Hawthorn Garden Update - Week 19

Things have slowed down again this weekend which is wonderful - it has meant I have been able to spend some quality time in the garden at home and at Luscombe Street which has been great.  The weather has been warming up over the past couple of weeks, and the garden is going leaps and bounds ahead!  Its so great to see things on the move, and growing well.

The potatoes have sprouted, and so time was spend on Saturday rolling up the sides of the containers and adding more soil over the sprouts ready for the little potatoes to do their growing!  The broccoli is also growing really well, and there are lots of little sprouts coming along on all of the plants which is great.  The beetroot and two kale plants are moving along as well, so hopefully we will be able to plant the sugar snap peas in there soon and harvest the beetroot soon after!

Many of the seeds have sprouted in the hot house as wel.  I sowed a heap of butter lettuce seeds at the same time as the other seeds I purchased from seeds2freedom and they are growing incredibly well.  The next to sprout were the sugar snap peas, and then the tomato seeds.

We went for a drive out to the Diggers Club garden in Dromana on Saturday and picked up some strawberry plants and a Stevia plant as well, that have now been planted out near the front door in a pot. 

Potatoes

Strawberries and Stevia plant out the front

Snow peas and baby spinach - we continue to pick from the spinach twice a week and it keeps on growing and growing!  An awesome crop...the snow peas have been growing, but seem to be prone to a bit of mould or something similar and are dying back in areas.  Might go for another variety next time, and provide a bigger trellice for them to grow on.

The Broccoli and Nasturtium are doing really, really well.  They're taking over a bit, but are doing so well so that's great!

Beetroot and Kale are going well as well.  Once the crop is ready to harvest we will plant the sugar snap peas and lettuces in this container.

The backyard...

Next batch of beetroot that will be planted once the broccoli are finished...

The Sugar Snap Peas, Butter Lettuce and Tomato plants have sprouted.

Beautiful head of Broccoli, almost ready to harvest.

Hawthorn Week 12 / Luscombe Street Week 11 Update

Sorry - I forgot to post photos of Hawthorn from Week 12!  Trying to catch up I'm afraid :)

This week brought on the first harvest of radish from the Luscombe Street garden!  I was incredibly excited, and just couldn't help myself.  I ate the radish straight out of the patch!  Delicious :)

We're in the depths of winter, so things are going at a bit of a slow pace, but all is going well and everything is looking very healthy.

Legume Bed

Brassica Bed

Allium Bed

Root / Fruit Bed

Radish!!!

Radish and Carrots growing along...

Butter lettuce seedlings that have sprouted

Sprouting broccoli, spinach and kale

Spinach, butter lettuce and spring onion

Garlic, spinach, spring onion and lettuce

The Hawthorn Planters - Broccoli, snow peas, nasturtium and various seedlings

The Hawthorn Planters - Beetroot

Hawthorn Garden Update - Week 10 & 11

Wow, oops I forgot to put an update up the week before, the fornight before, last...eek!  Oh well there's a huge amount to update you all on which is very exciting!

The snow peas are going mental, and flowering like crazy, and the broccoli has also started flowering which is great!  I have had to keep a watchful eye on the broccoli though as the grey wooly aphids have made a comeback and like munching in the new growth.  I have given them a good spray of EcoOil, and will continue to keep an eye on them to see whether they need another dose by next weekend.

The beetroots are also growing well.  The seedlings in the planter are growing and I have also taken the seedlings that have sprouted out of the hothouse to continue growing in a more natural environment.

And we have baby mushrooms!  It has taken, what, almost a month and a half, but we have the first signs of little white funghi in our shed!  So exciting :)
 

 All looking very green :)

 Almost ready to pick!

 Snow peas continue to grow and flower like mad.

 The first of the Broccoli!

 Beetroot are going well.  I have also planted the last three Kale seedlings to see how they go.  The companion planting herb containers are to be made this coming weekend - how cute are they!  Dan has made one as a test and I think it looks great!  It's just made from little offcuts that we had after making the timber containers.

 The worms are almost ready to be transported to another section of their Worm Cafe.  I'll leave them another week or two to demolish the last of the food in the bottom tray and then attempt to lure them into a new upper section.

 The baby mushrooms!  It looks like the plain button mushrooms have started growing which is very exciting :)

Hawthorn Garden Update - Week 9

All of the lovely plants continue to grow at Wattle Road!  We are at full capacity at the moment, just waiting for all of the vegetables to continue growing in what has been very wet and cold weather!  The shortest day of the year has passed, so we - and I'm sure the plants feel the same - are looking forward to the brighter, longer, warmer days  to come.

We built the last of our container boxes this weekend, and have planted a heap of beetroot seedlings to mature whilst the seeds are continuing to grow in the hot house.  The garlic has also shot out of the ground and is looking very happy!  The snow peas continue to flower and the pods on the plant continue to grow.  The only work that I'm doing with the plant is pinching out any wayward sprouts.  You will notice that each new flower/leaf growth also has an additional sprout that forms perpendicular to the branch.  I have been pinching these out and leaving the new growth that comes directly adjacent the new flower.  I have been told that this helps with flowering and means that the plant spends more time producing flowers than unnecessary plant growth.

Snow peas, spinach, broccoli, spring onions, nasturtiums and catnip

The new beetroot box!

Snow peas continue to grow and ripen

Kale and fennel seedlings

Oregano, rosemary, mint and thyme doing well through the winter

Sage and parsley.  New parsley plants are beginning to grow.

The garlic has sprouted!

Companion herb plants ready to be potted out...

The leftover spring onions are being snipped and eaten as we go :)

Beetroot seeds are beginning to sprout.

Hawthorn Garden Update - Week 8

Attack of the moths!  Having left the garden to fend for itself for a week (we have again had very cold and wet weather so not nice to be heading outside!), I managed to bypass checking for caterpillars and moths and found two big, plump specimens on the broccoli plants at home!  They have really had a go at two of the plants so here's hoping the plants will still do well and continue to grow.  It just means that I will need to keep a really good eye on the plants and squish as I see them.

The two containers - the peas are doing fantastically well!

Not exactly sure what these are!  Maybe droppings?  They were also on the new shoots toward the centre of the plant.

 Little villan on plant

So the Cabbage Moth apparently lays its eggs on the underside of leaves where they hatch and feed mostly on new growth.  These caterpillars are very well fed and are at least a couple of days old.  The best way to deal with them in a small garden is to spot the little villans yourself and kill them as you come across them, along with any eggs you find on the underside of the leaves.

I will have a look at the EcoOil as well and see whether it may help with the problem.  First things first, I have investigated whether companion planting might help the cause.  As a quick solution on Friday afternoon before we heade away I tied a bouquet of herbs to the stakes to ward off any of the moths over the weekend.  There weren't any eggs when we came back so I hope this might be a solution!  The other recommendation is to place crushed up egg shells around the plants.  Apparently this tricks the moths into believing that there are already a lot of moths hovering around the plants and they look for somewhere else to lay their eggs.  Will try that with the egg shells from breakfast this weekend!

 

The two little monsters - squashed!

A temporary solution - bouquet garni of mint, rosemary and sage

The last of the Spring Onions are well and truly ready to be planted!  Once we have constructed the final container this weekend they will be free of their black plastic pot.  The Parsley is also doing well, along with the last of the Kale, also to be planted into the container.  The Beetroot is yet to germinate but should do soon!

Luscombe Street - Week 4 Update

Prior to heading out to CERES on Saturday, I popped past the Luscombe Street plot to see how thing are going.  All of the beds are going well, things are going a bit slow but all the plants are very healthy which is a great sign!  More of the radish seeds have sprouted and will need to be thinned next week to make sure there is enough room for them all to grow.  I planted one of the nasturtium seedlings in this bed as well as a few chrysthaninum seeds in the Allium bed - go the companion planting!

The broad beans have sprouted but not popped to the surface yet so hopefully next week they will be up and growing well!  I'm debating as to whether I should pop a few seedlings from CERES in as well to have two staggered plantings of the beans.  I might just wait to see how the seeds go next week!

I planted out the kale seedlings into the Brassica plot so this bed is chock-a-block and will be yielding heaps of yummy goodies in the months to come!  With the amount of work we had on this weekend I have left the spring onions to be planted out next weekend when there is more time!  We have a working bee on Sunday so will be out there again to help out :)

 Root / Fruit bed

Allium Bed 

Brassica Bed

Legume Bed

Hawthorn Garden Update - Week 5

The propagating hot house is alive with activity at the moment.  The Kale seeds continue to grow very well, and the Nasturtium seeds have also sprouted!  It looks like three out of the four seeds have germinated which is fantastic.  I haven't had as much luck with the Catnip seeds that for some reason got completely waterlogged and were subsequently chucked in the worm farm!  I think it must have been the huge amount of rain that we have had that was dripping through the holes in the roof of the hot house onto the seeds.  Oh well, lesson learned!  I bought an established plant for kitty at CERES yesteday instead!

It will be interesting to see whether the Warrigal Greens and Radishes sprout.  The Radishes in the Luscombe Street patch have already sprouted so maybe these ones have been given a little bit too much water!

 The Hot House - Parsley seeds are almost germinated, Kale doing well, and Catnip seeds have been given to the worms!

 Kale seedlings are going really well

Nasturtium seeds have germinated