Winter veg patch update

The past weekend saw the removal of the majority of the summer specials such as the tomato and pumpkins. But in the other beds all the winter crops are growing well and now take centre stage in the patch. I also have laid down weed mat over all the paths and will be putting sawdust on top of this. I hope that this will help on a number of front. 1 - reduce the slug wars an 2 - reduce the weed wars. More to follow on this soon. The following are some photos of how things are going.

Broccoli "Marathon" and Brussel Sprouts

Kale "Red Russian" and Turnip "Hakurei". This turnip is delicious eaten raw or raw in salads

Kale "Borecole"

English Spinach "Winter Giant"

Jerusalem artichoke soon to be harvested

Leeks with a rogue intruder

Lettuce and Collards

Oca and Purple Sprouting Broccoli

The chance of morning frost

In the last week we have had our first glimpses of the arrival of winter with a number of mornings nudging 1 degree, extensive frosts around the corner in Nicholls Rivulet, and heavy snow above 800m asl. The fireplace has also kicked into gear for the first time since last October. The forecast for tomorrow is possibly light morning frost and I think I have gambled with the pumpkin long enough.

Today I will be picking all left over pumpkins and tomatos, no matter how underdone some are. With pumpkins I will leave as much vine on the pumpkin as possible and bring undercover on the deck. I will leave them there for 3 weeks to catch the arvo sun and hopefully sweeten up just a little more.

All ripe or having turned colour Tomato will go into the kitchen, the balance will be picked and stored in a box to ripen slowly or left on the plant and hung under a tree. Each week I will go through the boxes of green tomato and take to the kitchen the ones turning colour. I trialled picking a few earlier in the season when they were very green. About 75% of them ripened in the kitchen before some of the green ones on the plant. This shows that temperature is a key factor in the ripening of Tomato and a higher average temp in the kitchen must be the reason.

I will also pick all capsicum and watermelon.

Tomorrow I will plant garlic where some of the tomato are growing. I planted garlic in early May two years ago and they grew just as well as the garlic i planted late March last year, so I have delayed planting this year to allow more beds to open up.

And with the onset of the risk of frost heralds the Oca harvest. Oca or New Zealand Yam tastes a bit like sweet potato but even better in my books. And frosts are the time to harvest when the tops are burnt down. If you have never tasted Oca I highly recommend it.

Happy gardening.

While most tomatoes still seem to be doing well, it is there time to come out with the risk of frost

Willie Smith Organic Cider

I could count on my hands the number of apple ciders I have purchased during my life. And the majoirty of those times has been since moving to Tasmania which is not surprising looking around the area at the number of apple trees. Last Sunday we ventured over to Grove where Willie Smith Organic Cider farm was having an open day.

I never realised how much equipment was needed for producing the levels of cider these guys produce. As I walked around their orchards and buildings it was obvious that a fair level of capital is required to set up an operation as impressive as this.

Fermenting storage

Obviously we sat down after the guided tour and enjoyed tasting their cider, and tasty it was. To go with this there were some artisan products for lunch and we tried a nachos that was quite delicious.

It was interesting to note that the majoirty of apples they grow are Gala, Golden Delicious, Fuji, and Pink Lady. There may be another one which I can't remember.

Even their straight apple juice was much better than the normal shop bought reconstituted stuff. Live music was also provided by Alan Gogoll, a local guitarist from Kingston. I highly recommend you check his music out. He creates a unique sound on his guitar and is a truly talented artist.  Check him out here. hhttp://www.alangogoll.com/home.htm

It is fantastic to see ventures such as this happening locally. The Huon Valley really has so much potential.

Pumpkins and the summer crop clean up begins

Last weekend I pulled the corn. I am currently processing all this by cutting up and adding to a compost heap which will be finished when i remove the tomato and pumpkin and take the mulch from this and add to the compost. The corn provided a reasonable harvest of cobs which have all been eaten, however I will be switching to a different variety next year as the corns lacked some sweetness we are used to from our crops when we lived in Qld. I have heard the open pollinated ones may be sweeter but need to be eaten on picking as they lose their sweetness quicker than the hybrids.

We have picked 10 kgs of pumpkins which are now in storage after having sat outside in the sun for 3 weeks. Today I picked another load of gold nuggets and buttercups. The butternuts are being left on the vines till the very last minute as they need all the time to sweeten their flavours in our shorter summers of Tasmania.

The warmer march and early April has extended the Tomato harvest which large quantities still being picked. While we had one morning this week get down to 2 degrees celsius, the majority of days are still warm enough to continue the ripening of fruits. In the next 2 weeks tho I will harvest the last lot of tomato for indoor ripening.

All of these summer crops have been and will be replaced with a green manure of tic bean which is perfect for my soils which are higher in clay and create a lovely loamy clay when dug in early spring.

The next couple of weeks I have to catch up which a number of clean up jobs as the start of the soccer season and being away for work has seen me not do a great deal in te veg patch apart from harvesting. However on my work travels we stumbled upon a wombat who seemed to be interested in our presence and wondered at a distance smelly our presence often. It is easy to forget how large wombats are and they truly look like little Australian Bears.

March 2013 Weather

The march weather results from my home weather station was as follows:

March	2013	2012
Max Avg	24.2	22
Min Avg	11	9.6
Highest Max	38.8	31.8
Lowest Min	4.4	3.3
Rain	78.3mm	31.5mm
Avg Wind	4.6 km/h	3.8 km/hr

It was certainly a much warmer March than the previous year but thankfully the rains returned. There has been some noticeable new growth on the pumpkins in particular and a late rush of fruit setting and growing large.

Rainfall year to date is  148mm compared to  113mm in 2012.

Summer winds down

Things are slowing down now. I have the bulk of the winter crops in, garlic will soon go in the bed I have capsicums and watermelon in, and tic beans as a green manure have started to be planted. My corn is on its last legs. This week will likely be the last of them. There are still a couple of weeks of tomato left. Once the corn and tomato are finished I will sow tic beans to improve the soil.  The pumpkins are also nearing an end.

Tonight we started eating the first of the seasons pumpkin. 3 weeks ago I noticed one of the buttercups ready. The little nodule that joins the pumpkin to the vine had shriveled so I cut the pumpkin (with some of the vine attached) and left it in the sun for 3 weeks. We  are fussy with our pumpkin finding a number of varieties not too our liking such as sweet gray. However we really enjoyed the buttercup tonight. It had a rich deep orange colour and was lovely roasted.

The watermelon experiment will soon be tasted. Over March the vines have set a number of fruit and I am hoping they mature before the cold/frosty weather may arrive. They are only small, but I am hoping the are sweet. Whether growing watermelons in Tassie is worth it is another discussion, but I have the space to spare and the taste of these little boys will be interesting.

The capsicum has been a success. There are about 15 on each plant and they have been turning red since late February. I will be growing this variety again (Antohi Romanian).  While I hope the frost is not too early, once the frost does arrive it will herald the Oca harvest (Oxalis tuberosa). More on that next time.

watermelon (taken March 22)