Our farm in Daylesford is zoned 'farm zone' and hence it cannot be described as Urban at all. However although hard paved surfaces are rare in farm zoned areas, in many cases so are trees! Because farm zones are reserved for agriculture or grazing, farming has...
In Daylesford there are some wonderful examples of the softness, shelter and shade that plants bring to urban environments. Daylesford has some fantastic established gardens, small orchards and a lovingly tendered community garden in the heart of the CBD.
Along our Daylesford route, someone is taking good care of manure. Now it is most exciting to find this fresh supply. Someone out there has horses and a good love of gardeners, because instead of filling up bags with spent, old, leached of nutrients manure, they fill...
In December there are boysenberries - which are a blackberry hybrid We have been growing them for the past five years or so. Our crop has survived the heat of summers past. It has been easy to grow these berries, and hence I strongly encourage you to have a go,...
Now on the way to school or on the way home, Ahlia picks berries for her treat. Boysenberry flowers..Fruit beginnings. Harvest time.
These tomato seedlings from October, had grown a little big as my 'plant tomatoes before the end of October' deadline had not been met. To ensure their survival at transplant, I: hardened them off outside for a week placed them in a bucket of water for about ten...
After a nitrogen fixing crop has been planted, like broad beans or peas, you can harvest the pods but leave the plants and roots in the soil. Or don't harvest the beans if you want to maximise the nutrient content you dig in. Dig the plants lightly into the soil by...
It's getting a little strange in the garden. More and more of the garden is looking white instead of green. I am having to cover all my crops with bird netting; the cherry tree, plum tree, raspberry and boysenberry plants, lettuce, basil, Bok choy, kale, persimmon,...
The greenhouse makes growing my own seedlings a huge pleasure. Once the seedlings have established and are ready to be taken out into the garden, I open up the bi fold doors of the greenhouse to harden off the seedlings before planting them out. Over the past three...
One of the big reasons I love gardens is because as is well known but mostly taken for granted, it is plants that produce the oxygen we breathe. Whether that plant be a rose, or an indigenous grass or a tomato, all plants photosynthesise and produce oxygen in the...
This summers challenge is well and truly focused on managing possum magic. One day I am admiring the beautiful new shoots and small young leaves forming on the plum tree, the climbing rose and the pomegranate, the next day...voila! possum magic and they are gone! my...
Back in August I began to sow lettuce, Bok Choy, Kale, basil, tomato and eggplant seeds, as well as some flowers, Holly Hocks, Snap Dragons and Zinnias. Most of the seeds are now established seedlings chattering in the greenhouse about their pending departure from...
Axillary bud forming. After three weeks growth, the stem had lengthened and a small rose flower was forming.
It took the possums ten years to find us, lucky us! But now they are regular guests. They eat the young shoots of the pomegranate, they have almost killed the Akebia quinata, and they hunger even for astringent persimmons. I heard that if you keep your trees small and...
One of the projects we did not foresee the need for when we first moved into our home was a rain garden project. Back in 2003 we were thinking about fruit trees, raised vegetable beds, deciduous vines, native trees, solar hot water and solar electricity. I wish we...
In the garden blossoms are blooming and their colour saturated. Ralf is checking the bee hives for pests, and honey. With the warm weather the bees and the blossom will come together, each nurturing the other.
I love this time of the year. The garden is vibrating with life and with blossoms now on many of the fruit trees. While the perennial deciduous plants are awakening, I am preparing a feast of food producing annuals. In the greenhouse that Ralf and I built about five...
Along the Merri Creek we went, Jules, Artemisia and I. On the way we found a hut, trees to climb, wattle happiness, and on the way home, lichen and blue. ...