and hello winter and ‘The Garden Share Collective’. It’s time for another monthly update where a group of like minded garden bloggers, share their vege patches with all those interested – the trials and tribulations of growing your own!
Today is so mild about 18, which given we have had two frosts already this week is amazing! Those mornings were cold. It took forever for me to find matching gloves and even though my feet were in wool lined gummies, they took ages to warm up.
Grabbing my camera the other morning, I raced outdoors to grab a photo or two of Jack Frost. What do you think?
Of course while the mornings may have been chilly, the days were stunning. Crystal blue skies, no wind, perfect weather to get out of the office for half an hour, grab a coffee from the local cafe and take a hike on the beach. Lucky me!!
So what’s happening at Frog Pond Farm ..
Well the garlic is doing famously even if they are growing at rather odd angles. I still haven’t mulched this garden yet, which I need to do to keep the weeds down. And garlic isn’t fussed on sharing its space either. There are poppies, calendula, onion weed, milk weed, nasturtiums, Queen Anne’s lace, and a host of other stuff that is already growing quite happily in this bed.
I still need to haul out those chilli plants and a massive lavender bush from this bed. I loathe thinking about removing the latter as I know how much the bees enjoy these flowers, and food is becoming a bit scarce now.
My salad bed is chocka with plants .. flowers, vege, weeds and something which is digging holes that appear each morning. I suspect that the culprits are related to Mickey ..
The brassicas are growing brilliantly and surprisingly enough, a cabbage that got chomped by those gluttonous sheep is actually growing back nicely too. Who would have thought!
Kale and broccoli are vying for space in this bed.
The peas have finally got flowers … just as well there is only the two of us to feed!
Things I need to do ..
- hurry up and plant my second bed of garlic or we shan’t be harvesting until 2015!
- stop feeling depressed about the wandering jew which is endeavouring to ‘creep’ into our forest
- pick some more comfrey to replenish my fertiliser bins
- throw about some comfrey tea – especially in the direction of our citrus trees! This amazing plant contains nitrogen, potassium and magnesium which those citrus particularly enjoy
- dig up some yacon tubers for morning vege juices
- weeding, mulching and talking to my garden
- get that amazing olive oil into bottles and labelled, oh I’m excited! It tastes fantastic
Harvest
It is so nice to be able to grab fresh herbs for salads, pasta, Asian dishes and good hearty casseroles; mint, parsley, Vietnamese mint and Thai basil, oregano, thyme, lemon grass and tarragon. We are still munching on spring onions and I’m loving the huge Great Lakes lettuce leaves which are perfect in wraps with salmon, feta and hummus. Those chilli plants still have chillies ripening, even if rather slowly. There is beetroot growing nicely in the salad garden, a couple of dwarf beans which just shouldn’t be growing at all and an array of wonderful stuff that we have hidden away in the garage – garlic, Egyptian onions …
That’s it. Happy gardening!