Dec 07 Notes

Ninja likes to hide in the shade house on these hot days!

The last month of 2007 started of well, weather-wise. A few hot days followed by thundery cool changes which sometimes produced rain. This was a weekly occurrence and very welcome from a garden view point.

That was until Christmas when the temperature started to rise and we saw out the year in a heatwave...still it is Summer and that's what happens.

Salad boxes are planted up
and have re-chargeable solid water bags in them.

Most of my plantings have been posted in Garden Logs:

9 Dec 07
16 Dec 07
23 Dec 07
30 Dec 07

Lot's of seeds have been sown

Weather Details:
Lowest Minimum Temp was 4.5°C. The mean minimum was 13°C
Highest Maximum Temp was 40.1°C. The mean maximum was 29.5°C
Rainfall total was 26mm for the month with our average for December being 22.7mm.

2007 yearly rainfall total was 338mm our average is 332.4mm. We just exceeded our average but compare the monthly totals with what our averages are:


As you can see by this we haven't had a consistent season all year. It was dry in winter Jun - Aug when it was supposed to be wet and very wet in summer (Jan) when it was supposed to be dry????

The wicking-worm beds are thriving despite the heat!

Chooks:
230 Eggs from The Ginger Girls
I haven't counted the ones from The Old Girls any that I've found I've given to Lucky Dog:
Blackie has been broody
Mrs Houdini keeps escaping
Old Speckles says it's just too hot for an old girl
and I think Old Mamma has forgotten what eggs are!!

October 07 Journal Notes

" The Value of Keeping Records"

A little trouble taken to keep notes of garden operations, the season, rainfall, time of sowing, planting, blooming, ripening will return in the course of a few years an amount of information which will prove invaluable, therefore we suggest that every beginner make a few notes from month to month; this will enable him rapidly to improve his methods and become an expert gardener."
-Yates Garden Guide 1933

In keeping with this advice I post a summary each month from my Garden Journal. That is the word processor version of my scribbled notes I write by hand into a notebook.

Tuesday 2^nd Min 5.2°C Max 31.5°C
9 Eggs
Watered everything. Filled tubs and containers (waterers) and set taps on very slow to drip while we were away.

Potted seedlings were moved from the hot houses to the back pegola to be watered. They were put on a plastic tarp that had been placed over tyres to create a 'pool' effect. Any run-off water from these pots will remain on the plastic to be absorbed by the plants.

Meaning these potted seedlings only needed one supplementary watering during our week away. See here

Wednesday 3^rd - Tuesday 9^th

Travelled to Far North Queensland to celebrate our daughter's wedding.

Thursday 11^th Min 11.9°C Max 20°C
1mm Rain
5 Eggs
Dug out half of Bed 10 for new wicker-water bed.
Purchased 20m roll of drainage pipe and some plastic sheeting.
Also purchased 1 punnet mixed sweet Capsicums and 1 punnet of Jalapeno Chillis, individual potted seedlings of 1 Purple Capsicum and 1 Habanero Chilli.
Potted all these plants up when home.

Saturday 13^th Min 0.5°C Max 17°C
5 Eggs
Garden Club Plant Stall at Hospital Fete. Lots of others brought along plants to sell for the club. All my Black Russian Tomatoes and Basil seedlings sold in the first hour.

Thursday 18^th Min 7.1°C Max 31°C
8 Eggs
Planted seeds of
Five Colour Silverbeet
Salad Mixed Lettuce
Gold Rush Lettuce
in punnets placed in the Shade house.

Friday 19^th Min 9°C Max 25°C
8 Eggs
Put shade cloth back over frames on Beds 7&8, 5 and the Strawberry Bed. Temperatures on the rise over the weekend.

Saturday 20^th Min 9°C Max 34°C
8 Eggs
Built new shade structure over Bed 10. This includes wooden rails for attaching strings to for the Tomatoes to climb on as the wicker bed base of plastic means no stakes can be hammered into the soil.

Monday 22^nd Min 18.2°C Max 25°C
6 Eggs
Planting out Day
A cool change was predicted for today with the chance of thunder storms. Good cloud cover, good planting weather!
Into Dog Pen Wicking-water Bed:
6 Black Zucchini
5 Golden Midget Watermelons
3 Mini Lebanese Cucumbers on trellis
4 Bean Gourds on back fence
9 Silverbeet
Dwarf Sweetcorn Seeds
Nasturtium Companion Plants

In Main Veg Garden:
8 Hales Rockmelons on Bed1
5 Moon and Stars Watermelons to Bed6
Blue Lake Climbing Beans to trellis at rear of Bed10
Nasturtium Seeds

Prepared Bed 10 for Tomato Planting
Wood attached to polypipe arches
Wood on ground
Strings attached between wood to support tall Black Russian Tomatoes
Mesh attached to West end of structure to grow Squash up for shade and wind protection.

Tuesday 23^rd Min 13.7°C Max 20.7°C
11mm Rain
8 Eggs
Planted in Bed 10
12 Black Russian Tomatoes
6 Pacesetter Tomatoes
2 Delicata Squashes on side trellis
Companion plants of Sweet and Purple Basil, Nasturtiums, Marigolds and Parsley.
5 Lemon Cucumbers to Bed 3
Nasturtium seed for companions

Wednesday 24^th Min 8.1°C Max 19.7°C
3mm Rain
9 Eggs
Chopped down broad beans on Bed6 and planted 8 Mixed Sweet Capsicums.
Attached plastic trellis to front of Bed10 to tie the Pacesetter Tomatoes to as strong winds are forecast.

Tuesday 30^th Min 4°C Max 20.5°C
9 Eggs
Planted out the Habanero Chilli, the over-wintered Eggplant, 2 Jalapeno Chilli and 4 Ida Gold Tomatoes into the Tank Beds in the Dog pen.
Took cuttings of Cedronella, Golden Sage and Pink Evening Primrose.
Trimmed off all the frosted and/or dead parts of plants in the Herb Spiral and weeded and tidied it.
Trimmed the Saltbush hedge in the front garden.
Trimmed a Grevillea and discovered a volunteer Quandong tree growing through the middle of it. This was kept!
Noticed that the 'dying' Correas are re-sprouting back to life.

Wednesday 31^st Min 11.9°C Max 21°C
0.5mm Rain
8 Eggs
With the help of the Egg Collective girls we weeded part of the Edge bed in the Main Veg Garden. This area was heavily infested with a grassy weed. It's all clear now of this weed, snails, earwigs and just about anything else that moved.
Took cuttings of Southernwood for planting around the fruit trees later.

A summary of Egg totals and Weather details:

198 Eggs from the new girls, approx (??) 20 from the old girls who were hiding their eggs in the bushes when we went away. The girl that looked after the girls kept all the eggs when we went away so these were not counted.

Lowest Minimum Temp was -2.1°C The mean minimum was 7.2°C
Highest Maximum Temp was 35.5°C The mean maximum was 24.3°C

Very windy conditions prevailed for most of the month with 10 days where wind speeds of over 28km per hour were recorded with many readings peaking at 37km per hour.

Rainfall total was 15.5 mm for the month with the average for October being 29.6 mm.

September 07 Journal Notes

" The Value of Keeping Records"

A little trouble taken to keep notes of garden operations, the season, rainfall, time of sowing, planting, blooming, ripening will return in the course of a few years an amount of information which will prove invaluable, therefore we suggest that every beginner make a few notes from month to month; this will enable him rapidly to improve his methods and become an expert gardener."
-Yates Garden Guide 1933

In keeping with this advice I post a summary each month from my Garden Journal. That is the word processor version of my scribbled notes I write by hand into a notebook.

Sunday 2^nd Min -2.1°C Max19 °C
4 Eggs
Good day for grafting fruit trees on the Moon guides from Cosmic Gardener.
Grafted Granny Smith apple on to apple rootsock sucker near Red Fuji. Also grafted Granny Smith on to a potted Golden Delicious seedling and some Jonathon on to a Golden Delicious seedling planted in the chook run by the Granny Smith. Also grafted some Stella Cherry onto the rootstock in the Almond area Chook Pen.

Wednesday 5^th Min -1.1°C Max 21.4°C
7 Eggs
Added 30 litre barrel to Bed 4 Garlic and onions.
Bed 3 Most peas are up. Brassicas and Coriander looking good. Curtain is keeping out cabbage moths and grasshoppers that are slowly appearing with the warmer weather.

Saturday 8^th Min 2.6°C Max 24.5°C
7 Eggs
Re-routed Kitchen sink grey water to worm farm for cleaning before discharge onto fruit crops in Dog Pen area. See Here

Prepared site for trial 'Wicker-bed'. See Here

Tuesday 18^th Min 1.6°C Max 25°C
7 Eggs
Potted on 40 Organic Green Silverbeet seedlings in the shadehouse and planted out 6 to Bed 3 and 2 in Dog Pen Tank bed.

Saturday 22^nd Min 3°C Max 25.1°C
7 Eggs
Cleared Bed 2 and planted 5 Golden Zucchini under Shadecloth re-attached drippers and put water container on for watering.
3 Rouge d'Etampes Pumpkins planted into prepared 'Wicker Bed' planted through felt covering with 2 4 litre juice containers added for watering.
1 Golden Zucchini planted in tank bed.

Potted on
6 Golden Midget Watermelons
7 Moon and Stars Watermelons
10 Hales Rockmelons
5 Gourds
8 Bean Gourds
7 Ida Gold dwarf cherry Tomatoes
2 Pacesetter Tomatoes
1 San Marzano Tomato

Hilled up Potatoes in Bed 6

Golden Zucchini planted in Bed2

Sunday 23^rd Min 10.9°C Max 25°C
9 Eggs
Tidied Main Shade house- everything potted on that needs to be and everything well watered with containers beneath to help them survive.

Thursday 27^th Min 4.6°C Max 20.6°C
8 Eggs
Measured up and planning started for more 'wicker-beds'
One in Dog Pen Bed and the other on Bed 10 which is becoming clogged with tree roots probably from the large gum tree out in the street that is looking for water during the dry winter when our front garden hasn't been watered.

A summary of egg totals and weather details:

189 Eggs from the 10 new girls.

The old girls (8 eggs) are starting to lay again soon we will move them into the Fruit Tree Area around the Main Veg Garden and put them to work as pest controllers.

Lowest Minimum Temp was -2.2°C The mean minimum was 4.4°C
Highest Maximum Temp was 30.9°C The mean maximum was 20.7°C

Rainfall total was 13 mm with the September average being 33.4 mm

August 07 Journal Notes

" The Value of Keeping Records"

A little trouble taken to keep notes of garden operations, the season, rainfall, time of sowing, planting, blooming, ripening will return in the course of a few years an amount of information which will prove invaluable, therefore we suggest that every beginner make a few notes from month to month; this will enable him rapidly to improve his methods and become an expert gardener."

-Yates Garden Guide 1933

In keeping with this advice I post a summary each month from my Garden Journal. That is the word processor version of my scribbled notes I write by hand into a notebook.

Wednesday 1 Min 5.7°C Max 16.5°C
2mm Rain o/n
3 Eggs
Planted out a mixture of coloured Potatoes saved from last year into Bed 6 and covered over with a plastic tunnel.
See the full entry here

Sunday August 5 Min 5.8°C Max 13°C
3 Eggs
Added water container to drip line on bed 6
See how here.


Monday August 6 Min -0.2°C Max 17°C
3 Eggs
Planted
8 San Marzano Tomatoes
4 Buttercup Pumpkins
4 Rouge d'Etampe Pumpkins
6 Goldfinger Zucchini
6 Lemon Cucumbers
These were planted into punnets and margarine containers and put in polystyrene boxes with glass covers.
Into a 6 celled punnet seeds of Alpine Strawberries were planted, placed in a plastic bag and put into the shadehouse as they require a temperature under 16 degrees to germinate.

Friday August 10 Min 8.6°C Max 20.9°C
3 Eggs
Preparation for plastic hot house building on the weekend.
Cleared Bed 9
Took loads of topsoil and put them ready top up potatoes on bed 6.
Collected the star pickets.
Found 2 pieces of poly irrigation pipe that just fitted.
Bought plastic 6m
See the full project here

Monday August 13 Min 0.7°C Max 14°C
3 Eggs
Potted on seedlings after making up potting on mix see here.

Thursday August 23 Min 0.9°C Max 20°C
3 Eggs
Potted on
Black Russian Tomatoes 27; 12 to individual cut down milk containers rest in containers.
Pacesetter Tomatoes 5 to individual cut down milk containers
Ida Gold Tomatoes 1 to a paper pot
Goldfinger Zucchinis 6 to individual cut down juice containers
Lemon Cucumbers 5 to individual cut down juice containers
Rouge d'Etampes Pumpkin 5 to individual cut down juice containers
Potted up some Wormwood cuttings
Planted seeds:
Rockmelon Hales from New Gippsland
Watermelon Golden Midget from Diggers
Watermelon Moon and Stars from Diggers
Bean Gourd from a seed saver
Gourds Bottle from saved seed


Saturday August 25 Min 1.5°C Max 23.5°C
3 Eggs
Cleared end of driveway and moved cars around. Chooks out.
Prepared potting mix and pots for Oca.
Hot house temp peaked at 40C

Thursday August 30 Min 1°C Max 27.9°C
3 Eggs
Covered Bed 3 with curtains to keep off cabbage moths
See the full project here
Harvested first mushrooms from kit one large 164g and 2 smaller, more to come!
See the full project here


A summary of egg totals and weather details:
The girls were really feeling the wintry conditions this month and as a result the egg total was down to 93 but they are already improving for this month.

Lowest Minimum Temp was -2.3°C
The mean minimum was 2.9°C
Highest Maximum Temp was 27.9°C
The mean maximum was 17.3°C

Rainfall total was 7 mm for the month with the average being 37.6 mm.
Total for year to date is 223.6 mm.

July Journal Notes

" The Value of Keeping Records"

A little trouble taken to keep notes of garden operations, the season, rainfall, time of sowing, planting, blooming, ripening will return in the course of a few years an amount of information which will prove invaluable, therefore we suggest that every beginner make a few notes from month to month; this will enable him rapidly to improve his methods and become an expert gardener."
-Yates Garden Guide 1933

In keeping with this advice I post a summary each month from my Garden Journal. This is the word processor version of my scribbled notes I write by hand into a notebook.

Tuesday July 3 Min 4.4°C Max 18.4°C
1.5mm Rain
5 Eggs
Phoenix seed catalogue arrived the first catalogue for the year!

Wednesday July 11 Min 0.4°C Max 11.8°C
6 Eggs
Turned compost heap on Bed 10

Thursday July 12 Min 3.7°C Max 11.7°C
5 Eggs
Weeded pathway in Dog Pen put weeds etc in heap on edge of Herb Bed. This will rot down to allow pumpkins (maybe) to grow in Spring

Friday July 13 Min -0.1°C Max 11.2°C
4 Eggs
Emptied some of the chook house bedding on to the weed heap in the Dog Pen
Put some older chookhouse bedding onto the Asparagus beds also some ‘fresh’ bedding on top.
This bedding is a base of wood shavings and when mixed with the chook poop it breaks down quickly to a very friable mix. Which is good to mix in with our heavy clay soil here to break it up.

Friday July 20 Min -4.2°C Max 12.5°C
6 Eggs
Moved Mumma to the area with the other 3 'Old Girls'. She was put into 'Chippee's' old house/cage and will be kept separate for a while just to be sure that whatever caused the other 3 oldies to die was indeed old age or the extremes in temps. This will also give her and the others a chance to become re-acquainted.
Trimmed the wormwood bushes along the front fenceline in Fruit Tree Area.
Transplanted some Parsley from Bed 6 to the edge of the Asparagus bed
Cleared half of bed 6 and dug a trench. Filled this with some Broad Bean trimmings that the frost had injured and a load of Nettles from the chook run.
Put up the light frame ready for some plastic to go over after I plant the early Potatoes next week.

Mamma locked up!

Tuesday July 24 Min -1.1°C Max 20°C
5 Eggs
Planted early Spring Seeds
See Here

Early seeds under glass

Sunday July 29 Min 4°C Max 14.8°C
4 Eggs
Turned compost heap on bed 10 watering layers as I went
Turned and fluffed up compost on Bed 3. Fresh top soil placed on top except in trench in centre which will be filled with manures as a feeding trench
Weeded Bed 4 Onions and Garlic
In Hot house cosmos and sunflower seeds are emerging
Picked coloured Silverbeet and Carrots for lunch Large White Carrots were roasted while the silverbeet was steamed with tomatoes (out the freezer) then cheese melted through.

Lunch basket

Monday July 30 Min 6.8°C Max 15.9°C
4 Eggs
Seed order from New Gippsland Seeds and Bulbs which included:
10 Purple New Zealand Yams (Oca)
Packets of
Tip Top Carrots
Goldfinger Zucchini
Lemon Cucumber
Virginia Peanuts
Rouge d'Etampes Pumpkin
Buttercup Pumpkin
Alpine Strawberry San Marzano Tomatoes.

In the Hot house
Sweet and Purple Basil seeds are emerging
As are some Cucumber seeds

Purple Basil seedlings emerging

A summary of egg totals and weather details:

154 Eggs from the 'new' girls.
The old girls are still resting. We lost another one last month so there are only 5 old girls left now. Most of these are over 10 years old now.
The 'new' girls are playing games and laying under bushes in their run so I don't always find the 'nest' in time to use the eggs!

Lowest Minimum Temp was -4.5°C The mean minimum was 1.8°C
Highest Maximum Temp was 22.2°C The mean maximum was 13.8°C

Rainfall total was 16.5 mm for the month with the average being 33.8 mm. Total for year to date is 216.6 mm.

June Journal Notes

Saturday 2nd June Min 8.3°C Max 12.4°C
1 mm Rain
5 Eggs
Built compost heap on bed 10 where Tomatoes will be grown next year. Compost made with straw, cow manure, nettles comfrey and marshmallows. Watered with rainwater/seaweed extract/fish emulsion/Epson salts.
See Blog entry:

Ninja says the compost heap is warming up nicely!

Monday 11th June Min 0.4°C Max 12.8°C
3 Eggs
Turned the compost heap to aerate and re-moisten adding r/water/molasses and urine
See blog entry

Saturday 16th June Min -4.6°C Max 15.0°C
7 Eggs
See Garden Log entry for 16 June 07

Sunday 17th June Min -1.4°C Max 11.6°C
7 Eggs
According to Thomas Zimmer's Moon Planting Guide this weekend is time for Greens planting.
I planted seeds of:
Borage seed from Select Organics
Coriander seed from Greenpatch Seeds
Nonnie's Giant Arugula - Rocket seed from SSN No. 2917BA
Ethiopian Cabbage seed from SSN no. 2025B
Golden Acre Cabbage seed from Eden Seeds
Di Cicco Early Broccoli seed from Eden Seeds
Chervil seed from New Gippsland Seeds
A test planting of home collected seeds of the 3 types of wormwood I grow:
Tree Wormwood
Roman Wormwood
Common Wormwood
These were all planted in punnets and watered with a Rainwater/Epson salts mixture. Pace into the hothouse. The wormwoods were covered with a clear plastic container to keep them warm.
Later Lettuce seedlings (Red Velvet x 6, Red Coral x 9 and Gold Rush x 20.) were planted into boxes under the Back Pergola and into a waiting Tank Bed in the Dog Pen garden. These were watered in with a Rainwater/Seaweed solution mixture.

Lettuces in boxes under the back pergola

Friday 22nd June Min 1.7°C Max 11.2°C
1 mm Rain
8 Eggs
Winter Solstice 3:38 am the longest night and shortest day for the southern hemisphere.
The coldest time of the year down under. From now on the days slowly become longer triggering different growth patterns in plants. The lengthening days will tend to make Spinach plants run to seed, it means that garlic now puts more energy into bulb formation instead of leaf formation that it has been doing until now and after the solstice is usually the time for planting Long Keeping Onions. Many people plant Potato Onions on the shortest day of the year and harvest them on the longest day in December.

Saturday 30th June Min 6.3°C Max 13°C
Full Moon 11.20pm (Aus CST) Blue Moon for June
.5mm Rain
7 Eggs
Tonight’s second Full Moon for this month makes it a Blue Moon.
Turned the compost again see here:


A summary of egg totals and weather details:

194 Eggs from the new girls.
The old girls are still resting. We lost another one last week (Chippee the mad Bantam) so there are only 6 old girls left now. Most of these are over 10 years old now.

Lowest Minimum Temp was -5.0°C The mean minimum was 0.8°C
Highest Maximum Temp was 15°C The mean maximum was 12.1°C

Rainfall total was 7.5 mm for the month with the average being 34.1 mm
The photo below is from the weather bureau’s nearest weather station 10kms away. Click to enlarge to read it!

May Journal Notes

Autumn has arrived in Scarecrow's Garden.
Just in time for Winter!
The last couple of weeks have seen temperatures drop especially in the mornings and our first frost for the year. The leaves are falling from the fruit trees and we are getting some rain at last. Planting will slow down but I have already begun preparing the soil for next Spring's crops.

Saturday 5th May Min 5.9°C Max 20.9°C
8 Eggs
Temporarily fenced off the main vegetable garden and let the chooks out for the day. Hopefully to get some of the weeds that are threatening to overgrow the driveway.

Wednesday 9th May Min 10.2°C Max 17.2°C
6 Eggs
Time to clean out the Chook House...
See entry Chook House Fun

Thursday 17th May Min 4°C Max 19°C
7 Eggs
For this months Garden Club comp I decided to take a selection of different coloured silverbeet. Didn't win, I came in second...
I got Pipped at the Post by a Posy!
Our 'role call' was a weed and that was quite interesting...
I had some plants and eggs for the trading table too.
The group set off to visit a garden after the meeting but I couldn't tag along because I had to go to work!

Sunday 20th May Min 6°C Max 18°C
7 Eggs
Planted out some of the natives that were grown from seed last year but were not planted due to dry conditions. I also had a couple of non-native plants that had been grown from cuttings (Diosma) These were planted in the front garden and replaced some of the older bushes that have died off:
Acacia victoriae x 4
Acacia incana x 1
Acacia iteaphylla - Flinder’s Range Wattle x3
Acacia saligna x 2
Salt Bush (Atriplex) x3
Saltbush (Rhagodia) x 10 (for a water-wise hedge)
Erimophilla (orange flowered) x 3
Erimophilla (yellow flowered) x 1
Crowea exalata x 1
Melaleuca x 2
Golden Diosma x 2

Into the Dog Pen garden Bed I planted 14 Peruvian Emerald Broad Bean Seedlings.
Into Cell trays and 1 container I potted on Lettuces; Red Velvet x 8, Red Coral x 10 and Gold Rush x 30. These I have placed in the hot house to speed up growth ready for planting out later.

Saturday 26th May Min -2.2°C Max 18.3°C
8 Eggs
Today we trimmed the Cape Ivy off the chook fence and attached a length of wire netting to the top of the fence in the chook run to stop the escapees getting out over the fence. This involved attaching stakes to the existing poles and tying the wire on. The chooks are not amused!!!
See entry First Frost Today

Lowest temp was -2.2C and highest 22.8C with temps cooling since mid May with only one day above 20C. Please click on the photo to see it clearly.

Rainfall for the month was 30.8 mm just under average of 31.5mm which is the first time since 2002 that we have had anywhere near a May average rainfall! Lets hope this trend continues!

Egg toatal for the new girls was 210 eggs while the old girls are having a rest now and probably won't lay again until spring.

Journal Notes for April 07

Friday 6th April Min 9.1°C Max 21.8°C
8 Eggs
Dug up and divided Strawberry plants to keep
Took cutting of Feverfew to re-plant as Companions for the Strawberries
See also blog entry Herb spiral Re-Vamp

Monday 9th April Min 7.9°C Max 28.6°C
10 Eggs
Pulled up Strawberry plants and removed the tyres. These tyres have been placed around the Seedless Valencia Orange tree planted last spring by Shadehouse 1.
They have been placed in an arc on the south side to provide a heat bank. They will be filled with soil and weeds as the rotting greenery will add heat. I will also put 2 or 3 20 litre drums of water here for extra warmth and hopefully to keep the frost off the tree.
The Tangelo in the Almond Area will have some straw bales arranged the same way. This will allow for a sheet of plastic to be thrown over the tree if there is a risk of heavy frost.
The Eureka Lemon Tree in the Pussy Willow bed has a shade cloth wind protector that kept off the hot north wind in summer.
This has been moved to the opposite side to keep the cold south winds off in winter. I will also put 1 or 2 water drums here too for warmth and this area has large bushes of Lavender to protect it with a Tree Wormwood hedge on it’s south side.

Wednesday 18^th April Min 4.6°C Max 22.9°C
7 Eggs
Bought a new Digital Camera and had to go out and play!!
See New digital camera

Friday 20^th April Min 7.3°C Max 27.6°C
8 Eggs
Moved the top (weedy) layer of soil in the new Dog Pen Shadehouse to the centre where the rain drips.
This area was covered with plastic (re-used potting mix bags) and topped with Crusher Dust (Thanks Doc).
Then barrows of topsoil were brought in (thanks again Doc) and spread around this mound. Rocks were placed around the edge of the mound to make it a pathway.
A mixture of potting mix, soaked coir (coco-peat) and topsoil was added on top and a few flat stepping stones put over the area.

Later I topped up the Strawberry bed with topsoil and a mixture of soaked coir top soil and some acid potting mix I had left over.
I then attached more of the in-line drippers here and a length of hose for drippers to the Companion Plants Feverfew and Borage (also Lettuce and Spinach)
Some of the acid mixture was used to re-pot the Cranberry plant I got as a freebie from Diggers last year. I used this mixture because cranberries prefer acid soil and our garden soil is fairly alkaline.

See entry Strawberry Bed Re-Vamp

Tuesday 24th April Min 11°C Max 19.7°C
Very light drizzle during day.
7 Eggs
Picked the Moon and Stars Watermelons and cleared that end of Bed 4. Extended the in-line drippers from the early Garlic and shaped the bed for onions. Planted Odourless Red Onion seedlings and one row of White onions. Weeded and fed Garlic with Blood and Bone ready for promised rains. Weeded Beds 7&8 and dug up Catnip self seeders from there. The ground here was scuffled and sprinkled with Blood and Bone as was most of the garden ready for the rain. Doc moved rest of crusher dust pile to small pathways around the garden as it tends to solidify after rain.

See also Garden log 26 Apr 07 where I prepared for the coming rain! It came!!
From the chart you can see that temps are on their way down. (Click on the picture to enlarge it) Note the temps on Thursday 26 Apr min 14.7°C max 15.7°C. Good hey!

Total of 230 eggs from the new girls that are starting to go into moult the old girls haven't started laying again yet!

Up until the 20th Apr we’d only managed to scrape up 2 mm of rain but on the 26th it started to rain and by 30th we’d had a total of 30mm our average for April is around 22mm so it was good to get above average again this year!

March Journal Notes

These are notes from my garden journal.
I usually add these to my Glog (garden blog) on ALS but they are winding these down soon so I’ll just put a link on there to this post!
Most of my journal is written up my here on my Blog so I’ll add the links.

Thursday 1st March Min 14.7°C Max 34.1°C
6 Eggs
Blog entry In-line drip system

Wednesday 7^th March Min 12.2°C Max 30.4°C
10 Eggs
Blog entry Log 7 Mar 07

Sunday 11^th March Min 14°C Max 27.1°C
10 Eggs
Bog entry Transplants and Planting

Thursday 15^th March Min 19.4°C Max 35.1°C
0.2mm Rain
10 Eggs

Garden Club this month for roll call was to name the varieties of lavenders in our gardens. Most people have the hardy varieties and said that the ‘prettier’ butterfly types were not as hardy.

There was news of the next Garden Clubs of Australia Zone get together being held in Pt Augusta in April so I will be attending that as it is on a Saturday. The day includes some garden tours and a meal so should be fun.

The discussion was members favourite or unusual plants we have growing and there were some interesting ones.

M chose Lemon Verbena and told of its uses as a tea and culinary flavouring.

J told of a Nemathanthus that she lost in the frost last year fortunately she had previously given me a piece of it and mine survived so I will be able to give her some back.

V had a hint of putting Epsom Salts around a maidenhair fern that she had been given as a present from one of the patients in the hospital she used to work in. She struggled in to the meeting with an enormous pot of the most wonderful fern you could imagine.

Others spoke about sunflowers and grevilleas and nasturtiums and my plant was the Strawberry Spinach I grow.

It was a very interesting meeting showing we don’t always need a guest speaker.

Friday 16^th March Min 18°C Max 29°C
11 Eggs
Blog entry New Growth

Saturday 17^th March Min 12.5°C Max 25°C
10 Eggs
8.5mm Rain
Blog entry Moon Planting

Wednesday 21^st March Min 14.7°C Max 26.2°C
10 Eggs
Blog entry Log 21 Mar 07

Thursday 22^nd March Min 16.6°C Max 34°C
1mm Rain
11 Eggs
Blog entry Log 22 Mar 07

Friday 30^th March Min 7.5°C Max 20°C
.5mm Rain
11 Eggs
Blog entry Log 29 Mar 07

I usually add a summary of Egg Totals and Weather details here:

300 eggs from the new girls the old girls laid some hidden in the bushes and then went broody so I won’t count theirs! I gave them to the dog!
The rest of the old girls are moulting.
Two chooks died this month one of the new girls and old Tippee.

Lowest Minimum Temp was 6.1C
Highest Maximum Temp was 37.6C
Lowest maximum Temp was 16.6C. This shows how our days are cooling down!

Rainfall total was 35mm for the month with the average being 16.0mm

The photo below is a Temperature Chart from the Weather Bureau’s nearest weather station 10kms away.
Click to enlarge to read it!