Happenings in the Greenhouse

At the end of summer i took cuttings from some of my fruit trees to see if i could get them to root over winter in the greenhouse. I removed the bottom leaves, soaked the stems in water for a few mins and then dipped each one in rooting hormone and popped them into the grow pots.

Building a Greenhouse

I can't believe it has been more than a year since i last posted, time really does fly by when your busy.

House renovations, gardening & work make Nicole a very tired person who would really love a get away to the sea to recharge my batteries, but alas no matter how much gardening i do i still cant find that money tree.

in 2012 my wonderful husband used his tax refund & purchased this for me a 6x3 Greenhouse.

after some thinking & rethinking we finally found a home for the new house. the boys had to dig quite a lot of dirt to level it up.

it took a few weekends to get this baby from the box to the finished house.

the directions were really difficult to understand (few words & fewer pictures), i think they were written for the person who has put one of these up at least a dozen times. we spent a lot of time undoing & adding more bolts sliding things around.

until finally our little house was finished.

all the staging & racks were purchased separate (still have 2 more in their boxes). added newspaper & cardboard to the floor & a couple of weeks after that wood shavings on top.

a few seeds in & we're under way. growing by seed is very rewarding, i know exactly what i'm getting with no chemicals or other sprays that you would normally get when buying seedlings from a nursery or hardware store & not to mention a lot cheaper.

i have just been reading a book called "New Plants From Old" by Jackie French & i have been inspired. Jackie talks about propagating plants that you pick up on your travels, walking about the neighbour hood or from friends & family. just pop it in a pot water & see what happens :o)

something else she talks about is, if it tastes good then pop the seed in a pot & see what comes up. 

this has been very successful for me & very exciting as i have had quite a few fruit seeds germinate & some that are ready to be taken out of the grow pots & potted up.

i find myself spending a few hours every week in the greenhouse its very relaxing & Sally Girl keeps me company. 

  Linked here: Frugal Days Sustainable Ways

Onion

Spring Onions, Green Onions or Shallots

what ever you call them they are delicious & super easy to grow

i purchased these organic onions in a bunch, cut off the green tops to use & then planted the white part with the roots into the garden. pictured above is three weeks ago after i cut the tops off them, if you click on the picture you can see where i cut them. they have been in the garden for about 12 months. i just cut some when i need them & they regrow.

before the last cutting they had been left to grow & had become leggy, thick & dark green.
i washed & sliced them & filled up 2 drying trays.

i have an ezi dry dehydrator that i got for christmas a couple of years ago & i love it.

i never time how long it takes to dry stuff i just keep checking it till its done.

out of those two trays i got a large vegemite jar full [pretty well packed in].
you can use them in soups, casseroles, stews anything you need onions for really.
i have since used some in a dry mushroom soup base, that i will post about next time.

Garden Notes

Start to finish pictorial of our veggie garden

6.6 x 10.8 metres = [ 71.28 sqm ]

the 2 corner posts

chicken wire

the gate

concreting the wire

the gate post

sandstone entry

beds & mulch

netting on the top

finally finished

steel posts = 0
star pickets = 0
chicken wire = 0
gate = 0
timber gate post = 0
fencing wire = $40
fencing clips = $6.95
bird netting = $75.88
concrete = $50
wire tension =  $23.60

total = $ 196.43

Garden Notes

2011 is gone & 2012 is upon us who new the year would go so darn fast.

on the last day of 2011 we spent it down the back in the veggie garden.

all spring/ summer we have been plagued with butterflies & some may say how lovely, but it has not been lovely. when ever anything new has emerged from the ground they have been eaten to within an inch of their lives. we made a hoop net over 3 of the garden beds as a quick solution & it worked great but it didnt solve the problem for the rest of the garden. money has been really tight with me still out of work & A is on holidays for two more weeks, so we have been working on how to solve the problem without spending a lot of money. a while ago we purchased 2 bird net rolls for $16 each, we have managed to cover most of the roof area, we were a metre shot on one length. in just two days it has made quite a difference with lots of butterflies flying about above the netting.

for christmas A & i received a few hardware gift cards so today we will be off down the mountain to purchase two more bird nets to hopefully finish off this afternoon.

Raspberry Bramble

we have a Raspberry Bramble down the side of our house, its shady & wet most of the time. this is our third summer here & its the first time i have gotten any raspberries, as usually the birds have stripped the bramble clean.

these pictured above will be ripe in two days.

Miss Sally Girl loves fruit she can just snack on any time she likes, here she is picking raspberries. when i go out to pick them she has to stay inside or i would get very few in my bucket :o)

the bramble is not huge, probably 2 1/2 metres wide & 3 metres long about that any way. the area was bigger but i cut them back last autumn. they are super easy to grow & need pretty much no maintenance if you dont want them to take over keep them cut back & remove all the ones that pop up around them or you can also keep them in pots.

they are not very spiky like the blackberries so are much easier to pick. the fruit hangs low under the leaf canopy away from the main spiky branches.

the bucket is a 1kg honey bucket & it is 3/4 full this is from a two day pick. pick one day then skip a day then pick the next. I have a short list of what I will do with them & ill post recipes when  I've decided.

to clean & store any berries i make up a mix of 1 part Apple Cider Vinegar to 10 parts water, swirl around & then drain [you can rinse but i dont bother].  the reason i wash my berries like this is because most berries go mouldy pretty quick & this gives them a lot longer mould free life.
store in the fridge or lay out on paper towel to dry then place on a try with none of them touching & freeze, when frozen store in tupperware or zip lock bags. If you have a dehydrater remove any stems before drying, for a quicker dry cut in half long ways.

Veggie Yard

another day in the veggie yard, a few weeks ago we had a load of dirt, cow & mushroom mix delivered & today i used up the last of it for beds #6 & #7. bed 5 is the only one that has not been made yet.

bed #6 will be for the bush tomatoes.

the two pots of either side of the gate are for chilli plants.

this is bed #7 it is a corner bed, on one side i have planted bush beans & on the other sugar snap peas

if your wondering where all the mulch went from yesterday it is now the walk ways around the beds. it makes its much softer to walk/ kneel on & keeps grass & weeds down.

Chipper/Mulcher

last year we purchased a big chipper, we just had a very small one when we lived in Linden but with the amount of trees here we needed something with a little more grunt.

we got 3 barra loads of mulch from down the back & another one from the hedge out the front.
it makes a big job very easy & pretty quick.

Yard Work

another day spent in the yard, thank goodness for all this beautiful weather.

a friend from work pulled out some garden beds last christmas & i took all the stone. they have been sitting down the side since the beginning of the year & i thought it was about time i used it.
son #1 wheelbarrowed it down the back & helped me set it out. there were a few adjustments as the rock was already set in cement, but nothing a hammer & rock hammer couldn't fix. just enough for 2 garden beds.

they are on either side of the chook gate. the small one on the left used up the left over stone.

the larger one goes from the gate & up to the tree.
the reason for the garden was 2 weekends ago Sally decided she wanted to visit the old lady next door she stretched & worked the wire till she could fit through. so that morning after i got her back through the fence. A' & i used 3 sheets of metal from an old bird aviary & 2 bags of concrete. no more visits :o) the cat will be relieved.
i moved the stone & dug them all in, it only goes to the end of the tin. i couldn't have gone any further even if i wanted to as there were heaps of big tree roots. the only thing left was 3 pieces of concrete.
i think they turned out pretty good & now there will be no complaints about it all sitting around & when am i going to use it.

Veggie Garden

with no work i have plenty of time to get things done, esp all the things that keep getting put off

yesterday A' & i finally finished off the fencing around the veggie yard now miss Sally girl cant get in well fingers crossed.

i pretty much worked all day 9 till 4.30, needless to say i am a little tired now.

first up i built a trellis well not first as i had to cut the branches first & play tug of war with Sally Girl, she loves it when we prune the trees. sooo much fun to be had.

bed #1 is half purple beans & half yellow zucchini & down the centre because it likes shade is 2 rows of english spinach.
bed #2 is two types of beetroot
bed #3 is spring onions then globe onions & at the end is bok choy

bed #8 along the fence was just a huge pile of dirt that i moved today & is now home to sunflowers along the back. at the right hand end are 3 types of carrots, then 2 types of cucumber that will climb the flower stalks as well as attach to the wire fence & right at the end are the only 2 strawberry plants that are left after Miss Sally got a hold of them.
there are 3 trees in front of bed #8 a fig, peach & a lemon.

Veggie Garden

its been quite a while since we were down in the veggie garden, yesterday we had 2 m3 of soil /compost mix delivered & 4 garden beds went in. we did want raised beds but we just couldn't afford the timber so we will do without. i will be putting down mulch in the walk ways. we still have 4 more beds to go in over the next few weeks.

today i potted up a whole stack of seeds & as there is still a chance of frost i rigged up a kind of green house.

using the old trampoline, two large plastic bags & a few bulldog clips.

Yard Work

two days of yard work, yesterday it was just Sally Girl & i, 'A' joined us today. pruning mulching & planting, needless to say im now had it so a leisurely afternoon for me, but first some pictures
ok no pictures blogger wont let me, so maybe later

two orange trees, one is a Lanes Late & the other is a Valencia

the people next door pulled all the jasmine off the fence so now they can see all the way down our yard from their back veranda, to say im not pleased is an understatement so i have started to plant agapanthas along the fence & the first of a row of Grevilleas, far enough away that they cant cut them from their side.

these are the Lilliypillies i planted a while ago they are full of new leaves, they are down near the compost bays we put in when we first moved in. i am hoping to grow them to fence height.

Garden Notes

Garden Notes
20kg of Potatoes dug up 

these are just a few that were drying in the garage

Sweet Corn coming on a treat


we have had a lot of rain here in the last few weeks, its good & bad. good because rain is always welcome, bad because a lot of my fruit has rotted & gone moldy before it was even close to ripe.


2 weeks ago i planted out another 2 rows of potatoes & they are already up to knee hight, thank you rain :o)
we have a load of granny smiths on the tree this year [mmm apple pies]


the Rhubarb has gotten out of control 


a couple of months ago i bagged up the fig tree & now i have figs just about ready to pick plus a whole heap of babies just coming on


looking out my window i just counted 47 white cockatoos down the back, they are truly a pest of a bird, they eat all of our fruit & make a huge mess, not to mention the cones they drop out of the pine tree down the back [look out below]


our two giant blood plum trees did not get any fruit this year but a small one in my front garden was loaded, we managed to get a few before the baby magpies finished them all up. they were small & super sweet.


for those of you who know about our solar panels you might be interested to know that our first bill was $123.86 & our second bill was $3.25
that makes you want to worship the sun :o)

Blogtoberfest day # 18

 day 18, boy does time fly when your busy


veggie garden fence is finished just need to do the concreting on the other side
gate is on & a sand stone entrance layed. the stone we have carried around with us for about 12 years, it sure is nice to finally give it a permanent home.
now we just need the timber for the beds & some dirt & we are in business
the total so far for this adventure is $142


Chook Wire - Free
Fence Posts - Free
Star Pickets - Free
Gate - Free
Sand Stone - Free
Timber for 1 bed - Free
Corner Spikes - Free
Fencing Wire - $62
Concrete - $54
Wire Strainers - $18
Wire Clips - $8

How Nice

how nice is it to just take a day off work, well thats what i did on monday. never taken a sickie before, it felt great & a little bit naughty.

spent most of the day down in the chook yard.

i had dug a new bed on sunday & A' added compost from one of the bays & dug it through.

the chooks went nuts for all those worms & bugs. ended up shooing them out before they spread it all over.

planted out sweet corn & made another row for butternut pumpkin, topped them off with some straw.

in the hen house there has been quite a bit of pecking going on, so late in the afternoon i did a little more fencing & moved Miss White & Miss Brown over to the Green & Red hen house. they have settled in & still sitting. when i went down to feed the chooks that morning there was a little grey chick in the nest but unfortunately it was dead.

sunday also saw two more posts in the ground for the new veggie garden.

rows three & four in the potato garden have now come up, Nicolas & Dutch Creams.

this morning i made a new garden journal, think ill sit outside tomorrow afternoon & fill it in. nothing like a new book for a new season, bring on the lists :o)