It is blowing a gale tonight! I am glad I battened down the
hatches earlier, pulled the tarps down to shelter the chooks and turned
Lipstick around so she wasn’t facing it. Keep thinking of my poor little plants
outside getting thrashed but my rule is, it either grows or it doesn’t. While I
will make an impressive effort to provide shelter, sometimes it is easier to
roll with nature and just see what happens.
I do hope my Asparagus fares well
in the bluster though...since planting it out in the tub it has produced quite
a few spears and while I can’t eat them yet, it’s encouraging to see.
Had to move a few of the deck plants back under the veranda
tonight, just couldn’t risk any damage to them when they are growing so well.
My Blackboy peach is laden with new growth and the rhubarb has made a good
recovery after the last chop, the strawberries transplanted well and seem to be
thriving in the planter. There was a few strawberries left over that are in a
pot for now but eventually they will go somewhere in the new garden. The beans
and peas I planted in the terracotta pipes are growing well and the
passionfruit seems to be happy in the new spot.
The new garden is coming along with the addition of
soil/compost, the chooks love scratching around in it which is good but they
sure make a hell of a mess. I have a pile of bamboo that has been sitting in
the basement and I think with some decent bits of driftwood, a perfectly
acceptable fence-come-climbing frame could be made to keep the girls out and
provide some support for the vines. I am also using all the bits of broken
concrete I found up the front in a junk pile, to edge the garden and frame it. A
nice beachy, rustic charm.
All the sunflowers have come up now and are about ten
centimetres tall, there are so many of them that it will take a month of
Sundays to plant them all. I may just plant them around the edge of the garden
so they become part of the fence. The Austrian oil seed finally arrived today
so tomorrow I will plant a few pots up. How awesome it will be to have fresh
pumpkin and sunflower seeds to nibble on! So good for trail mix, quiches,
biscuits, birdseed bars and salads...it’s going to be great having a decent
supply in the pantry.
With all the peas, beans, tomatoes I have growing at the
moment, I think I will dehydrate a good portion of it when it’s ready for
picking and I found a great recipe for tomato paste which will be perfect for using
the smaller jars I have stashed. A few of the corn have come up now, also the
stringless beans which will be lovely yellow and purple colours. A couple of
wire baskets I brought from the opshop the other day will give me some extra
planting room under the veranda. I am going to put chain on them so they hang
one above the other, great for the smaller varieties of tomato.
