VEGE PATCH. What's growing in yours?

[silver]

Can't wait to sink my teeth into these

shallots

corn got bigger

male flowers on top

plenty of cob tassles too

mulched in under

threw a few extra pineapples under the bowen mango where the afternoon light will get to them

and an orchid flowering in the full sun on an Alexander palm(it does get middle of the day shade)

 

[silver]

Plenty of leaf on the pumpkin vine, corn has some ready

couple of passionfruit up n away

pumpkin scooting across old chook.pen floor

phenomenal growth

corn showing on this little cob

lookin good

and soo sweet (pretty sure this is the third generation grown from saved seed)

shallots in pots

some in the garden too

two little rows of them

and Lola (helping me)

dragon fruit flower

turns out the fairy flowers are actually a miniture datura

passionfruit are showing up here and there now

actually getting a few lemons off now too

and a couple of nice little pawpaw tree's coming up under the bananas

about to shift a few gardens around a bit so the strawberries can have a new bed too

 

[Jaros]

You're making us all jealous Silver.

 

[thedigger]

You will not starve Silver,it is magic the way you have got things growing.

 

[silver]

Thanks fellas, I recon the deep mulch, rooster booster, ash, and weed tea all work pretty well together over time. I try to make it that nothing leaves the yard except through the sewerage. If I could use that too I would (actually..... citrus love urine). The romans used to have a clay lined pit like a pool that everything went into (sewerage, weeds, scraps, dead animals and such), and when it was ready to use the slaves used to dipper it out into the orchards and fields. I'm cheating... but trying to increase my environmental fertility locally with what I have mostly. I really need to get the motor going on the mulcher so I can get excess limbs on trees organised and mulched (fed to the food producers)

 

[thedigger]

We are like you,always putting what ever on the garden beds to improve the soil.
I go to the oak forest and grab a load of old leaves,then cover with pea straw.Also hard wood saw dust.

 

[silver]

We get birds and bats stopping in and dropping nutrients and minerals that they've eaten elsewhere... and a fleet of frogs, toads, wasps, and local birds(and two chooks) that tranform insect life into fertilizer for the plants.

We watched in the backyard a while back and after a sunshower... the moths rise out of the grass everywhere flying low... and a full compliment of every toad in the yard out hopping around catching them all. Was an amazing sight, with Mrs S repulsed by the whole ordeal (she has toadaphobia reeeeal bad).

I like that our yard is alive and kicking.... even the toads die in it eventually and all the weeds (most of... one mongrel seedy thing goes into the bin... not sure how to spell citotoshous.... goes slippery in your hands instead of pulling out easily....I'm a lazy gardener) are great to have growing well cause they are just adding to the mulch all the deeper down minerals

 

[Teemore]

Apart from the veggies .... lots of waste concentrates from dry blowing and sluicing ..... bring home the cons, extract the good stuff, gold, and use waste cons as path between the beds.

 

[Jaros]

Healthy and tidy-good weed control you have there. erfect:

 

[silver]

Looking great Teemore erfect:

 

[silver]

Dragon fruit might open tonight maybe

found some new type of mushroom in an orchid (not a gold top)

potted a few (bare rooted) seedling fruit trees and passionfruit out of the garden the other day, mango, avocado, peach. Lost a few of the smaller vines.
(already gave a few away)

some years(not often) the big trees flower 6 months out of season.... exactly opposite when they normally would do.
This time it was all three (usually only one or two

there is Jacaranda

leopard tree (camouflage tree)

and a swamp paperbark tree

The usual flowering time for all these trees is September. I've been meaning to correlate them to the weather for years.... cause I can never remember what happened when they did what.

 

[silver]

So here it is.... my first ever dragon fruit flower
from this

to this (sneaky night photo)
I pollinated it with my finger

the things we would miss if we slept hey

 

[silver]

Hangs its head in the morning to protect itself I guess.

 

[Mackka]

Watch out the possums or rats don't get it mate.
Mackka

 

[silver]

That's a possum trap underneath it there in the last shot Mackka.... been a very long time out of use (the possums have lots of food here they could access.... they dont even take my pawpaws when they could).... I recon it's low enough that Lola would like to see them try

 

[Teemore]

So here it is.... my first ever dragon fruit flower

OK now I'm seriously jealous ..... have a shite load go cacti/moon cactus that regularly flower BUT also have specific Dragon Fruit cacti both yellow and red/purple varieties.

These bugger have NEVER flowered let alone set fruit. I know Vic is not the best location for them (unlike the tropics) but I live in hope.

 

[silver]

Avocado tree (seedling)

telling me it needs a feed (light coloured leaf with deeper green veins)

Couple of male pawpaws ripening up

some mushies coming up (chooks must'a tried the first one and spat it out)

harvested the corn

some for the chooks

some for us for freezing and for nect lot of seed (I'll seed up the biggest earsfor its DNA)

I left some of the third row standing to shade my little capsicum (I'll remove some each day to let it get used to more sunshine)
The first two rows are going to grow some local garlic next... but that third row can have some snow peas soon)

and of course.... the compost heap was a big winner too

Somehow I've gotten it in my mind to plant garlic around the 17th of March give or take a week... so that's what I'm doing.... following my instinct

 

[silver]

Garlic
Got some bunning compost....(no seeds in that type compost)
and local bulbs(from elswhere)

Cleared off the mulch to the wheelbarrow
(the worms are at work under the mulch)

Dug 3 rows about 4 inches deep and filled them with compost

took outer paper only off the garlic bulbs

So they looked like this

Singularised them (still with their own protective paper on)

Then discovered I never bought enough lol

Tommorow is another day(shop is shut)
(and....those ones are already planted )

 

[goody2shoes]

Do your garlic come out being purple Mr Silver?

When I use to grow them down at Tassie I would just buy the garlic cloves from the supermarket

Would pull them apart like you did and plant them

But for some reason they would have a purple ting to them

The garlic cloves still tasted just like the shop stuff

 

[silver]

I confess goody that my last lot of garlic(and first ever)(Chinese I'm sure) sorta came up and died off bit by bit. So I've utubed myself up a bit... and hope I'm going to do better this time. I'm expecting them to dig in and sprout... then get themselves ready for winter, and then grow properly after that. But I'm flying blind really goody. They should look purply and great being fresh when they get harvested eventually. I have never even tasted this type, but, because it is already locally grown I'm hoping to gain some type of advantage out of just that itself.
If I don't try I'll never know what is possible for me. And we do use a fair bit of garlic each year. I'd like to get some elephant garlic bulbs to try if this works for me. If not.... I'll try different timing next time.