Sustainable Garden Coming Up

It was a quiet July in the garden. The peas continued to shuffle up a few millimetres, but little sign of anything else in the vege patch. Bulbs moved two years ago to surround the mulberry tree gave a light blooming, but nothing spectacular.

Rainfall for July was 57mm, falling on eight days.

Will need to move the caneberries to their own bed, preferably on the lower level of the back lawn, nearer the pond. Strawberries that are currently shaded by the apricot tree will also need to be moved into the sun, and a wire cage constructed to protect them from the magpies.

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June has gone with lots of frosts and 34.5 mm of rain over 6 days, but little has changed in the winter garden. All the deciduous leaves are gone now, and the peas are poking through, but the aquatic plants are badly burnt by the cold nights. Waterlily pads are crispy, but still green. One of the hedge callistemons has a couple of blossoms. Plenty of leaves to start mulching; just need a little more energy.

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The Granny Smith apple leaves still cling to their branches, but the autumn toll has bared all other deciduous plants, so the garden is looking rather downbeat.

Strawberry and raspberry leaves are a mix of red and green, and a few Cambridge Rival plants continue to produce small white strawberries which are promptly removed by magpies.

So it’s an odd mix of autumn and winter, despite a couple of months of frosts.

Of the new plantings, only the peas are pushing their heads through the earth and mulch, despite regular waterings, frost and heavy dew. Frost, though has killed off the remaining tomatoes and largely cut back the nasturtiums.

Rainfall for May was a healthy 78.5mm falling on seven days.

The garden is mulched, but I’ve little in because post-surgery, my body lacks the strength or energy to do much.

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Autumn plantings went in over the weekend. Nice spell of sunny weather now after a week of cold, with more cold coming up. And only 18mm of rain in April.

Bought a Dwarf grafted citrus Washington Navel Orange grafted on Flying Dragon rootstock for near the pond. It will help screen the western side of the pond and the greywater filter tub.

Oranges seem to be a bit iffy in the Canberra climate, so will need to protect it from frost with a frame and shadecloth. Ideally it should be in a north and west-facing spot with its back against a brick wall, so this may be a little exposed. Will have to mollycoddle it for a bit, at least until it grows larger.

Sowed flanders poppy seeds (Papava rhoeas) near the letterbox at the front. Hopefully they will come through in a cluster of colour, although the soil there is less than ideal. We’ll see.

Raked back the lake weed from a part of the vegetable garden bed and was delighted to see worms in almost every section. The apple tree partly shades the patch I selected, but it should get good sun once the leaves fall for winter.

Planted coriander delfina (Coriandrum sativum), white turnip (Brassica rapa), broccoli waltham (Brassica oleracea) – all from Diggers – dwarf pea (blue bantam), red cabbage (ruby ball F1) and californian red onion (in a tray) from Mr Fothergills. Diggers pak choy (also Brassica rapa) went in the southern orchard in a full sun spot.

Used good quantities of worm castings and alpaca poo slurry on the vegies, so it will be interesting what difference they make to production.

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March was pretty much a repeat of February – wonderful! 112.5mm of rain over 9 days, and the good growth started in February continued.

Tomatoes are beginning to redden – fruit is still small, but the plants are prolific.

Eaten the first few Cambridge Rival strawberries – mouth-watering! And a single raspberry, although I was probably a bit anxious to beat the birds so it had not had a chance to reach full taste.

Netted the strawberries from birds, but the slugs have taken over. It seems that you can’t leave the fruit to ripen fully, which is a pity, but a couple of days early is small price to pay for not having to abandon them to the slimy ones!

Self-sown cos lettuce is reaching pickable size, so providing good fodder for sandwiches.

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February was a terrific month for rain in Canberra… 171.4mm, falling on 10 days – that’s double the best month for 2009.

The result has been a transformation in the garden. Plants are growing! Strawberries and caneberries that appeared to have given up the ghost at Christmas are now flourishing, and there’s fruit forming on many of them.

Hedge plants in the open are thriving, although those sheltered by wattle and petosterum are less vigorous.

Tomatoes, both store-bought and self-seeded, are beginning to fruit and looking much healthier than they were. Nothing on the fruit trees, and the January dry (with the help of sulphur crested cockatoos and parrots) killed off the promising apple crop.

Unfortunately the snail population went on the march as soon as the rain came, and wiped out peas, beans, and bok choi.

A couple of nasturtiums weathered the drought and are now prolific, but just about everything else I planted died.

Aquatic plants are thriving in the pond, and margin dwellers are also doing well. Removed the shadecloth at the end of February and the waterlilies and Rainbow Nardoo have delighted in speading their large leaves across the surface.

The Pickerel Rush is outstanding. The shadecloth kept it in one place, but it tilted on its side and probably doubled in size nevertheless. I’ve now placed it within a steel frame to try to keep it upright, and hopefully it will adapt and camouflage the steel. It’s certainly healthy!

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One millimetre of rain fell in January, and plants basically withdrew into their shells.

It’s a meagre growth rate and very little is showing signs of fruiting or flowering. One exception is the grevilleas in the hedge – only small plants, but flowering bravely.

The shadecloth has helped considerably in the pond, and aquatic plants are thriving.

The Pontederia cordata is now cornered between two lengths of shade cloth. Appears to like that, and is throwing off numerous purple ‘poker heads’ of flower. The water lilies, too, are in flower, and the leaves of the other plants are spreading strongly.

The sun has been intense, burning off a lot of the strawberry plants. Raspberries and tomatoes, too. Had two little tomatoes, but there are now signs of some regrowth flowers – after December’s rain?

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Shadecloth spread over the greywater pond has dramatically slowed evaporation, and allowed the water levels to effectively activate the sump pump. Not fully using the greywater produced, but a huge improvement!

I also installed a purple greywater dripper hose from the pond to the downhill hedge plants. it’s not getting much of a workout, but the larger drip holes seem to be doing a better job than the weeper hose. Need more water flow before I could consider adding more length to the dripper network.

While we were away at Christmas there apparently was a very heavy fall of rain. Whacko! December rainfall ended up being 82mm, falling on 5 days, making December the wettest month of 2009.

The Bureau of Meteorology says “The average annual rainfall is 629 mm with an average of 108 rain days per year. Rainfall is reasonably evenly distributed throughout the year with the wettest month being October (65.3 mm) and the driest being June (39.6 mm).”

Total rainfall for 2009 on this block was 457.7mm, which is about 73% of the average. It fell on 74 days, which is about 69% of average. The pattern did not really conform to the long term average.

The December rain has started some indications of growth, but it looks like being a meagre harvest compared with last year. Few vegetables are doing anything; I got only about 5 apricots, but plums may be OK and the old apple tree may do reasonably well. The new trees are not expected to produce yet, but the feijoa has flowers this year for the first time.

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Evaporation in these 30 degree cloudless days seems to be rendering the greywater watering system ineffective. The water is flowing into the pond, but the surface level seems reluctant to rise sufficiently to trigger the pump.

When the aquatic plants, particularly the water lilies, grow sufficiently to shade the surface, the problem may go away. In the meantime, I may have to erect shadecloth! Frustrating.

The weeper hose seems to be inadequate for the task of distributing the greywater. The hose is filled, but the pores appear to be too small to allow greywater through. Bought and installed 30m of 13mm purple greywater dripper hose. Manually tripped the pump and in the brief time it ran there were promising dribbles from the holes.

Rainfall for November was 10.5mm over 4 days, which makes it the third driest month for 2009. Bought a new rainguage which is more accurate for the smaller readings that seem to be more common. The old one was inaccurate at small readings, and beginning to clog up with algae, spider bodies and dead flies.

Planted cos lettuce, Manchester table carrots, tatsoi, dwarf snap beans, sunflowers, long green cucumber and three different tomato plants – gross lisse, health kick and tigerella (from Diggers!) – marigold, nasturtium, pumpkin and rockmelon.

Dideon has supplied several truckloads of lake weed, and the garden now has 50mm or more of mulch in most places.

Everything else is drying out badly, and watering is needed for most of the plants.

The marionberry and blackberry planted with strawberries and sheltered by shadecloth are growing strongly. The caneberries out in the open are not nearly as vigorous, and two have died – although they were near where some digging may have affected them.

Interestingly, the strawberry plants are growing well, but there’s not a sign of berries. Seems to have been the first flush – most of which the birds took before I installed nets – and that’s it. I expected a much longer harvesting season.

Will need to rig up some sort of automatic watering system for the tomatoes and melons if we are going away for Christmas.

I ate the first apricot of the season on December 1 – lovely. Unfortunately, it is a meagre crop compared with last year. I may get a few to eat fresh, but there will be none for drying or preserving. The other fruit trees, too, seem to have much less fruit than they did last year.

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Finally found a selection of aquatic plants! Woefully little information about them, particularly their value as filters and water-cleaners for greywater ponds. And, of course, ‘the horticulturist’ won’t be in until Monday.

Still, I bought a selection – they’re much dearer than ‘land plants’ – and immersed them in the greywater pond. I say ‘immersed’, because you can’t actually plant them, can you?

Anyway, that brought up some unexpected challenges. The nursery had a useful zoning system on a poster, indicating that Zone 2 plants were suitable for pond edges, through to Zone 5, which can grow in water that’s from 600mm to 1.8m deep.

The Zone 5 plants – Hardy Water Lily Yellow (Nymphaea Hybrid) – were only about 200mm high, so I felt a bit cruel dropping them into the deepest part of the pond. They disappeared completely. I only hope they can thrive and stretch up to find the sunlight!

The Zone 4 Pickerel Rush (Pontederia cordata) did reach through the surface from its mid-range depth… but decided that it was a nomad. It simply floated free of the bottom and headed for other parts of the pond. I weighed the pot down with a brick, but it simply curtseyed to the west, the brick slid off, and away it sailed again. Packing clay around its feet fared no better, and neither did a larger brick. I’ll wait and see where it ends up!

Another Zone 4 plant – Rainbow Nardoo (Marsilea mutica) – would also be completely submerged if I placed it on the pondbed in its appointed position. Instead, I placed it on a brick so that some parts of its four-leafed clover-like leaves are clear of the surface and able to breathe air. It’s supposed to be quite vigorous, so I’m hoping it will camouflage the pump in the rubbish tin, and as it spreads, I’ll lower it to the pond floor.

Japanese Iris Fascination (Iris ensata cultivars) and Elephant Ears (Colocasia Black Magic) – both Zone 2 – were quite obedient when placed on their 300mm deep ledge. They both, apparently, don’t like to be wet in winter, so they may have to be re-deployed to the bank when the cold winds begin to blow.

I wil have to check again when the experts are at work to find reeds, rushes, sedges and whatever else will help filter and process the greywater.

In the meantime, these will at least start to make the pond look a little more attractive.

They all seem to require pond plant fertilizer tablets at the beginning of Spring, and some require more again in Summer. Several also need to be repotted every couple of years, but they can be divided, so we can keep refreshing the population.

Greywater Irrigation

During the week I got the sump pump working and installed weeper hose along the native hedgerow. The second outlet goes to a sprinkler, which is working well, but there is very little seepage from the weeper hose. The plants are simply not benefiting at all. I looked again today for purple greywater dripper hose, but no luck. The stores said they never have carried it. I’ve seen it elsewhere, so will have to keep hunting.

Sunburnt

The sun has been quite fierce in the past few weeks, and a number of plants that have fared well in past years have simply curled up and burnt. The strawberries and caneberries covered by shadecloth have performed dramatically better than those left open to full sun.

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