Suburban Food Farm – December 2014

Finally I managed to get into the garden and give it a bit of TLC.  After completing the morning postal run, I had a couple of hours to myself, so it was into the veggie patch to weed and just generally tidy up.

Due to working the last seven weekends in a row, the patch was probably looking a little neglected.  But after two hours solid work, I had all the pathways and beds weeded.  I also managed to tie up all of the tomato vines as they are starting to get a bit leggy.

So here is a photo expose of my gardening handy work.

This bed has two types of capsicum, some spring onions (shallots), and two random potato plants.  All looking quite healthy.

Bed two has heirloom tomatoes planted.  They look a bit shabby in this picture, but that is because I just tied them to their stakes.  They were starting to trail everywhere.  All of these plants have small tomatoes on them already.  I accidentally snapped off the main runner of one of the plants, but easily fixed by just tying up one of the side shoots which will now become the main runner.

As for the one left in my hand, I just snapped off the lower leaves and planted it deep into the soil.  It will grow as a clone of the original plant.

Moving along the path, bed three has more heirloom tomatoes that were gifted to me by Jessie (aka Rabid Little Hippy).  Under the trellis are climbing and bush cucumbers to make use of the available vertical space.  Around the bed are wild nasturtiums that pop up every spring.

In between bed three and four is my abundant Meyer Lemon tree.  Still going strong after seven years in a large pot.  I think it needs another dose of worm wee tea to give it a boost!

I pulled all of the red spanish onions in this bed today and left them for a day to harden.  I will chop off all the stalks tomorrow night and put them away in the pantry for summer eating.  Not sure what I am going to put in this bed.  It is a toss-up between chillies and maybe some more cucumbers for pickling.

This is the entire view of the western garden.  I weeded the path—but left the warrigal greens—that had sprung up as weeds.  It was very overgrown with Italian parsley plants that had gone to seed, which I gave to the chooks as a snack.

Ben weeded the next bed for me.  It was full of pick-and-come-again lettuce that had gone to seed.  Another feast for the chooks.  At least the lettuce will get converted into wholesome eggs!

Finally, for today anyway, is the Chicken garden.  You may remember that I planted more tomatoes gifted to me by our friend Stacey.  They are all growing well and are loving all that chook poo.

There you have it friends, the Suburban Food Farm – December 2014 update.

I will stop there for today, but I have swags of photos of the fruit trees laden with summer fruit to put up tomorrow.  I don’t want to overload you with gardening goodness!

How are your gardens going?  Hope you are getting lots of rain to keep it all growing well.  If no rain, have you been putting your grey water to good use?