TWIG - 18

Ohhh in all the excitement over the RAIN I clear forgot to post anything else last week!

 

raspberry - yum

I sent all my rainy piccies off to foxtel/austar weather channel – and the whole of oz got to see my dear Sams Creek (and to hear my excited rain recitation) - this week the weather channel crew sent me this lovely gift in the mail – its great that I have used it already

Anyway with all the excitement - this is more of a 'this fortnight in the garden' rather than 'week'....

.... and what a wonderful 2 weeks it has been – with the rain at the end of last week (340mm all together – extraordinary!) As I'm writing this we are getting the absolutely essential 'follow-up' rain. This is what we call rainfall that comes after the initial drought-breaking rain. It's important that follow-up rain arrives not too soon and not too late after the initial fall – this is arriving a week after the huge downpour – just perfect timing. The follow-up rain consolidates the big fall – this is the stuff that really gets the grass and garden going. The big downfall filled the rivers and creeks and dams because most of the rain just ran off the very dry ground. This is the stuff that soaks into the now softened ground. And the timing couldn't be better – late summer is just perfect - the days can still be potentially very warm, but the hottest parts of summer are behind us and the cold is yet to set in – so it will be a most glorious autumn and winter! The best in more than a decade I'm tipping.

Yesterday and today was the annual Cobargo Show – only it's been a little bit damp for most show activities – but no one is really complaining. Sass and EJ sent in some very lovely paintings and drawings, they both cooked a cake for the packet cake section, Sass submitted a crocheted string man and EJ entered a collection of flowers -all very adorable. (show update – the kiddies collected a bunch of prizes –much to their delight!)

Here's EJ's rather wonderful abstract painting
(she painted it to go in her room....I just love it!)

and Sassy's collage of favourite things...
bikes feature heavily - oh joy! 
(also to grace his room once it returns from the show)

 

red yarrow

To do

after all the rain I am rethinking our autumn plans – at long last I can plant some of the trees and garden beds that I've been holding off on – but more of this will emerge in the coming weeks/months

plant new seedlings: santolina,  celeriac, stevia

milk spray the cucurbits (powdery mildew is rapidly setting in on my pumpkins squash and friends)

spread organic fertiliser – on all beds – everywhere

trim westringea hedge plants

pick/preserve more cucumbers (if anyone is coming past Sams Creek – please drop in and collect your FREE cucumbers – seriously – please – save us! we have an avalanche of cucumbers at the moment)

 

armenian cucumber (I think....)
I feel a bit like the old woman who lived in a shoe
- she had so many cucumbers she didn't know what to do!

Completed

most of the last week I've spent rushing from dam to dam marvelling at the glorious overflowing bodies of water! And its been too wet to do some of the things that really need attending to – ah well, you're not going to hear me complaining

seedlings planted: morrocan mint, lemon balm, common mint, artichokes & comfrey (in the sunken garden), chinese wombok cabbage, great lakes lettuce, pak choy (vege beds)

endive seedlings thinned

another batch of mustard pickles bottled

Picking/ eating

green oak leaf lettuce, raspberries, rondo de nice zucchini, yellow crook-neck zucchini, green patty-pan squash, spring onions, ivory eggplant, pontiac potatoes, early wonder cucumbers, armenian cucumbers, passionfruit, cherokee wax beans, climbing princess beans, sweet basil, roma tomatoes (yipee – tomatoes at last!!!!) but our stone fruit are all finished for the season (phew...I was nearly out of bottles...).

 

climbing princess beans - small but delicious!

seeds of success!

As you’d expect for early to mid spring – our vegie garden is a hive of activity. All our seeds are heritage or open-pollinated varieties – and it's so exciting to see them all germinating and growing strongly. Like a typical gardener I have to regale everyone with tales of my darling seeds and plants.....

'Cherokee wax' dwarf bean

We have 3 types of beans currently – ‘Climbing Princess’, ‘Cherokee Wax’ and a Borlotti type.

We’re trailing 2 varieties of carrot – ‘little finger’ (which is apparently a squat little one – I’m expecting Sass and EJ to attack these raw) and ‘Chantenay red-cored’ (deep red in the centre – very attractive). Both have sprouted thickly.

Getting our ‘hollow-crown’ parsnip to sprout has been a source of great pride – parsnips are fickle buggers – I remembered my late grandfather’s advice – plant them shallow, stamp them down hard with the back of the rake and water only on planting

My dear pop would be proud!

We’re eating from the giant mustard greens (they’re much nicer picked small and tender) and I’m stealing outer leaves from our small red cos lettuces (oh they are del-i-ous – yum! But I am a BIG salad lover)

The salsify is up – this is a fun experiment –I’ve never come across it before…

'early fortune' cucumber - an oz heritage variety dating back to the C19th

We’ve got the ‘early fortune’ cucumber up as well as both the ‘rondo de nice’ and ‘yellow straightneck’ zucchinis (the yellow ones are for my ‘famous’ bread and butter zuc pickles – remind me to post a recipe later in the season)

'rondo de nice' zucchini

We’ve got both ‘progress’ dwarf peas and ‘oregon’ snow peas up – but they are looking patchy – I think something has been snipping of the little seeds as they emerge… (I’m thinking its birds)… so I’m re-seeding the gaps…

No sign of any of my pumpkin seeds up yet – but I have these dotted around my other garden beds and the conditions are variable and not ideal

In my seed raising area finally all my tomato seeds are up – we’re planting ‘yellow pear’ (for my mum – they are a low acid variety), ‘amish paste’ – these are fabulous big juicy things – a beefsteak variety.. brilliant for a sandwich; and ‘rouge de marmande’ (I’ve grown these before – but my crop wasn’t brilliant – better luck this time around) I look forward to posting some pics of these as they grow and fruit.

As I’m quite behind – I resorted to buying a few small tomato seedlings to get some production happening – and yesterday planted 6 romas (my main sauce tomato – I make soooooo many bottles of tomato sauce and relish!)

And over in my seed raising area I have okra, spring onions, banana shaped rockmelon, raddiccio, bronze arrowhead and more red cos lettuces all up and going – still waiting on the ‘rosito’ eggplant and ‘golden wonder’ capsicum

oooooh there's so much to do - what am I doing here in front of the computer! must get back out there amongst my dear little plants!

seeds and seedlings

Our raised beds are now filled with a wonderful mix of topsoil, spoiled hay, organic fertiliser and old cow manure (courtesy of the dairy nearby), and are topped with a layer of hay mulch to keep the soil moist. We hope the huge input of materials and effort will pay off in great soil quality (there’s more than 5 one tonne ute loads of cow manure in these 4 beds – and we hauled the mix in by tractor bucket load…. It took over 40 trips to the mixing site… a mammoth effort from Farmer Phil over 5 days)


We’ve even planted our first seedlings (cos lettuce, giant red mustard greens, warragal greens, cream-gold and red onions) and seeds (beetroot, butter beans, borlotti beans) – how satisfying! (that's one of the warragal greens)




And the old garden site has been taken over by Farmer Phil’s potato crop – and they are up already! (local wisdom states one shouldn’t plant potatoes or tomatoes until after the October long weekend (last weekend) but Phil decided to take his chances…. Fingers crossed the frosts have all passed…

And today our large Eden seed order arrived (oh Joy) Eden Seeds are open pollinated, non-hybrid, heirloom and old time varieties – I ripped open the packets – rushed to the garden and planted 'little finger' and 'red chantenay' carrots and hollow-crown parsnips… tomorrow I’ll get to some of the other beauties!