In the garden today ...

OK so the garden is firing, weather is a cool 5 - 8°c at day break and up to 28°c during the day.

We are doing daily pickings of the new crop of beans. The follow-up planting - which has not flowered yet - will be ready on que as the current one ends. Succession planting is a vital for everyday vege like beans.

Just started to harvest another carrot crop and the next lot is about an inch high. Jeez the last carrot crop was a cracker! Actually talking about cracker crops.. I have never seen so much great looking broccoli that we have been eating from the garden in the last 6 or so weeks - mind blowing stuff (can you tell this stuff excites me?).

Pea shoots have been a great hit around here too - Jules mixing it up in salads, stirring through stir-frys etc. Peas in the pod too, BUT honestly half of it doesn't even make it to the kitchen cos' what we like to do is forage about the garden - we all just go in there and pick stuff and eat it on the spot. The vege garden for us a like a meeting place, our family end up in there several times a day over the weekend chatting and foraging like a bunch of chooks - its all happy times my friend.

Motivating you to plant some seeds?   ….join the revolution and cast some seed today!

Fresh head of Broccoli

Older head, going to flower - but still great to eat

Planting Beans

Yep, today was another day where I think what can I plant and what’s going on in the garden? The last lot of beans that I planted in top paddock are about 2 inches high, so time to plant more.

The crop just before that is just starting to flower. Beans are funny, they’re easy to grow but sometimes they die easy as well. They can die so fast that even with a daily inspection you don’t see it coming and it makes me wild! So I plant for succession and in case of failure! Even with this approach you’re still ahead, you’ll be eating fresh and cheap veges at your convenience. Water the beans once and no more water until after they sprout. Another golden rule - large seeds only need water at planting; they draw enough moisture from surrounding soil.

Most of the time I try to remember to cast a bit of agricultural lime over the ground prior to planting even though my soil is pretty neutral, it’s some “old timer” theory, anyway it works and is cheap as chips as well. Today I planted some climbing snow peas in a different spot with some stakes to climb, see how they go as the soil tends to be generally dry in this spot.

stakes for climbing snow peas
(newly scattered ag lime in vacant row behind ready to plant)