Veggie Patch Upcycling

This year in the patch we are trying out some new ideas in the ongoing search for ways to improve our vegetable growing on the cheap, so in this post we want to share some simple methods that you can use in your patch on a low budget. we've been up-cycling, recycling and occasionally upside down cycling with things that we have found here at home to make the garden grow even better.

In ground Worm farm composters



the finished worm composter in action

prototype 1 - DIY in ground worm composter

We are rather excited about this little experiment to try and improve our soil by placing in ground worm farms made from PVC pipe throughout our patch. we made these from some left over pipe (20cm diameter) by drilling loads of holes into lengths of about 40cm, then burying them upright in the veggie beds. Add some wet paper to the bottom, a handful of red wrigglers (compost worms) and some vegetable scraps, some more paper and last of all a lid. (just make sure it is sealed off from fruit fly). Even after a couple of weeks it is surprising how quickly the scraps are being digested.

Worms are like the intestines of the soil. Compost worms tend only to inhabit the top soil layer, breaking down leaf matter and other dead vegetation. Earthworms (the big fat guys) burrow much deeper, and help to transport the nutrient rich humus of the compost worms deeper into the soil and around the root zones of our veggies. What a great team! They are jam packed with good microorganisms that enrich the soil into a bustling micro metropolis of healthy humus... at least that's the theory behind this idea, and I am busting to see if it works as planned.

Worm farm seedling tray in one.

a great way to reuse your water

I got this idea from a permaculture farm that used old bathtubs as worm farms in their nursery. their seedling trays rested on top of their worm farms. As they watered the seedlings, the water seeped through the wormy tubs and the worm juice siphoned into a storage tank which was later filtered and pumped through their irrigation system. We have adopted the same principle on a micro scale with our own worm farm. We simply removed the lid, laid down newspaper and a folded hessian mat which the seedling trays rest on. Its working a treat.


Drip irrigation with Venturi pump

This spring was very dry, which contributed to the terrible fires that we have had up here in the mountains. To conserve our water use in the garden this year we are trialling a drip irrigation system on our main vegetable patch. Its a fairly simple setup that we connect to a small secondary water tank near the patch. We purchased some cheap black irrigation pipe and punctured it with small holes every 10cm or so,  and arranging the lines to run across our grow beds.

 We have also added a simple venturi pump system that feeds into the main irrigation line which allows us to add liquid fertilisers to the water as needed. So far we have been pumping our plants with filtered weed tea,  and worm wee and the results are starting to show already. Its important to filter liquid fertilisers to make sure the lines don't get clogged up. We are using some wool insulation in a milk carton to filter the organic fertilisers.


The venturi pump works on simple suction. As the water runs through the main line, it creates suction, which draws the liquid fertiliser from the milk container into the irrigation line. The higher the water pressure, the higher the container of fertiliser needs to be, otherwise, you will get water going in the wrong direction and back into your liquid fertiliser container. A little trial and error and you'll have it down pat in no time. The pump is very easy to install to an existing irrigation set up. all you need it a t-join, a tap, and some extra hose. you can adjust the flow of fertiliser into the irrigation line by adjusting the tap.

For the areas in our garden that don't have drip irrigation installed yet, we are making use of our old milk bottles as slow release irrigation units. We are using them on our pumpkins at the moment to give them plenty of juice. Its a simple matter of filling the milk bottle with water, adding liquid fertiliser and whacking the bottle in upside down nearby the roots of the plant. Over the course of the day, the water and nutrients is slowly released into the soil. Its great for plants like pumpkins which are heavy feeders as you can pump nutrients directly to the plants root system. It also means no need for overhead watering, which reduces the likelihood of powdery mildew and weeds. by adding a tiny pin hole on the bottom of the milk bottle, it allows air into the bottle, aiding the water flow. the larger the bole, the faster the flow of water.

beer bottles for seedling holes
Being spring time, we have been planting out our new seedlings. We have found that a great way to speed up the process is to use an up turned beer bottle to make the holes for the seedling to go in. Its a perfect fit! Its also a great excuse to crack open a beer before planting out... or maybe 3 or 4, to get the job done even faster. hmmmmm...

Water the seedlings and the planting site with some worm wee or sea-sol before planting.


Chooks and weeds get the (hessian) sack

We are lucky to have a great local coffee roaster in our community, who has loads of spare coffee bags to dispose of regularly. We have been putting them to good use in the garden as covers for some of our veggie beds. They are excellent for stopping the chooks from digging up the dirt and plants, and also help to keep the soil moist and stop the weeds. Being made of natural fibres, they break down naturally as well. If you are after some sacks, look up local coffee roasters in your area. They will have loads of sacks and may even be happy to simply give them away.

 

Hessian mats a success

 

Our new and improved DIY Black-soldier-fly Composter

You may remember that last year we experimented with growing black soldier fly (BSF) as a way of composting and generating feed for our chooks. Our first prototype was successful in so far as it attracted plenty of black soldier fly, but when it came to harvesting them, many of the grubs didn't find the pipes to crawl up. this year we improved on our BSF composter by using a plastic 10 ltr watering can. Its cheaper, easier to build, more contained and hopefully works much better. With this design the grubs crawl up the spout of the watering can (there's no where else for them to go) down some hose and into a plastic bottle. We add food scraps by unscrewing the t-bar and put them down the shoot. I used some liquid nails to fix the t-bar in place. The chooks are already very happily eating black soldier fly larvae from our new system.

 

 

bsf fly in the t-bar pipe and lay their eggs. Larvae crawl up the spout and into the plastic bottle.

 

New plants in the Patch
Last summer, we planted some tamarillo seeds from some fruit given to us by our neighbour Grant. He has an amazing fruit orchard and edible garden! Our kids loved his tamarillos, so we decided to give them a go ourselves. Not only do they taste delicious, but they grow incredibly fast. We planted this one from a seed last summer (Not even a year ago) and it's setting fruit. Tamarillo's are a short lived subtropical fruit tree, but grow well in temperate climates too.



nearly one year old

ripening tamarillo's

We have also planted two feijoa trees (pineapple Guavas) on account of how fantastically delicious they taste, and also to make feijoa wine, which I hear is very easy to swill. If you haven't tasted one of these delicious fruit, do yourself a favour. Another new addition to the garden is a tropical guava tree which has taken the place of our mandarin (God rest its roots) after it was savagely mauled by a heartless and possibly drunk mob of cockatoos. We discovered (albeit too late) that they are terrified of red underpants hung on a pole. We are not sure if this is a universal rule or if it is uniquely my underpants that did the trick. If so, and you are in need of a pair, be warned, prices will be exorbitant.

Finally our apple trees have fruited this spring, with a bounty of promising small apples hanging on their branches. If they can duck and weave the possums and cockatoo's, rosellas and bush rats, maybe we might even get to eat one in the summer.

Happy gardening gang.

Cows and Kimono's

Staying With a Little Black Cow

Last year we received an exciting invitation to attend "The Little Black Cow" farmstay from one of our fellow bloggers, Kim. She had kindly invited our family to stay free of charge for a trial run of their new farm stay in the beautiful Hunter Valley. Arriving on Friday evening, as we drove our station wagon through the farm gates, packed to the hill with gumboots and our farmiest farm clothes, we were all very excited. There ahead, down the long, dusty drive, past the quaint tree- lined creek sat "The Little Black Cow" Farmstay, amidst paddocks that were peppered with beautiful Angus cattle. Unlike our 750 sq metered suburban frontyard farm, this was the real deal, a real, working farm.

After meeting our lovely hosts and unpacking the car we donned our farmer's hats and were put promptly to work, job no 1, a trip in the jeep to herd the cattle and shift the electric fence. We've all wizzed past a paddock of cows on the freeway but standing within arm's reach, with only a thin electric cable between you and 50 Angus cows and their two tonne and somewhat territorial bull, can  get the suburban heart pumping.

 But in true country style Kim's 11 year old son made light work of rounding them up on his dirt bike sending the herd thundering off into the next paddock... There is something beautiful about a cow, maybe it's the eye lashes, maybe it's the glossy coat or the lazy moo cow stare they seem to give (which is quite different to the way a bull stares at you) that makes them so endearing as they munched the grass a foot away from us.

As David and I shifted the electric fence, walking through knee high lucerne, I was tempted to ask him a question about bovine that had been on my mind for many years... can cows really explode? Instead, I decided to ask about the growing patterns of lucerne (so as not to reveal my grose urban stupidity). David is a wealth of knowledge, and we learned a lot from him on our trips about the farm on the jeep.

As the sun set on our first afternoon, we returned to the homestead for a traditional country meal and glass of wine with Kim and David, before retiring to our very comfortable beds. Next morning, Kim and the kids herded the sheep into their paddock, collected eggs from the chooks, and played with the Guinea pigs and rabbits. Kim showed us how to milk Honey the goat, and we each had our chance to show Kim a thing or two about how NOT to milk a goat.

We had a great time at The Little Black Cow Farm Stay, and it was wonderful meeting Kim and David, who are so passionate about sharing life on the farm and the experiences that come from it. One day soon, we would love to visit the Little Black Cow farmstay again, and maybe this time, Joe will muster the courage to ask David about exploding cows.


Summer Rain

Back on our own enormous 750 sqm metre farm, the relentless wet summer had brought good times and bad in the vegetable patch. The endless rain has brought us gluts to gloat over, and the odd minor gardening tragedy too. This season we have had an especially good crop of tomatoes. Planting a selection of heirloom tomatoes, we have enjoyed the most colourful mix of green zebras, tommy toe, black russian cherry, orange juan-flamme, beautiful yellow lemon drops, and brown berry and other varieties. For the backyard farmer, the smaller varieties are worth their weight in gold. Ripening faster, they provide an ongoing supply and are less prone to pest damage. They taste fantastic and provide a colourful array for any salad.

just out of reach!

Our cucumbers also had a bumper crop, yielding about 60 fruits from 3 vines. Unfortunately though, they fell prey to the dreaded giant extra spotty lady beetle, which devoured the vines in a matter of weeks. Unlike their smaller cousins, the larger variety of lady beetle are not so friendly, and should be squished on sight. They eat the leaves of cucumbers working in circles until their is nothing but a lacy skeleton of the leaf remaining.

unlady like lady beetles

Our crookneck zucchini's could not withstand the powdery mildew without the dry weather and consequently shrivelled up prematurely but still gave a good yield while they lasted. Whilst we are on the topic of tragedies, our store of broadbeans (several hundred) were discovered by a barbaric hoard of field mice and seemingly disappeared over night. Joe was devastated! The little buggers took every single last one.

But on the upside, we have new cucumber vines fruiting and a new crookneck fruiting as well. Just goes to show its worth doing a second round of seedlings in early summer.

New to the Patch

With our Crop  and Swap (food Swap) well under way, we have been discovering so many new varieties of foods that grow well in the mountains, and it has provided us with the unique opportunity  to grow some new plants in the patch. We now have loads of Comfrey (from Cath) that we use to feed the chookens, as well as for liquid fertilizer (amazing stuff). Our Jerusalem Artichoke is growing extremely well and looks to promise a good harvest, and we tasted our very first home grown cape gooseberry,  which we planted some months ago thanks to Jane and Peter (neighbours that attend the Crop & Swap). Our choko vine is running wild and making light work of covering our fenceline, and our pumpkin vines are doing laps of the frontyard, but perhaps our most  intriguing new edition to the garden is a plant called Yacon.

Young Yacon plant

Yacon is a root vegetable, which grows in a similar fashion to Jerusalem artichoke, although the tubers are high in a sugar known as inulin. It can be eaten fresh, is said to be crisp and sweet, like an apple.The tubers can be grated to extract the juice, which is then reduced to make a sweet syrup similar to molasis. Most interesting of all is that the sugars in yacon are not absorbed by the body, so its sweet to eat, but doesn't contribute any unsightly kilos. Our plant is growing well, and if all goes well, we will trial making some Yacon syrup and let you know how it goes.



Crop and Swap Continues to grow

Our local food swap, the Crop and Swap, is going from strength to strength. Every second Saturday of the month we have been meeting with around 60 other locals who grow or make their own food. Now with our 5th swap on the doorstep it has been so rewarding to see the variety, creativity and quality of homegrown or home-made produce. Although no money changes hands at the swaps, a unique bartering currency has developed. We are able to access items that money can't buy. You can't go to your local shops and buy Peter and Amber's artisan sourdough, nor Miriam and Russel's honeycomb fresh from their hive, or Melanie and Alexander's pink rhubarb champagne.


















Likewise, another benefit for us is knowing that our organically grown potatoes, heirloom tomatoes, eggs, cucumbers, zucchinis and  macadamia nuts aren't just enjoyed by our own family, they are being shared amoungst our local community.

Our homegrown produce at last months swap

The Crop and Swap has opened up an exchange not only of goods but ideas, local knowledge and resources. From these exchanges we've discovered local secrets...apple trees down quiet laneways, when to forage for local mushrooms and who to ask for advice on fruit trees. It's conversations like these that have got a whole neighbourhood talking again....it seems though that someone has been doing more than their fair share of talking, as news of the Crop and Swap has reached the shores of Japan...last week we were contacted by a Japanese ecological magazine called Konichiwa who want to write an article about the swap...consequently now that we are internationally acclaimed superstars, Joe refuses to be seen in the garden in anything less than a pure silk kimono...and gucci riding boots... Not to mention a large pair of Audfrey Hepburn sunglasses in case the paparazzi pop out from behind the choko's, or Google earth decide to update their satellite images.

take that grasshopper!

A shout out to Brad and Ange... we know youre reading.

Ask Your Neighbour for some Sugar!

The First ever Crop and Swap

Now that a few weeks have passed and the dust has settled on our very first local community food swap, we can take stock of its success in a more level headed and objective fashion, without getting all swept up in the giddy pandemonium of positive community spirit that might otherwise blurr our judgement.... Objectively speaking, the first ever Crop and Swap was bloody fantastic! Absolutely Amazing! Awe inspiring! and sooooo much fun!

As we arrived at the community hall to set up, the golden shafts of sunlight were just beginning to warm the  cool mountain air, and it looked set to be a beautiful day. Inside the hall we set up the Crop & Swap banner, a registration desk, a circle of hessian sacks on the floor (the swapping circle), tea and coffee, and a resource table (where locals could bring magazines, tools, or any other resources to share).

We had no idea how many people to expect and thought a modest 25 or so would attend. By 9:30 people started to arrive, and by 10:30am, we had over 80 people in the hall, bringing all manner of home grown and home made produce. Baskets full of garden greens, mulberries, macadamia nuts, mushrooms, seedlings and seeds, beetroots and bread, jams, eggs, honey and even cheese! we met so many fantastic people, and it was fascinating seeing what people brought to swap.

At the end of a hard days swapping

Swappers had come from all over the mountains and even as far as eastern Sydney. The atmosphere was honestly electric, and it was simply a pleasure watching others make swaps, get chatting, exchange numbers and begin building a vibrant community network before our very eyes.

ok, ok, pass me lettuce leaf to dry my eyes, while I mop up the oil spill of community mojo before someone slips over and blows all our public liability. I'll stop wobbling on and on about how wonderful it was, and get down to the nitty gritty; How did it work and what was swapped?

After everyone registered, they chose a mat in the swap circle to display their produce, and then grabbed a tea or coffee, had a chat, and spied on what others had brought to swap.  At 10:30 the swapping began, and people made swaps independently with one another.

Our own swap mat started with broad beans, macadamia nuts, silver-beet, nasturtiums, two dozen eggs, three bottles of worm wee and bunches of parsley. We brought home a super yummy medlar fruit sauce, baby garlics, snow peas, Thai mint and rosemary seedlings, kefir, heaps of mint, oranges, sage, rocket, dwarf beans and baby spinach. Swapping with neighbours beats shopping at Coles any day of the millennium!

What is most exciting about being involved in a local food swap is the way it reinvigorates the connections between neighbours, builds local knowledge, and makes a community more empowered by sharing skills, resources and of course, good food, which is a common bond for us all. Just about everyone walked away thinking, "Right! what can I bring next month that is knock your socks off amazing" or "wow, I'm going to have a crack at growing that in my garden", or atleast, "mmmm... that home baked apple tart smelled delicious"...(that's what I was thinking). We all felt motivated to be more resourceful. But most important of all,, was the fact that it gave us the opportunity to share what we had with others, and without getting all mushy, it seems to me, that in a society where we have more than we need, sharing is oddly something we seem to do less often than we should. Its true what they say, that the fun is in the giving. I think this is why the Crop and Swap will hopefully continue to be a success.

Sorry, pass me another lettuce leaf........

Gourd Almighty!

Our next Crop and Swap is only a week away, and we have been busy preparing our produce. Today Jo made jars of raspberry and Logan berry jam, and in the garden, our carrots and beets are ready or plucking, as well as potatoes, silverbeet and lettuce. But our prize swapping item for this month is our crookneck zucchini! They look totally out of this world! With yellow warty looking skin, they may at first seem less appetizing than the regular zuke. But they taste great, and are incredibly productive. Crookneck Zucchini are one of the most prolific zucchini's and grow as a bush instead of rambling along a clumsy vine like some uncivilised courgettes tend to do.

the crookneck's in the patch

Jo's raspberry and Logan jam

Our beets have been growing particularly well in the raised mounds.

The Garlic Wars

Garlic is glorious! It tastes fantastic, keeps you and your chookens super healthy (just add it to their porridge), and wards of vampires and fair weather friends. But Alas, there simply isn't enough of it grown here in Australia, and we are doomed to purchase foreign garlic from the other side of the world that has been fumed with fungicides, and is months, if not years past its used by date.

our hard neck garlic

I don't know if you have experienced the same, but the store bought imported garlic has recently taken a major nose dive. More often than not, upon cracking open a fist full of garlic, we have found it to be mouldy and rotten. Home grown garlic stores incredibly well for 6 or more months, so it makes one wonder how old our imported garlic is....



Well, we have a plan. Our aim next February is to plant as much garlic as our garden will hold, after the equinox, as is the tradition. I became very excited recently when one of our hard neck garlic bulbs went to seed last week. With dreams of replanting the seed and becoming a major global exporter of garlic from our very own front yard, I started to become deluded with garlicky grandeur,  only to find out after some research that they rarely grow true to type from seed, and even if they do, it takes 2 years before you can harvest them. bugger!

 Needless to say, we can still plant the bulbs, and in time, our plans of world garlic domination may one day still become a reality. Garlic is easy to grow. Prepare the soil before planting with compost or manure. plant the cloves about 10cm apart, pointy end up, about 5cm beneath the soil. There are many varieties, but are largely divided into soft neck and hard neck varieties.

We are looking for volunteers to enlist in our guerrilla garlic war. So if you too are sick of bad imported garlic, join the ranks and plant some garlic in your patch this Autumn. Who's with us?!!!

Chapter 4: House Hunting Tips, then back to the Garden

Chapter 4 : House Hunting Tips and then back to the Garden

There are some things that will haunt a renter til the day they die (especially if they are still renting when they die). There are the onging mundane aspects of 'renting life' like having to constantly deal with inexperienced real estate agents with names such as 'Sheri-lee', 'Mario' and 'Kaylene', who insist on sending letters outlining your immenent eviction even though your rent is 6 weeks in advance. Then of course there are the old sour pusses like 'Yvonne' who tells you the land lady "is a dear old sweet lady who drops by maybe once a year for a quick dip at the beach and to prune the front garden" but ommits details of any size 26 knickers and the truth about extended stays with her extended family having extended parties in your back yard for up to 4 weeks.

Or there are those friggin cold winter mornings when you shiver to the fridge for the milk, open the door and realise in a moment of renting sadness that the inside of the fridge is warmer than your house...and there is nothing you can do about it...except climb inside the fridge.

Almost all renters have experienced plauges of one kind or another, whether it be the killer wasp hive inside your living room wall, the psycho possum who stares at you through your air vents or the endless stream of german cockroaches that take up residence in every single electrical item you plug into a wall and that no spray known to man can kill.

There is an inevitable period of self deception that every renter undergoes by concocting a series of pschological antedotes such as 'those silly people who are chained to their mortgage, I am free to go anywhere I please, hell I could even live in Brazil tomorrow if I wanted to' or the classic spartan and quasi-ethical excuse for renting 'my house does not define me as a person, I have transcended all need for material ownership, thats why I only aquire my house-hold furniture at council pickup, I am NOT buying into this consumerist ideology damn it!' Last but not least there are those less fortunate renters who have subsided to drugs and alcohol abuse as a final resort, before leaving and joining a commune. Their excuse for renting usually goes a little something like this 'I won't be told I need to buy a block of land, I mean we all own the land, the land is part of us and we are part of it. right? Darren? wake up darren!'

Unless you have already come to the last intoxicated option and embraced Socialist perspectives of land ownership, eventually every renter faces the cold, hard fact that they would prefer to own their own home.

Here are our top tips for escaping the rental cycle.

1. Start saving and put your money in a high interest saving account, don't touch it, be patient. Getting into a cycle of saving will give you a good indication of how much you are capable of repaying on a mortgage.

2. Start seeing brokers and banks (they will come to you) and get an idea of how much you can afford to repay fortnightly. They will most likely offer you more than they should so be smart. Make sure that the monthly repayments are well under the amount that you are putting aside in savings already otherwsie a simple interest rise will knock you about.

3. Start looking on Domain.com and Realestate.com and other private sale sites to see what and where your money can buy. The more you do this the more discerning you will become of good value for money.

4. Make a list of everything you want in a home such as distance to work and shops, number of bedrooms, size of block, suburb etc and then work out which things you will and won't compromise on right down to things like floor boards v carpet.

5. When dealing with real estate agents be very clear on your checklist, email it to them, it will save you and them alot of wasted time.

6. Start getting out and seeing houses, see at least 10 before you seriously consider anything. This can be hard, but be disciplined and patient.

7. Think outside the square. Advertise what you want in local papers as private sellers will respond (this was how we bought our house).

8. When you find the house you really like make sure you get a building and pest inspection and if possible get some advice from someone in the building industry that you trust.

9. If all else fails revert to phase 3 of our renting scenario, Yalumba makes a great Dry Red, 2 litres for only $12, if it wasn't for the fact tht Joe kept breaking out in an allergic rash, we may never have owned our own home!

Starting a Veggie Garden
Anyway time to put the funk back into our funky frontyard farming advice. In the garden right now we are growing purple carrots, Pak choy, lots of tomatoes, huge bunches of basil, sweet potatoes, strawberries, butternut pumpkins, baby capsicums and spicey hot chillis. These are but few of the summer bounty which is sadly now coming to a cool close. But do not despair, our fellow funky farmers, there are still plenty of volumptuos vegetables you can grow right now.

"But I don't have time to make a vegetable garden", I hear you think across this cyber space. Don't be silly, even in a styrofoam box you can get a satisfying return of crops. Heres what to plant this month of March:

for the budding first time vege gardeners, try all season carrots, lettuce, Pak-Choy, silverbeet, shallots and garlic.

for the more adventurous, go for beetroot, broccoli, chives, Leek, onions, turnips and strawberries. if you have the room, plant them all.

Some handy hints are as follows.

put your patch in a spot where it will get as much sun as possible, and near a water source. Good soil means good crops. plenty of manure and dark soil will give big returns (top soil and manure is about $5 a bag). add mulch like sugar cane mulch to help retain water. (about $13 a bale at bunnings).

We made this vege box from a wooden pallet i found in council pick up (we were renting at the time).

Some things grow larger than others, so plant your taller crops at the southern end of the garden so they don't overshadow the smaller crops. Don't fret too much about this if you are a first timer. you will pick it up as you go. main thing is to make sure you have a go.

water in the evenings every 2 or 3 days, and after any hot days.

Pak-Choy grows super fast (an asian green that is great in stirfries and laksa's). When sowing all season carrots, mix the seeds with some sand (they are tiny) before sowing to help space out the seeds. Shallots are great - hack them back and they grow back again and again. Garlic shoots are also nice to flavour dishes or can be used to tie chicken thigh fillets flavoured with seasoning etc. Yummy.

sweet potatoes grow like mad in spring and summer. Unlike normal potatoes (which have poisonous leaves) the leaves of sweat potatoes are edible and delicious in a salad. they grow heart shaped leaves as a creeper, and look nice in the garden too.

when things start to grow cover with netting to keep out unwanted feathered or furry freeloaders. There, that should get you started. We will keep updating you with what to grow each month.

Next week - time to talk poultry. Introducing our three lay-dees, Henrietta, Charlie, and Billy Holiday. How we got started, and some eggsellent ideas for anyone thinking foul thoughts.