The Scary Gardener – Snack Size Crop

My crop is ready to harvest, yeah.

For all my efforts so far I have harvested 4 grape size tomatoes, half a dozen snow peas, 4 stubby carrots, a couple of soup bowls of mini cos lettuce leaves and some pretty healthy spring onions stalks, leaves, whatever. I have no idea if they have bulbs at the end or how big they are because I am afraid of pulling them up to finding nothing there.

You may not think that’s too exciting, a snack rather than a meal and certainly not enough to feed anyone for any length of time but for me the fact they survived at all is an achievement in itself.

The green beans died in the first couple of weeks and the rock melon hasn’t even sprouted but the rest have survived, so far. My cabbage and cauliflower are still nothing but leaves and the garlic bulb doesn’t look any bigger than when I planted it, it has some leaves though so I am not entirely sure when to pull it out of the ground.

My mini broccoli grew to the size of a coke bottle cap, so I waited for it to get bigger when suddenly the florets separated and developed small yellow flowers, much to the delight of some bees. Which brings me to my next question, what’s with all the yellow flowers? The tomato which is still bearing me some of the cutest fruit have yellow flowers and my cos lettuce, which seems to have forgotten all about its leaves but is crowned with a burst of flowers, the colour, you guessed it, yellow. Don’t vegetable flowers come in any other colour?

I have decided that the tubs I used to grow my veggies in were a great experiment and proved if nothing else, that I can manage to grow something edible but they are definitely not big enough. I will have to take my veggie patch to the next level; time to build that garden bed.

I have my spot worked out and I’ve settled on making my patch a no-dig garden.

I have decided on this for a couple of reasons. Firstly of course I don’t have to dig which is a real biggy as the backyard is made up of impenetrable clay and this will require less back breaking work. Secondly, I can build it up a bit to avoid the grass and weeds and so there is not so much bending. At least that’s the theory.

For this I will need to collect newspapers, so I can lay them relatively thickly over the area I am using. I will also have to get myself some straw and more garden soil. I already have some cow manure, icky poo yuck, and I will finally get to use my compost I have been diligently nurturing.

It is still winter here in Brisbane, Australia, not that it gets very cold. Winter here means having to wear a cardigan and putting flannelette sheets on the bed. Some people turn on their heaters and some actually have fireplaces going but personally I don’t find that necessary. Having said that it is still cooler than at other times of the year and seems the perfect time of year to get my garden bed ready for the coming spring. As it warms up pretty quickly here I will have to get a move on, so it’s off to the garden centre again to buy some straw and garden soil. I will also have to evict any more of those grubs that may have taken up residence in my compost bin.

On a positive note, I have worms. My compost bin, not me personally and I have been told that worms are good. They aerate the soil and add nutrients via their poop.  I have discovered that gardeners are quite obsessed about poop. Cow, horse, chicken, worms; you can even get zoo poo in Sydney I believe which comes from some exotics like zebra, giraffe and elephant. Hmm, designer manure, lovely, not. They suggest using gloves and a dust mask when handling potting mix and manure; I think I’ll just keep using my hazmat suit.

Oh and a tip for using a hazmat suit; it gets a bit warm in there so don’t forget your antiperspirant and tell your neighbours. Preferably before they call the police, the street is cordoned off and the neighbourhood is evacuated.

Next edition I should have a nice new garden bed to show you, so until then, keep safe and wash your vegies before eating, especially now you know what it’s been growing in.