The mighty Waikato is in the centre(ish) of the North Island of New Zealand. There is also a large river in here by the same name.
Come in summer when its not cold unless you want to experience cold/wet. Snow is fun we have that alitle further south too.
Well we found out that the dome will not blow away easily, we had some ferocious winds a couple of weeks ago and all that happened was the sail fell off the top of the dome and hung alongside of it. All the potatoes have been planted out now so we have 6 short rows about 55-60 plants. We've started to hill them up as they show just in case there was a frost unexpectedly. What is it about rows that make you feel productive? I discovered that it doesnt matter what time of the month it is, if its too cold and wet then your seed will just rot in the ground. The Cannelinni beans wound up as fodder for somelittle white bugs but the runner beans have actually sprouted. The onions we planted around the orange tree are getting to a size where you can actually notice straight away that they are there now. Some of the sugar beet have disappeared though, probabably slugs and snails. Most of the seedlings we put out over the last few weeks are still tiny and havent grown all that much with the exception of the white cabbage which is alittle bigger. I've managed toget some lawns mowed again, the first lot didnt give all that much clippings so they went into the compost bin and I then covered them with some horse manure that hadnt fully rotted down. I had a peek in there this afternoon and I think the sunshine we've had over the last 3 days has warmed it up abit so everything in there wants to start breaking it down, its definitely shrunk down quite abit, so at least something is working. Todays lawn clippings went around the edge of the garden and in the next bed over as mulch to cook the weeds that were starting to grow. I have managed to mulch the paths around the Avocadoes, in front of the Feijoas as well as the paths around the "sun" mandala. I have been keeping an eye out for any more shredded trees on the side of the road with not much success. Might have to go to the firewood man and buy some munched up bark. I have decided that sunshine this time of the year is quite deceptive, you get the idea that its time to start getting seeds going or seedlings planted out but its isnt really warm enough and they dont move. It must be time now though surely. I dont understand how you can get seeds to sprout in the time the catelogue says it takes them to sprout, then transplant them before the roots get too big and then....... you wait and wait and nothing happens, so you put them in the ground thinking maybe they need alittle extra room, feeding etc.... and they are still the same size.( some of these seedlings are three months old!!!) Sometimes I feel like pulling them all out and starting again. Still the garlic is looking good and so are the currant cuttings I took, both the red and the black ones, can remember where I put the white ones. The orange tree is looking alittle tender still but it does have alot of little new growth coming along,I need to make sure I cut off all the flowers this year so it can concentrate on regrowing its poor roots. The pine cutting I took ages ago and then forgot about for a week are all standing up and looking rather greener than they were afew weeks ago. I had this idea of coppicing them, I dont know if they can be but I dont see we have anything to lose by trying. If they do grow then we have pine needles for strawberries, Avocadoes and anytihing else that likes acidic soil. The green manure we sowed down in a couple of beds has been growing quite well, it was a mix of peas, lupins and oats. I forgot that it had oats in it and have been pulling out 'stray grass seedlings' til I noticed that the 'grass' has little knobs on the bottom and then remembered there were supposed to be oats there too....Oh... We've been trying to decide whether to dig the green manure in or let it grow to maturity, well the peas anyway, they are alot sturdier than the ones the slugs and snails have been stealing from us. I see split pea soup,mushy peas.... Can you eat lupin seeds? The hens are still laying at least 3 eggs a day. I think they have done really well,its been almost a year since we got them and they havent gone off the lay. I have left the chooks on the same spot for another week. I might lkeave them on each spot for 3-4 weeks over summer to try and give us that extra time/space to get things ripening. We are having to keep feeding them their pellets still as they just mow down anything growing in the dome almost straight away. They dont like florence fennel leaves though. We are back to eating shop bought vegies again. We should still be eating our potatoes, but they obviously dont like being stored in the attic as the last box all sprouted so madly they lifted the lid of the box. We are going to have to get a cool store area setup for them by next Autumn. Not sure where exactly they should go or what temps they store best at.
Over the last couple of weeks the potatoes have shot away. I put the last row in on a root crop day and hilled up the others. The 'swift' type has definitely grown the fastest and I'm sure it noticibly gets bigger every day. We decided to let the field peas and lupins go to seed and they are looking quite good. The Avocadoes looked at one point that they would be flowering and most had little buds on them but there hasnt been any movement on them since. I had a look at the fully grown tree out the front and its the same as the babies which was a relief, I thought I might have set them back with the move. The Orange tree is still looking sad and has lost more leaves, but it also has alot of little leaves sprouting along with the flower buds. These I pluck off when I see them. The slugs and snails had a lovely feast on the sugar beet and ate half of them, I think we will sow some more on a root day and replace them. All the currant plants and cuttings, the gooseberry,kiwifruit and boysenberries are leafing up beautifully,the garlic are all growing strongly. The black radishes I let go to seed are reeally pretty with pink flowers,the turnips that are seeding have masses of lovely white flowers and are quite eye catching. The salsify seeds sprouted, they are such odd spiky looking things. Its been alittle differcult getting to the garden over the last couple of weeks due to having to work out of town. My mums been feeding the cats and chooks for us each day and watering the seedlings if it looks like they need it. We are having less seedlings disappearing due to snails but they are still really slow to grow. Perhaps we are being alittle quick off the mark in trying to get them started while its still quite cold. I keep thinking okay now we are getting warmer weather they must start growing. We've had some lovely warm weather over the last week and finally it seeemed that we would warm weather from now but no today its cold and raining again. Good thing I went out and mowed most of the lawns yesterday. Some of the clippings went onto the compost heap along with another big bag of not quite rotten horse manure and the rest I used to cover one of the beds that the chooks will soon be moving onto. I am really glad we moved the chooks yesterday, today the wind is ferocious and it just wouldnt be happening. I have to be up in Auckland for the next week or so and am seriously wondering if I should take the seeds and trays up there and try to sowing seeds up their, getting my brother or dad to look after them til they are big enough to bring home. I know we are heading for cooler seasons but I cant help wondering how on earth did people get on with their food supplies or is it that our seasons Are changing whereas for the most part theirs were stable? We had a curry last night for tea and in this went celery, silverbeet, mustard lettuce, parsley,mint,alittle fennel leaf, same smells amount of vietnamese mint,chives and lots of diced up butternut. So while we might have made a booboo with the potatoes we are still getting some meals from the garden.
I think she's plucking off the flowers not the leaves. I guess its best not to stress the tree by making it work on fruit if it isn't a happy chappy to start with.
I took our seeds up to AK and went over them with my nephew and dad(bro was still at work). They sorted thru which ones they wanted seeds from and when I came back on Friday I sowed most of the choosen out for them. I have sown alot of our next lot of seeds too. The apple cucumber and oriental cucumbers are looking really good and so too are the capsicums. I must do some chilli this year, but will leave them for next month. Sow peas got planted out and this time I will be putting a stake at each end of them and string a couple of loops of line around them so the peas can grow up and through them and not swamp everything else like they did last year. I hoed the few stray clumps of grass growing in the paths. I also moved out from one spot, a whole heap of mulch out of the path where there isnt going to be a path anymore and moved it to where there is now going to be one. Along this edge I have little white plastic tubes to mark out where the edge is and just to make sure nobody misses it have a lime green garden twine along this length as well. The first lot of parsley got planted a foot apart for our growing border. The winter savory has grown abit more so I took more cuttings of these and put them in another spot along a path. I think we need to get some seed for this though, I can see it taking ages waiting for the winter savory to grow big enough for cuttings. Nasturtiums got planted out amongst the brassicas. I found the gooseberry plant again and moved it to a better spot along with half a dozen black current rooted cuttings. These are along the 'fruit walk' on the chook dome side. One of the other beds got filled up with grass and weeds with very few vegies left in it so I gave this a thorough hoeing being careful of the seedlings that were still there. We have tiny little onions. This is such a thrill after last years fiasco, I would like to put some more in but I'm not sure if I have left it too late, I'll have to check. The bed with the sugar beet was filling up with dock, not possible to pull them out so I took a really sharp knife and cut them all off below the ground, I suppose I'll have to keep doing this but surely if I do then they will die off, heres hoping.(all good compost material though). I had my first wild strawberry yesterday.Very small as they are, but so fruity. I noticed that this year the coddling moth and white butterfly where in the garden early. Usually you dont see theses til around nov or even later with the white cabbage butterfly. I wasnt happy to see them,I have sauerkraut in progress in the garden and dont want them ruined before I get my cabbages to the kitchen. We have an egg eater in the dome. I have been finding half eaten shells or sticky eggs. Luckily she seems to be eating only her egg but I think we may have to take each hen out at a time and put her in an old dog kennel we have, with her own nest,so we can see which one it is.... and then its probably time to start hunting up that chicken and chives ravioli recipe we tried afew years ago. We were playing with our masterplan again and will be moving the chooks dome over bit by bit while they are in the water constellation beds. We were going to make the path between each station permanent but think it will look better and be more useable to have a single curved path around the central bed. This will mean needing less plants for the edging and we can if we want use these 3 chook dome spots as one whole single bed if we want to do a bulk planting for say kumara or pumpkins. Have to see if I can scan our masterplan and post it so you can see what I'm talking about.
I would love to see your plan mischief - please get it for us. we cut off the dock below ground level too in some places and it is a great addition to the compost. Just think of the deep roots bringing stuff up from below. It will not die out though and as it regrows the root will be even harder to pull but that is ok I reckon for some of them. Good luck with the egg eater. the only "cure" we have found beyond humane cull is to clear the eggs frequently during the day. I give the job to the wwoofer and it works but they do go back to their old ways it seems.
Its sad to read about what is going to happen to the chicken who likes eating eggs. Wouldn't it be better to make a booby trap under her nest so she can't get at the eggs. I don't know it makes me feel sad that one is going to have the death sentence for such a personality failure. Saying that i am probably going to eat the chicken that is growing up into a rooster. That makes me sad too. I'd much rather have a rooster but alas, I am not allowed to keep one because it will disturb the neighbours. I've got a duck who so far doesn't lay any eggs but i've no plans to sentence her to death as yet. I like the number 5 in the flock. I shouldn't be guilt tripping you but its just sad. I am not against eating meat. On another point, are you not tempted to take photographs of your garden and show us?
Hi Sunburn, I did post some pics of the winter garden, but as you can imagine it looks rather brown and empty. I have tried to will summer along by sowing seeds when I shouldnt have bothered but that didnt work. Just because the sun shines for a day doesnt make it the start of summer. We used to get a really good hot spell between Aug and Oct for about 6 weeks then a cold spell then into summer but for the last few years there hasnt been that hot spell just a few days here and there. So I will have to re sow most of my summer vege seeds again cos those that havvent died will probably sulk for ages. When we got the hens last year it was on the understanding that they were food, either via their eggs or themselves. Nothing nasty about it, thats life. We are trying to get to grips with life in the slow lane, so anyone eating their eggs is a goner. Having said that I still havent set up the kennel to check which one needs to be dealt with. I realised the other day when I put the rubbish out for collection that this was our first bag in at least three weeks! We take our plastic bottles to the recycle centre and I insist we keep our old glass jars for preserves etc..., newspapers get saved for winter (or when its cold) for the fire and anything vaguely edible gets eaten or composted if past its best. I keep forgetting to use hardworkinghippy's idea of using toilet rolls for seed sowing and keep burning them instead. We dont have alot of tinned food so our refuse has been minimal for ages which is pleasing. I let hubby know that the pee bucket was in a spare compost bin bay, this is quite a nice spot for a bit of contemplation, being hidden by unexpected guests by our turnip that is in full flower at the moment,he hasnt used it yet but Im sure he will now that he knows it will go to feed the orange tree. I managed to get my nephews seeds sown, labelled and delivered, not sure how my brother will manage with 3 different types of Rock melon but what the hell. I also did alot more of ours including lots of sweet corn. The 'moon' bed( thats the cntral bed just as you go into the garden) got edged with parsley and this is where the sweet corn and NZ spinach have been sown. I put some lengths of re inforcing mesh over the bed so the blackbirds dont ruin everything like they are doing with the orange tree bed(sun bed). I thought I was rather clever when I used the lime green twine to mark out the paths in the first mandala, nobody can miss this so we shouldnt have any more meanderers wrecking things. Bit of a booboo with my measurements as it now seems that I will have to move the compost bin back towards the parking area so the dome can get around the mandala properly.oops. Oh well perhaps the compost could do with abit of turning.
I am starting to appreciate living in the tropics in a whole new light. We don't have frost so we can grow things all year round though not that much of conventional vegies in the wet season apparenlty. Oops i'v e just spied a naughty duck. How did she get out? gotta go and check it out.
This week we mulched the orange tree with grass clippings and havent worried if the sugar beets under it get cooked. We decided that it was more important to look after the tree and perhaps the others my take up the nutrients that the tree needs. The onions are right on the edge of the bed so we are making sure they dont get covered in clippings. The twine at the path edges seems to be working a treat and the parsley seedlings are coming along really well. I have always liked the look of the potager gardens with their neat edges, cant guarantee that ours are going to severely pruned to such a neatness but I think it will be a great advantage to have the permamant edges along the paths. Apart from telling visitors where the actual beds beging and end it should stop the chooks scratching out the mulch onto the paths like they have been doing and should help with protect against the wind(and tell us where to put the dome). I just got back from AK after being away for most of the week. I am quite happy to see that mum did look after the seedlings for us and we only lost the savoy cabbage seedlings which got fried. The potatoes have shot up Im really impressed with them and really hope we get lots of large tubers this year now that they are planted futher apart than the small ones we got last year. These got mulched with lawn clippings too.We sort of ran out of anything to hill them up with. They were planted at 800mm apart and I was expecting to hill them up at least once more but I cant quite see how we can. I did sneak in some butternut seeds 2 every other row. These werent strictly speaking supposed to be sown as it wasnt reccommended by our planting by the moon diary but I just couldnt help myself. The melons have started to sprout as have the sweet corn. Tomoorow I will be weeding. Weeding everywhere by the looks of things. I really want to re sow some more tomatoes as the ones I did ages ago havent done too well. I think we started them to early (I know we did, at some point I might learn not to). We have had such glorious weather this week I wished I could be home sowing and planting while I was away but when I looked at our diary, I only missed out on the root crops. Talking about root crops, we will have to check if builders sand is river sand or sea sand as the kumara tubers we had sprouting in a pot of this sand rotted instead of sprouting. These were from the ones we grew last year so we know they werent dusted with something noxious to stop them from sprouting. I had them sitting in their pot on the sunny side of the garden shed so they should have done really well and should have sprouted but they didnt. Kumara has to be an absolute favourtie for the both of us so we will be buying seedlings to put in, its too late to try again with another tuber. The hens seem to be happy even though they havent been moved as often as they used to be. We have alot of dandelion,Puha(sowthistle) and Italina chicory for their greens requirements and now the comfrey is coming up too. The pie shaped bed at the back of the garden has been absolutely demolished by the wild birds. The mulch is all over the paths and the little pine cutting have all bar 3 been dug out and tossed aside. Forget about the vegies that were in there they are all gone. this is so annoying, my cats are not doing thier job properly, obviously too well fed. Still, It was a buzz to come home and wander round and see most things are doing really well. Flowers on the raspberries and finally on the avocadoes- they have had flower buds on them for sooo long now I wondered if the big day was ever going to really happen.
Why are you sprouting your sweet potatos in sand. They should go fine in the soil. Here they come up without any help from me. I imported them in a trailer load of mill mud and they just got chucked on the garden with the mud. Often its not even a tuber but a piece of one.
It's much easier to propogate kumera from cuttings of the runners. Just cut off a bit and whack it in potting mix and stand back.
sunburn, kumara is a tropical plant, so it thrives up your way. Here in New Zealand, if you're not in the semi-subtropical North, growing it is a bit of a drama.
Apologies sunburn, my post looks a bit condescending when I read back, not my intention at all! What I meant to say is: because our kumara season's so short, people usually put the tubers in sand to sprout before they could be planted outside, and break off the 'slips' to grow on. When I've just planted the tubers, they've struggled as my seasons are too cold and short
