garden

I finally got back into the garden last week. We have had so much rain, the ground just squelches, and the rest of the country is in drought...

I had to remove one of my bean pyramids as it had rust, but the others are going strong. My 7 year bean has pods on it - and it's only been in for 9 months. The flowers are beautiful, adding colour to my winter garden. Another thing adding colour to my garden right now is the mandarin tree. It is covered in mandarins, just coming ripe now. We lost some due to excess water, but most are still on the tree and almost ready for harvest. We do have one mandarin which looks a bit funny...

Everyone is commenting on the pumpkin vine out the front. The silly vine (3 actually, all twined together) gave me a lovely crop of about 30 butternut pumpkin, and now seems to be growing Jap pumpkins... The zucchini is still hanging in there. and giving the occasional zucchini, but this current cold snap may finish it off. My broad beans are up and there are some chokoes coming through, again not bad as I only planted the vine in spring. I have spinach growing in the garden and bok choy growing in the lawn. There are tomatoes on their vines and pea pods on the bed base trellis. I have carrots and parsnips scattered everywhere, and have just picked 3 turnips to put into the bacon and egg pie I want to try. Here is a pic of the day's bounty.

My Mum used to make a fantastic bacon and egg pie whenever we went on picnics, which had thinly sliced fresh turnips in it, which helped cut the grease from the bacon. I asked her for the recipe a few years ago, and she couldn't remember ever making it! If anyone knows a recipe for this, please let me know. In the meantime, I will try to fake it, which gives me a chance to try some more pastry recipes which do not involve wheat, corn or potaotes and my daughter and I are both allergic.

I have had some amazing comments on the garden. I am surprised by the number of people who recognise that it is a permaculture garden. Even the lovely older ladies from the Jehovah's witness recognised it. So far it has saved us heaps of money, and even made some cash from selling excess zucchini. Apparently my husband thinks you can have too many zucchini!!!!

My hubby made me a lovely circular garden bed around the bottom of the clothes line, which I have planted out in herbs, to help the clothes smell fresher. I have planted lemongrass, which is trying to take over, perennial basil, oregano, lavender, savory, hyssop, stevia, parsley and some others. It's looking really good. Then the clothes line broke so it now will not go up. At least I can reach it easily now.

I have just started making a new batch of potting mix. I have the coco-peat soaking in recycled water and once it is all moist I will add the sand, vermiculite, perlite and worm castings, then plant up some more cuttings. I sold so many plants at the last LETS picnic that I need to set up some more. I also need to plant out some seedlings which are outgrowing their pots. In the meantime, I need to do some study while Miss 4 is at preschool, so I can get this Permaculture Design Course completed. I am almost done, but I keep finding new areas to investigate.

Bye.