Merry Christmas Everyone

I have given a lot of people the web address to my blog lately and right now it's not looking too up to date. Unfortunately (well not really), I have been hit by the silly season and not had the time to write up any posts.

The good news is I have had time to water and poke around in the garden so things are going great guns. I have even started giving food away!

I will be back in the new year with some updates on a number of things including:
My war on snails
Potato progress
How to accidently grow a Marrow
Uncle Trev's rhubarb
and
spinach harvest with a yummy cannelloni recipe

Have a super great Christmas full of fresh salads and yummy home grown veggies on the BBQ
xxx
from me and my family, including all my plant babies.

Hot Potato Hot Potato

Yet again this weekend I only got into the garden on Sunday. But that was ok because we had things going on. Lily had her first concert (of her choice). Live music is a very sacred thing in our family. In fact we all went along to this band as first timers and knew pretty much every word. 

This post is more about the spuds I got in the ground this week, but the title is all about the music. We went to The Wiggles live and I saw my little girl become both speechless and motionless as all her favourite songs were played by characters she thought lived in the T.V. So we truely did have a weekend of Hot Potatoes!

I am probably the last gardener to plant potatoes in all of New Zealand. Who said new spuds were only good at Christmas. If the packet is right with four months till harvest, our family will be enjoying yummy spuds in March.

I bought my seed potatoes ages ago on one of my trips to my favourite garden store for a halumi and beetroot salad. They have been in a black canvas bag in the bottom of the pantry for over a month now, feeling all warm and shooty. And Andrew only grabbed them twice thinking they were the potatoes to be cooked for dinner (a funny truck every time).

The actual planting of spuds is pretty easy. I planted Desiree and Agria. A row of each and I am also trying out some spud bags (both 2 x Desiree/bags). I heard about these on the Kitchen and garden radio show that I try to listen to for at least 10 minutes while kiddy wrangling on a Saturday morning. I have put one of the bags in a full sun spot and the other in the corner next to the garden bed of spuds. It will be interesting to see how they turn out.

My mum was telling me how she used to help my grandad plant spuds each year, when she was young. In a trench, handful of blood and bone and a spud every foot. I used worm wees this year as I have so much of it. If my yield is disappointing then next year I will use grandads approach. He owned an orchid and market garden all of his life so I'm sure that my small family plot won't out do his methods. However on the off chance that my dog gets into the veggie patch, I don't want the blood and bone leading to a crazy digging frenzy. besides, I have worm wees, it's sustainable and doesn't cost any money so I'm looking forward to seeing how it goes.

Snail update.

I have been noticing that snails are getting caught in my bird netting around my strawberries and drying up in the sun. 

I have read that snails live and lay eggs in rocky areas and leaf matter.

My solution, I have wrapped left over bird netting all over my rocky boarders and right in under my plants. My hypothesis is that snails will try get out of their homes and onto my plant babies for a munch but will get caught in the net till morning. 

They have three options :

1) somehow free themselves and get to safety

2) struggle to escape, only to be dried out in the hot hot sun

3) remained trapped long enough to feel the wrath of my stone, first thing in the morning when I do my daily netting inspection.

Day one, I got five fat snails. This could be an effective approach.

Ps look at my zucchini!! About 8 flowers and 2 cute wee zucchinis.

I have worms

Out for lunch with the girls from work we got to talking about food waste and how much food everyone puts out with their weekly rubbish. 

I proudly said "we have no food waste, I have worms"

Silence.....akward looks and I clarified

"A worm farm in my garden" 

No one wanted to talk about the other type I worms they thought I had and how that would mean there weren't often leftovers, over our lunch.

I have had a worm farm since 2010. Given to me when a friend moved overseas. He has since came back to NZ and not asked for it back, hopefully he doesn't after being reminded by my blog!

It's such a great way to reduce household food waste, the worms (tiger worms, not normal worms) eat almost anything. Avoid meat (maggots), too much Citris (burnies for wormies), too much bread/pasta (mould), chilli/garlic/onion (must taste yuck), avacado skin or stones (hard on worm digestion).

They even eat tea bags. Until I had a veggie garden I used to tip worm wee anywhere to get rid of it as I kept the farm for its effective food waste management, and didn't care about having good soil. Now I am loving this environmentally friendly by-product.

Their wee is magical fertiliser. Worm wees diluted with water (otherwise it can burn roots) makes all plant babies happy and is what I am topping up my veggie garden with. 

There are thousands of worms and even if you don't feed them for ages they are almost impossible to kill. Although my sister managed it with Dunedin frosts. 

The worm farm has three levels that you rotate if space is needed for more scraps, however our family of 3 plus flatmate struggle to keep one level topped up. Our worms are hungry little buggers. 

Not only wees is handy, their castings (poos) is also great for digging into soil. 

BEWARE worms can't break down tomato seeds.

This means anywhere you dig in castings will most likely sprout unwanted tomato plants, some people don't put tomatoes into their worm farms because of this, I just pull the tomatoe plants out like weeds. Or I sometimes give them a chance and see how they go. I love the smell of tomato plants so I give them a chance to see/smell that tomato goodness.

Auckland city use to run free information sessions on composting, including worm farming, their website is really helpful.

Auckland CC worm farming site

(Lunch was at Zap, a fav with my work mates)

Zap - try the Pad Thai

Garden Update

After the long weekend and a week of work, the garden has been watered but I haven't really done much more. It's so great with even that little effort things are growing beautifully. Although I do have a long list of things I'd like to do and there have been a few casualties but nothing too upsetting.

Today we harvested three very little slow growing spring onions. I planted these on Mother's Day, before winter and I think they have missed their puberty growth spurt so are as good as they'll get. They haven't really worked so we are going to eat them and I can re-plant the row. They added to a yummy sauce for dinner.

I worked in the garden till dark tonight, sounds hard out but I started working in the garden just before dark. It was probably an hour and was great to get out there. It's Sunday and I want to get my potatoes in this week, so I have a few jobs and haven't got into the garden all weekend.

The strawberries in a bag may not be as genius as once thought. One of the plants has dried up and died (although it did occur while we were away on a three day weekend so it was half neglect and half the fault of the bag). But I'm thinking of making so sort of funnel into the bag so I can be sure the water is getting right in. My friend who did this with tomatoes used a drink bottle and squirted right into holes. So now there are 5 plants. I have also got the bird netting up over the strawbs which will disappoint the local sparrows - although the are still loving digging up worms in my other plot.

I didn't think I had it in me, but as Andrew lifted a stone to weigh down the bird netting tonight, I saw a big fat snail and although slightly squashed already by Andrew, I finished him off. It was a bit like how I felt when out fishing with Dad when I was younger. When the excitement of getting the fish in the boat was over, all that was left was the harsh reality of getting it off the hook and hitting it as hard as possible with the wattie (large bit of wood). As a young girl my process was be as quick and kind as possible unhooking, whisper sorry and BAM. Job done.

I have a few other plans for snail management but this week I'm going to head out each night and hunt, I got two tonight. The two I found tonight were in the rocks, which makes for a quick, easy kill, with another rock. The process is find big fat snail on his/hers way to chow down on my plant babies, get in close, whisper sorry and BOOM. 

I have a video that I will work out if I can get on here later :)

Today my 18 mo daughter and I had a great time spotting caterpillars on my swan plants. It probably goes against good gardening but I love monarch butterflies so have planted a couple of swan plants near the garden. We have at least 20 very hungry caterpillars and they are so fat children can easily spot them and even a gentle pat doesn't seem to bother them. I love the life-cycle of butterflies and can wait for chrysalis' to start popping up in strange places.

So this week I haven't got much food from the garden, other than our tiny spring onions. I also haven't put in much work but with caterpillars and setting up netting/ preparing for the potato planting I have enjoyed the garden and that's what really matters.

Ps look at my zucchini, carrots and beetroot!! The spinach is ready for eating this week also!

Get a bloke in

I'm out of my sling but heavy lifting/work still isn't, and probably never will be my thing. The garden area I have fenced off still needed a bit of clearing out. Enter Andrew and 15 minutes later we can see fence. And I have more space that I think might eventually be corn, right now however I am simply clearing as snails hide in and lay eggs in loose leaf matter. I'm taking this snail issue seriously reading lots of blogs and working on my next move.

Before and after shot of a great job done.

Seeing those photos make me realise just how nicely everything is growing. I had my first harvest yesterday, I shared two yummy strawberries with my daughter, cousin and an unwelcome bird. We all got half each.

Not much of an entry this week. I'm back at work and am hardly getting time on week nights for watering, not to mention blog writing. I am really enjoying both however, so I will keep at it.

A death in my plant family

I'm sure there will be more, and I won't detail every plant That is murdered. But today was tough. The other night one leaf was taken and the only remaining evidence was a shiny looking snail or slug track.
When I was little I used to think snail tracks were exciting, I don't even mind that they eat bits from our mail. But today I have joined the hard arse gardeners and am waging war on all snails and slugs that slither and eat green leaves.

last night we lost a whole zucchini plant. It's lucky my neice Lena is too little to remember choosing it for me, so a difficult conversation about mortality has been avoided. It's also lucky that the snails took the weakest of the two plants.

See our poor wee bugger, I now have an opening in a full sun area however, I'll probably get another zucchini and call him zucchini 2 like a childhood goldfish.

All of my research reading will now be on organic snail and slug control. I'm not going completely organic but don't want poisoned bugs being sniffed out by Bonnie and I do want to try reduce the chemicals that go on our food.

If you have snail eradication tips please let me know!

My garden store sanctuary and 1st progress report

 Kings Plant Barn in St Lukes is my local, and most favourite garden centre. I buy big stuff like soil and tools from cheaper places. But all of my plants so far have been from Kings. (Except my seeds which were a gift from my mother in law). I love going to kings, all the staff are kind and very helpful, I have gained confidence in the gardening retail world, as I'm there at least twice a week. But, in the beginning I was well out of my comfort zone and would walk around in a daze not really sure on any purchases. This place is currently my sanctuary, it is the horticultural heaven that clears my head and recharges my soul. And there is a really yummy cafe in the middle of it, which never fails to satisfy - the halumi and beetroot salad is my current obsession. I have been taking everyone who comes to visit and get me out of the house there for lunch. Partly because it's a great place to eat and partly because I can get a few wee things while I have a driver :) all my lunch dates have not minded at all.

This post is not intended as an ad for Kings, without the catchy jingle. But, I do heart it, I think one of the joys for the gardeners of my generation is the pleasure of a quality gardening retail experience.

After a trip to the nursery with my sister and, almost two year old, niece for lunch. As is routine with every visit, we walked out past the seedlings section and just like that - we needed a trolley. Although with only one arm it's not difficult to need a trolley!

My niece chose two zucchini plants and nursed one of them all the way around the nursary, not a nice beginning to my relationship with this new wee plant, it still has most of its leaves and I'm sure will bounce back most likely with trust issues.

I also bought yummy snow peas and spinach for salads and dwarf peas that are not for the kitchen, they will be popped on the spot for me and whoever is on a garden tour.

Red line - beetroot

Green line - spring onions

Blue line - snow peas

Pink line - perceptual spinach

Yellow line - dwarf peas, for the gardener

Red dots - strawberry bag hiding ugly tree stump

Orange line -  carrots

Orange dots - capsicum

Purple dots - egg plant

Blue dots - experiment snow pea

Yellow dots - experiment dwarf peas

Green dots - zucchini 

The garden space in the front of the photo (concrete tub and stone boarder garden) is the closest my garden has to full sun. Hence the capsicum moving in on carrot space a few blogs ago.

I have squeezed a snow pea and pea experiment plant in this box to see how they grow compaired to their brothers and sisters up the back.  I'm not sure how long I'll have the space but while I do, I can learn for next year.

Progress Report

My beetroot and carrot seeds have done their thing underground and have sprouted into plant babies!

They are so cute, I can feel all the birds keeping one eye on them and the other on my strawberries waiting for the perfect treat. I planted sparingly so I don't need to do too much thinning. Thinning is effectively playing god in the garden and pulling out some of the sprouts so the the strong have room to grow Big and strong. I'm not ready to do this yet as I'm not sure where I stand ethically on the death of innocents. I will probably try some form of rehoming although have read that carrots don't do replanting well.

My strawberry bag is doing great with heaps of green strawberries fattening up nicely. I think the bag is a great incubator, always nice and warm and full of everything a strawberry needs to grow sweet and juicy berries to go nicely with ice-cream. My next job is strawberry protection from birds, which should be simple with them being so nicely compact in the bag.

I can't believe how quickly I am feeling a sense of achievement and progress in my garden. You can see everything has grown since it's planting day and 10 minutes out in my patch everyday is great medicine for me. There are so many lovey gentle jobs I can do with my arm still in a sling. Although I have been lucky to have had Andrew, Mum and even our neighbour helping me with the heavy jobs and all the people who have driven me for lunch at the nursary and a wee purchase ( I have been to the cafe, I mean nursary, 6 times in the last 3 weeks - yum)

Lily is starting to ask to go for a look in Mummy's garden and getting better at only looking with her eyes and smelling flowers. Although toddler sized handfuls of soil are often re-homed. I am looking forward to all the things she will learn out here, most importantly it will hopefully keep her interested in vegetables and healthy eating.

This week I am telling people I know about this blog. Being my first blog, this is quite a weird, exciting feeling. I'm fine with strangers reading and not enjoying this but not sure how I will feel about how people I know will respond. So leave a comment if you have been for a visit to my blog, I'd love to know who has dropped in, it's like having a virtual garden visit - but without a taste of peas or strawberries.

Xx Robs - VegeGardenNovice

Big planting day

With only one arm currently in action, I have to be cunning in order to make things happen. So a lunch date with hubby was put on the table. "I know a great place..." I said.

So off we went for a romantic, the child is at daycare, daytime date. It was a wonderful coincidence that the cafe, I chose, was right in the middle of a garden centre. The food is yummy, I love it there and after some great quality time I suggested to Andrew we walk back to the car through the seedlings section.

He knew what I was up too before his first sip of Latte but still played along with my plan.

A trolley was found and we bought some wee beauties!

2 x capsicum 

2 x egg plant

6 x strawberries

And some pretty little marigolds because the southland times told me these were good for companion planting.

 Hot lunch date, followed by a hot afternoon in the garden = perfect day

Strawberry bag planting experiment

My friends Kim and Chris first introduced me to growing stuff in a bag with their tomatoes outside their flat in England. Then Mum started talking about it with strawberries and I thought I have the perfect spot covering an ugly tree stump and it won't take up precious garden space. So on my tree stump I will have my yummy strawberry bag with lots of warm rock seats around for Lily and I to enjoy berries right off the plant.

I got a bag of special strawberry mix and whacked some drainage holes in the bottom, cut six little crosses, and watered well.

I folded out the corners of the cuts, jammed in my strawberry beauties and then folded the corners back into the middle of the plant, making a nice plastic surface with plants popping out.

Easy as 1, 2, 3...

Hot tip from Kim I will use a drink bottle to get the nozzle right into the bag for watering.

Planting my other babies

Egg plant and capsicum need as much sunshine as possible. I didn't know I was going to be growing these, Andrew picked them when he was high on the excitement and romance of a meal out with only us, no high chair required. 

You know when you buy suede high-heels and they are amazing, and you are really excited to get them home and do a new shoe dance. But then, you get a pair of boots the next week and it's winter and it's practical that you wear them for the next while rather than your beautiful suede high heels in the rain.

I am in this predicament in my garden. My carrots are the high-heels and my capsicums are the boots and they need the sunny spot that my carrot seeds are sprouting in.

So carefully I reclaimed what was a carrot haven, and gave the most sunny spot to my orange cap. Who knows, maybe the seeds will survive and when they sprout the can be re-homed. There is still plent of the carrot row left and my capsicums can bask in the sunniest spot like little tuataras.

My garden paradise is filling up, now all I have to do is keep everything alive, I wonder what my survival rate will be. I also bought seed potatoes and have thrown them in a dark warm cupboard for time out to think and sprout for a while.

Red line - beetroot

Green line - spring onions

Orange line -  carrots

Red dots - strawberry bag hiding ugly tree stump

Orange dots - capsicum

Purple dots - egg plant

Here's me, a very satisfied, slow moving, one armed, novice gardener. It's all coming together nicely.

And the best thing about my hot afternoon of gardening, was that it motivated Andrew to mow the lawns and it was fun working together/perving at him mowing the lawns.

First planting

My shoulder is at the point that I can wind up and unwind the hose on my own and that was my green light for planting. I know that I can tend to my plant babies without needing help from Andrew.

I have been reading a beginners guide to vege gardens from The Southland Times a few years ago.

Beginner's guide to vege gardens

Even though I'm in Auckland and the advice is for cold old southland (I'm a Dunedin girl, so I say that with experience) I'm going to take it all on board and because I'm not much of a reader/researcher I'm going to take it as gospel and have a crack.

So today I planted seeds straight into the ground.

Carrots, beetroot and spring onion seedlings I have been trying to grow since Mother's Day.

Red line - beetroot

Green line - spring onions

Orange line -  carrots

It's Soil not mud

Months have past, we have watched rain over our 4 hour weekend windows and when the sun has been out lawns and all the boring day to day stuff has taken priority. The good new, lawn mowing has been a breeze because all catchers have been emptied into the garden boxes. Such a great start to delicious mud for my plant babies.

Soil I mean, I called it mud for a long while but I am learning to understand the work/money that goes into good quality vege growing soil that I now respect it.

I am recovering from shoulder surgery so was lucky to have been helped by my Mum and again Andrew to get all the broken down manure and soil filled in and turned over. Also our neighbours did a bit of forking work with payment in fresh parsley and coriander (thanks Matthew)

I also have to thank our dog Bonnie for her daily manure deposits each day.

Andrew doing the hard work

LESSON ONE - cute fluffy dogs LOVE to dig freshly filled gardens!!! 

Time to build a fence

Bonnie just wouldn't be able to resist and I knew I would want to know all garden bits would be protected from both fur baby and baby baby.

Quick and also pretty, Andrew whipped up a Bunnings special for me with plastic warratahs and ready made garden frames. So far no toddlers or puppies have broken through.

Perfect garden protection from our little family members

Making the beds

The corner I have taken over already had a small rock garden and concrete trough that I planned to add to. We (husband Andrew is pulled in for any heavy jobs) built two frames out of treated pine, because it was treated I covered the internal sides with black plastic to avoid potential leeching.

The frames are ready to be filled.... On this blog it looks like we did this in a day or weekend - enter the full time job and 17 month old daughter, this has taken us a good few months!! Two two hour naps each weekend has been our window and more than often, depending on broken nights that week we choose sleep over everything else.

The beds are made!

Pavers laid by myself, not at all level but I figure that will right itself over time.