Lightweight, Energy independent, Odourless Tractor....no such thing?

Just before you dismiss it as a crazy idealistic notion, it does exist. It's the CHOOK TRACTOR.

The chook tractor is an integrated part of our food production system in our evolving Mandala's garden. It is placed on grounds where grass or weeds or expired veg beds need to be cleared. The chookies will happily help themselves to the gourmet feast of slugs, snails, worms and a variety unwanted of greens. This reduces effort on weeding and moving the vegs to the compost heap.

Within 2 weeks, all the greens will be demolished and ground cleared of weeds and seeds, and the ground manured. If you place some pea straw or straws of any kind in the tractor after they've cleared the ground, they will happily eat all the seeds and hidden creatures and spread the straws nicely for you, and even add nitrogen to it as well. By the time we move the chook tractor to the next destination, the ground is well mulched and ready for planting.

If you want an extended area to be cleared but it doesn't fit the tractor, don't worry. Use chicken wire to create an enclosure and peg it down with standards (those use by farmers for electric fencing). If you want to keep the chookies in, use bird netting over the chicken wire. The chookies get to free range but only in the areas you like them to clear (and not your planted veg beds).

The Mandala garden in late August

Since I’ve read Linda Woodrow’s book “The Permaculture Home Garden” I can’t stop thinking about the Mandala’s garden working in conjunction with a chook dome. After measuring up the garden and deciding on the no of beds we want, Matt modified the design given in the book and build a pretty sturdy chook do me. We have since removed our square beds displayed in the earlier blog and replaced with round beds, with the help of our chookies. The Mandala garden is still in its infancy stage and I’m learning to garden with round beds instead of boxes. It takes a bit of getting used to.

Globe Artichoke

We planted the Globe Artichoke 6 months before our wedding. It has since died back and grown back over the last few years, each time with more dramatic display and growth. The first year, we admired the dramatic foliage, let the globes flowered and seeded, pruned it and added to our compost heap. The second year, we gave most of it to a friend who happened to enjoy them. This year, we’ve decided that it may possibly be edible and decided to give it a try. And it turned out to be quite tasty if we harvest it before it gets too big. I harvest it when it’s slight bigger than the size of my clenched fist. Next, I slice off one third of the top and chop off the stalk. Then, I put it into a pot of boiling water with a teaspoon of salt and boil the life out of it for about 20 minutes. After that, remove it from the pot of hot boiling water, either eat it as it is, or pull it apart and add it to a delicious salad. You’ll be pleasantly surprised! You can also check out this link to see how to appreciate artichokes.

George the Second

For about 2 years, George the 1st lived in the crack at the top right corner of the kitchen window. We watch George the 1^st feasted on bugs and flies and grew bigger through the two years. It was a comfort to see that George the 1^st kept the summer flies under control. One day, we found George the 1^st lying dead on the kitchen bench. We called our good friends and told them the sad news but they laughed so hard!!! One night, we heard a knock on the door, it was our friends. They had turned up with a replacement for George the 1^st, which we named George the 2^nd. George the 2^nd has since taken over the task of George the 1^st and is doing a great job in keeping the flies population down, and is flourishing with the feed. The White flowers from the clusters of buds are quite breathtaking.

George the 1^st was a spider and George the 2^nd is a fly trap plant!

Friend's advice for a winter veggie garden

Judith is the friend who has an amazing winter veggie garden. When I ask her about planting for winter, this is her advice:

Start thinking about winter now, yes. I know we have just finished but winter veggies take a long time to grow. I have just started the rotation system of O R B. This is the order that plants follow each other. Where the Brassicas (Broccoli, Caulis, and Cabbage) have grown, you plant others (lettuce, onions/leeks, silverbeet, beans/peas). Where the others have been you plant Roots (carrots, parsnips, potatoes) and around you go.

Sometimes you have to "fiddle the books" but I am sure you get the general idea. And I am only just sorting this one out, but you need to get the seed in so that the plants are big enough to into their permanent position in January/Feb/March.

Broad beans - almost ready now get planted in April/May.

Lettuce is short (2-3mths from seed)crop.

Brassicas - October is the last month for planting seed unless you want to battle with the white butterfly over late December - May. Sow seed of these in Jan/Feb to eat June/July.

I could go on. I am still observing and experimenting and should keep a diary. Need to plant corn seeds in pots this weekend to plant out in 2-3 weeks. I do the next sowing when I have transplanted these so get 2 - 3 sowings a season. You need at least twenty plants for a good harvest so room becomes a factor.

2007 October Urban Permies meeting

We had a rather international gathering represented by 4 nationalities, French, Singaporean, Kiwis and American. It's spring so we decided to do gardening for free - plant propagation through softwood cutting, with a focus on some herbal plants. After that, we retreated back into the house to enjoy a nice cup of Lemon Balm tea and followed by more discussions on plant propagation. Somehow the discussion led to the health benefits of raw milk and other things we can do with raw milk. Check out these websites if you're keen.

Lemon Balm tea
Put a handful of lemon balm leaves into a teapot
Put hot water into the teapot
Wait a few minutes
Serve it on individual cups with half a teaspoon of honey on each cup

It's a very relaxing tea with the most amazing aroma. No wonder bees go crazy over lemon balm.

Since the meeting, I've done more reading on softwood propagation. The key thing is to keep the cuttings moist and using a propagation mix that contains 60-70% coarse sand with a good potting mix for a greater success rate. I'm experimenting softwood cuttings with capegoose berry and a native plant at the moment.

The plan for the next meeting is to visit a small farmlet that produces raw goats milk. Still on the pipeline. More information coming...

Organic Fungal (RUST) Control

There are rust on a patch of vegetation. From my research for an organic combat, Neem Oil and Garlic sprays are two natural fungal control for Rust.

Garlic Spray:

1 garlic bulb
1 quart water
crush the garlic bulb, place in a pan of water. bring to boil then turn off heat.let mixture cool. Strain out garlic.Pour liquid into spray bottle and spray affected areas of plants. repeat as`necessary.

Garlic is known to fight many types of disease causing fungi, including mildew,gray mold, rust. Garlic has not only been shown to fight fungi, but it also has repellent qualities for other diseases and insects. Plant Garlic bulbs next to your roses, and you should not have any problems with aphids.

Milk is another combat but it works a little differently from Neem Oil and Garlic. A comment from a forum:

There are many layers of bacteria and fungi living on the outside of your plants. The simple proof of that is the rust fungus living on the outside of your plants. The problem is that the beneficial microbes, which usually live there and protect your plants from disease, have lost their ability to do that. They need to be revitalized. Your compost tea will help with that, but also I would spray separately with milk dissolved in water at 3 ounces per gallon of water. Spray as often as you want to. Up here we shoot for spraying every 2 weeks. Your area may appreciate it every week. The milk will provide real food for the microbes living on the plant surfaces and should restore the good health to the beneficials. Once they are healthy, they should eliminate the rust fungus for you.

As an experiment, I'll section out the problematic veg patch into 3 sections and try each of the remedies on 3 different areas. Looking forward to finding out the outcomes.

Winter gardening in Spring??

Not quite. What vegetables might you expect to be growing in winter? Not much one might say, but really, there are a lot more than we think. I visited a friend's garden, and the vege beds were packed with winter growth. It was a beautiful sight. Very encouraging too. This is Palmerston North we're talking about.
Apparently growing winter vegetables requires a bit of advance planning, at least 4 to 6 months ahead of time. This is done when summer gardening chores are also at their peak http://westsidegardener.com/quick/winter_veggies.html. Below are some vegetables that we could be eating from our garden in winter...the months are an estimate...I haven't done most it myself but this is the coming winter project - I know, I know, spring has barely started, but...

Do let me know if you've more winter vegs to add to the list and suggestions for winter gardening...

Some of more slow growing winter vegetables are: (6months ahead)
Leeks (sow in Nov for planting in Jan)
Celery (sow in Nov for planting in Jan)
Brussels sprouts (sow in Jan/Feb)
Cabbage (sow in Jan/Feb/March/April/May)
Broccoli (sow in Jan/Feb/March/April/May)
Cauliflower (sow in Jan/Feb/March/April/May)
Chinese cabbage
Parsnip

Some faster growing winter vegetables/herbs are: (3 months ahead)
kale
collards
kohlrabi
Chinese cabbage
winter carrots
silver beets
parsely (all year round)
snow peas
peas
sugar snap peas
potatoes
Broad bean (sow in April/May)

Fastest growing winter vegetables are (1 1/2 months ahead)
Lettuce (all year round)
winter spinach
radishes (all year round)

Rhubarb Galore...

It's time to divide the rhubarb clump. I did it last weekend and harvested a fair bit of rhubarb. Matt (my husband) decided to make a Rhubarb cake last night. We brought the cake to work, it went down like a treat. It tasted so much better the next day - 2 minutes in the microwave oven to just slightly warmup the cake. It will taste even better served with unsweetened yoghurt. The downside is we didn't take a photo prior to eating it..

Batter:
150 grams butter
1/2 cup sugar
3 eggs
1 1/2 cups organic wholemeal flour (it gives very different texture from normal wholemeal flour)
2 teaspoons baking powder

Rhubarb Topping:
500 grams chopped up rhubarb - 1.5cm lengthwise (remove the stringy bits)
1 tablespoon organic whole meal flour
1 tablespoon ground cinnemon
1/4 cup sugar
rind/juice of a lemon

Cake Topping:
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

Instructions:
Cream the slightly softened butter and sugar and then add the eggs, one at a time. After that, add the flour and baking powder, and turned the flour into the wet mixture - don't over do it.

Add all the topping's ingredients together and mix it well.

Spoon 3/4 of the batter into a 23cm square/round baking tin. Put in all the toppings. Spoon the rest of the batter on top of the rhubarb topping. Mix the cake topping together and sprinkle on top of the cake.

Bake at 160 degree centigrade for 45 -50 minutes (more if required -oven dependent).

This link has ALL the information anyone needs on Rhubarb

June Urban Permies Meeting Update

This update is definitely long overdue. Andrew Rundle-Keswick http://www.webpagebuilder.co.nz an enthusiastic budding permaculturist wrote a really nice comment of my ever evolving garden so I have to share it :-)

I did a Permaculture Design course at Wanaka in May this year and as
part of that course I with other course participants did a Urban
Permaculture design for a urban property in Wanaka. The property in
Wanaka was a blank slate. We had a lot of ideas and sketched up
various ideas and concepts. When I visted your Permaculture property
in Palmerston North I was able to see lots of the ideas and concepts
in actual working application, plus many more besides. I think that
your property is a excellent example of how an urban Permaculture
property works. In a very small space you have a very large
production and it has inspire me to get on with converting my blank
slate property into something as good as yours.

Keep letting me know about your upcoming Permies Meetings as I would
love to come up again and bring my wife and children to show them
your property.

Andrew