As I've mentioned previously , I used to think that making compost was impossible, but I tried again anyway, and so far I've had no trouble. Recently I've been using lots of compost, so I want to encourage you to use your greenwaste productively too, and not just throw it away. Here's a great overview to get you started. I want to tell you what I do, as I don't follow all the instructions exactly, I just make it up and it still works, so don't be daunted by all the complicated instructions, just have a go! my compost bin + tomato plant They recommend using a bin, which is what I use too, I haven't tried the open pile method, but I can imagine what the dogs would do (eat/roll in it) so I think the bin is a better option! The chickens also take a great interest in the compost whenever I open the hatches at the bottom, so I think they would destroy a pile very quickly! The video suggests to put the bin in contact with the soil, near to the hou...
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I planted lots of lettuce, so we've been having lots of salads this summer, (otherwise I'd have to feed it ALL to the chickens :) They know when I'm picking it and all hang around the garden waiting for their share). too much lettuce... ...and rocket Nourishing Traditions features a total of 45 salad recipes. This seems totally unnecessary to me, seriously, how hard is it to mix up raw vegetables!? It doesn't really matter what combinations you use, its all going to taste lovely and fresh. I just pick whatever is growing in the garden and mix it up on our dinner plates. Lately I've been using lettuce, rocket, mizuna, a little basil and garlic chives, mini capsicums, baby tomatoes, chopped up beans and peas and sliced zucchini or squash, and some sprouts. If we've bought carrots or corn, I add these too (just cut the kernels from the cob, sweet and juicy yumminess), and in the past we've also added beetroot and radish. We usually ...
January has been a month of extremes! We had a week of 35degC temperatures, dry and hot, the grass was starting to frizzle.....and then in the last few days we have had over 100 mL of rain! Tanks are full, the dam is full, the garden is going crazy again. And we are having flash backs to this time last year . Sorry I keep changing my comments form, I thought I was improving it, but the new one was terrible, I lost all those comments, so I'll just leave it alone now, promise! rain Garden Love my shade cloth during the hot days! stunted corn and mildewy zucchinis/button squash first corn cob - front... and back, tasted great, wish it was bigger! button squash in all sizes (depends when you find them!) lettuce going to seed, have planted some more.... so many pickling cucumbers, I've been pickling! The other half of the garden, tomatoes, capsicum, all the herbs. tomatoes finally an eggplant!!!!...
Following on from my post the other day about starting from seeds , here's the next step to cheaper veges, saving your own seeds. The advantage of saving your own seeds isn't just the money you save on seeds, it also allows you to breed plants that are more adapted to your climate and soil conditions. drying seeds from spaghetti squash, button squash, roma tomatoes, beans and spring onions, I always have lots of little trays in the kitchen waiting for the seeds to dry. I was never taught how to save seeds, I just started leaving plants that had bolted and seeing what happened. Actually it seems to be quite difficult to find information about seed saving, much easier to just buy seeds, but I find seed saving interesting and usually quite rewarding (I found one good step by step guide here ). All my gardening books explain how to grow seeds, but none discuss saving seeds, although I believe you can buy entire books just on the topic of seed ...
We had a solar panel salesman call up and ask to come out and talk to us about his product. I thought it was a good opportunity to do some easy research. We'd been thinking about solar panels since my parents-in-law installed a few. We weren't sure if it was worth doing or not. This is my analysis of our situation. Depending where you live in Australia, most states will pay a feed in tariff for solar panels on your property connected to the grid. However, if the power goes off, your panels get turned off to keep the lines dead (for the safety of those working on the lines to restore power). Our biggest problem with electricity is losing power during storms, so panels that turn off aren't that useful. At the moment the cost of grid-connected solar panels is also subsidised by the Australian Federal Government's renewable energy certificate (REC) scheme. The panel installers buy from you the right to sell "renewable energy certific...
When we took our old BBQ to the dump I had a an opportunity for a quick look through the dump shop. (I should also point out that the only reason we didn't put the BBQ on freecycle is that we took off the wheels and the hot plate for upcycling, and the burners were very rusty, so it was better off as scrap). The dump shop is even cheaper than op shops and you can find some really unexpected things there. I was incredibly excited to find the 1980s Australian Trivial Pursuit game with ALL THE PIECES AND CARDS!!!! I have wanted a copy of this for ages, yay! We have an old monopoly game from the markets, but that game just gets so boring it makes us fight, and we've had to resort to playing cards lately. This should provide hours of fun. I also found a couple of books, one about travelling in the Northern Territory and one about resources in Queensland. I got all of this for $5. Bargain! Do you use a local dump shop? O...
Planting seeds rather than seedlings is a significantly cheaper option (if you think about it, for some vegetables you get about 6-8 seedlings for $2 or about 100 seeds for the same price), as well as giving you so many different heritage seeds to chose from. Even better, if you start saving your own seeds its virtually free, apart from a small amount of time and effort. This is truly sustainable gardening and way easier than it sounds. I have had very limited success with planting seeds directly into my garden, I think its just the clay soil, its too heavy and the clods are too big, I also blame the slugs which have eaten baby seedlings to the ground before they get a chance to grow! Strangely though, things that I haven't planted intentionally keep sprouting up in odd places this year, like beans and tomatoes, so I don't know what I do wrong when I WANT to plant things! Anyway, this means that I mainly stick to planting in separate containers and tr...
Since I first posted about sprouts after reading about them in Nourishing Traditions , I've been continuing to grow them regularly. Alfalfa has to be my stand-out favourite, it works every time with no issues and its great to have some on hand in the sprouter or in the fridge to use in summer salads and sandwiches. Alfalfa is my favourite sprout I did branch out and try fenugreek. This is a very useful herb and the seeds smell beautiful, so I couldn't wait to taste the sprouts, but my first few efforts ended in tragedy. All the sprouts clumped together in the middle of the jar and there wasn't much sprouting action, they just ended up rotting, very frustrating! I tried several times following some of the advice here . I put less seed in the jar, I broke up the seeds/sprouts to make sure they didn't clump together and washed them carefully. I had absolutely no luck until a friend gave me some different seeds, which did work. The lesson her...