Gardening

We've been preparing to dig the new herb garden for G & L this week, as well as getting some more beds dug and planted in the vege garden so they have some fresh veg when they get back.

We've planted Rockmelon, Watermelon and Corn in one patch where beans were. There are also mixed greens (lettuce, cabbage etc) to take advantage of the Nitrogen that the beans would have fixed into the soil. We've also created a small circular bed and planted it out with Broccoli, Chinese Broccoli, Beetroot and Celery. Once the Celery gets to the right size, we'll place tubes over the top. This will help the Celery to grow longer stems and will also prevent them from turning bitter from too much chlorophyl (the stuff that makes plants green).

Here are a couple of photos of the vege patch so far:


The 1000 litre pod in the foreground will be used to store water from the dam once we get some fuel to run the pump. We have a basic watering system set up so far, but will improve on that as we find things around the yard. This should provide plenty of water to keep the garden healthy, as we are applying plenty of mulch to improve the water retention capacity of the soil. If the soil is healthy, the plants will thrive and it should also attract Earthworms into the patch to further help breakdown the hard crust below the garden soil.


I took the above shot before digging the circular bed and building the Pea stand.

Another couple of photos taken after clearing one patch of beans and after digging the circular garden and assembling the Pea stand.

The circular garden is small, but will produce plenty of Broccoli etc for two people.
This is the Pea stand. If you look closely you can see the Pea seedlings that Phoenix raised before I got here. There are also some Roma Tomato seedlings inside the frame that should thrive as well. Just in front of the stand is a patch with Zucchini, and closer still is a small patch of Potato eyes that will start growing soon.

The herb garden should be good. It's a horse shoe shape so that access will be easy. We started with the intention of digging down about 60 to 90 cm and using the waste from the Rota-Loo in the bottom of the hole, then building it up with soil etc to create a raised bed. I started a small 30 x 30 test hole to see what the ground was like. About 15cm down I started finding clay...damn. I got down about 50cm and it was all clay. Ah well, I figured that would be OK because the waste would help to break up the clay.
That night it rained (around 40mm). In the morning I had a look at the herb garden site and we had a little pond where I'd dug the test hole. A day later and the hole is still full of water.
That has led me to scrap plans for depositing the Rota-Loo waste there. There could be some health risks having half-composted poo soup underneath the herb garden methinks.

Yesterday we went over to J's place (he's the local fix-all man). We collected half a tray of firewood and half a tray of saw dust from around his portable timber mill. I'll head up there again soon for more sawdust and some fire ash from his old waste timber spots. It's all good for the soil.
As you can see in the photos below, we've started to incorporate the sawdust into thew new herb garden site . We'll collect the fire ash and charcoal and add that as well. One problem with sawdust is that as it breaks down, it draws Nitrogen from the soil. So, to counteract that, we'll also mix in the last of the Dynamic Lifter once it has dried out a little (it's wet and full of grubs at the moment). G & L have plenty of herb seeds that we'll use once the bed has settled and is ready to plant. First though, we'll have to scavange around the yard to make a temporary fence to keep the three chooks out. We had their hutch on the herb site to make use of their poo in the bed (it'll also help break down the sawdust).

Anyway, here's the photos of the herb patch in progress:








Once the herb garden is ready to go, we'll be starting around the other side of the house. We want to clean up the view from the bedroom window so that G & L have something nice to look at when they wake up in the morning. A shrub/flower bed is one idea we've discussed.

Last but not least and on a completely different subject, Jack is learning that stirring Sabrina to get her to chase him and play is not a smart idea. Sabrina plays when she's in the mood. If she's not, she burrs up, then chases him down and smacks him around. Jack, being the friendly, non-violent dog that he is, usually gets a bum or back full of claws if he's not quick enough. It's not all bad for him though. When she's in the mood, she rubs up to him and will even play chaseys with him. She also likes the back-up when she's chasing mice. They work well together rounding them up:

Phoenix took the photo above. When the flash fired, Jack sh** himself and ran away. He must have thought the monster under the plastic was attacking. Sabrina on the other hand just stayed there, looking at the dog as if to say "chicken!"