside from the green mulch in Big Green I think progress was good so far. As our raised beds used a mixture they hadn’t used before, we hadn’t weeded except for grasses in case Christina wanted to see what came up; we wound up leaving an example of one volunteer she couldn’t identify from the seed leaves.
Christina gave us some instructions on thinning carrots progressively; I’m going to have to steel myself to do it! We got our hands dirty transplanting frilly pink lettuce, mizuna, bok choy, and tat soi from the overcrowded conditions in Big Blue to the Berry Patch under the swings. Once we get a plank to walk on down the centre we’ll transpland some lollo rossa and spreckles as well. I still have plenty of overcrowded frilly pink lettuce, mizuna, etc if you’re in Hobart and interested!
Christina Transplanting Frilly Pink Lettuce Behind Blueberries
We went around to the front so we could show off the artichokes. We also discussed Apty the Kiwi Vine and his harem. They will be given the north facing wall of the house to make their own little world. Christina will talk to Danny to see when he can come out and put in 6 tall posts and cross bars. Each of the 3 Chinese Gooseberries* will have a post to be trained up; then they will be able to be trained horizontally when they reach the top. The vines will fruit from the horizontal parts. Danny will also help renovate the arch over the front path. It’s been quite precarious for years, and we want it in good shape for growing red and white runner beans over it!
The garden craft session was fun. It was fun to show Christina around, it was great to get some advice, and it was fantastic having someone so enthusiastic to chat and garden with. Very energisinig! 🙂
Lottie Loves Gardening
Lottie really loves her garden. It ensures that people get down near the ground, and she loves taking that opportunity to climb onto laps.
* ‘Chinese gooseberries’ was the name used for ‘kiwis’ before New Zealand decided to brand them. Scott prefers to call them Chinese gooseberries but is happy to give the individual vines Kiwi inspired names.
I’ll probably regret saying this ‘out loud’, but today I’m feeling like the queen of artichokes. FiMBY gave us 6 artichokes on Saturday to transplant. It was hot this weekend, so I just watered them and kept them in partial shade. I planted them out into the front garden after the day was cooling down on Sunday. I’ve been watering them in well; our front garden gets lots of afternoon sun . We’d been told to expect them to look a little sad from the transplanting shock but that they would recover. Our artichokes haven’t shown any sign of shock and to me seem to be growing already!
No doubt hubris will strike me down and they’ll be dead by the time I get home, but they looked so great this morning. I can’t wait for them to get big and delicious.
FiMBY had a hot composting demo session at their propagation headquarters in Taroona. Christina and Juliet lead the session, assisted by Hazel as well as 4 of us FiMBY beginners, Anne, Ian, Scott, and me.
First Christina gave a bit of a chat about the basic principles, 5 parts carbon (such as straw or some cardboard) layered with 1 part nitrogen (such as green garden waste). After her chat, we all got stuck into it. Some of us gathered green garden waste from the less tamed parts of the block, some chopping up the gathered green waste, and someone layered straw, 2 handfuls of chicken manure pellets, chopped green waste, watered it in well, and started another layer. We all had a chance to change jobs, ask questions, and chat about life and gardens. Anne and Ian are tree & sea changers originally from Edinburgh (via Canberra and Sydney amongst other places). They live south of Cygnet on a few acres and have FiMBY helping them out with edible garden and chooks. (Their dog is especially appreciative of the chooks! 😉 )
In 3 Weeks The Compost Will Compact
FiMBY's Propagation HQ
Scott Chopping Up Nitrogen Rich Greens
Anne Asking Juliet a Question; Compost Listening In
The closing chat was about what happens next with the compost. In about a week, it should be quite warm in the middle. It will have compacted by about half in 3 weeks time, and at that point can be turned over into the neighbouring compost area. At that point, especially if it hasn’t gotten hot in the middle, you can diagnose what might be wrong: for example if it is dry it doesn’t have enough water and if not it may not have enough nitrogen rich materials. 3 weeks later it can be turned again, and may be ready to use.
Afterwards we attempted to go to the Taroona Lounge Bar around the corner, but the Grand Final replay meant it was booked out. So we decided to head to the Citrus Moon cafe at Kingston Beach. But first we had some garden pilfering to do. We’d already been given some silverbeet to cook and some artichoke plants to plant, but Christina had friends nearby who had a male and a female kiwi vines that needed rehousing. So off we were to Sonia and Andrew’s, where Christina dug out the vines for us. We promise to drop some kiwis off when we have some! I’ve named the male vine Apty after a kiwi friend but don’t know what to name the female.
Male Kiwi's Last Moments in Sonya and Andrew's Garden
Christina Stealing the Female Kiwi from Sonya and Andrew
Lunch at Citrus Moon was great. When we started up with FiMBY I knew they could help us with our garden, but I hadn’t realised how good it would be that they put us in touch with a network of people doing the same things we are. People whose eyes don’t glaze over when we describe what’s happening and how we’ve established the various bits of the garden!
