Winter has arrived (albeit later than usual)

The past two months has seen many sunny days and warmer than usual evenings for this time of year. Until the past week, we had only seen 1 decent frost and another very light one. However last week saw the rains return with over 70mm of rain and the past two days have dropped below zero Celsius and the return of heavy frosts or fog. In my patch the frost was not quite as severe as the fog settled in but the kids down the road played there 9am soccer games on a bed of crusty ice.

I have been a bit of a lazy gardener over the past month hence no posts. The soccer season kicks in at this time of year and I am usually busy getting the weekly newsletter for the Cygnet Sea Dragons out, coaching the U8 and U14 Youth team, maintaining the facebook page and generally helping out. https://www.facebook.com/CygnetSeaDragons.


What I have done lately in the patch is lay weed matting down over the paths and cover with sawdust. This will greatly assist my weeding chores come spring, tho there seems plenty of weeding to do at the moment.

So what has been or is being harvested at the moment as the winter solstice has arrived. Here is a summary:

- The Oca was recently harvested (Oxalis tuberosa) - If you do not know what this is (also called New Zealand Yam - but it is not native to NZ) it is a little tuber that mirrors I suppose sweet potato but I think much better in flavour. We roast it and love it

- Broccoli heads are being picked, Kale is plentful

- Winter carrots are growing well and we are getting down to the last of the summer planted carrots. same for beetroot.

- Brussel Sprouts are almost ready

- Cauliflower heads are forming

- Mizuna/Mibuna/lettuce/English Spinach

- Leeks

- Garlic is shooting up

- Potato Onions were plated last weekend. These are a little different to onion in that they are onions (Allium tribe) however you plant the onion and it forms about 8 to 14 onions at harvest. These type of onions also do not bolt to seed and are not as fussy as normal onions. Many in colder districts often find just as their onions are bulbing, they suddently go to flower which is a sign that something checked their growth along the way and set them into seed formation (common problem with celery also). Potato Onions do not have this problem and are fine planted in the cold moist winter soils. (I do still grow normal onions and have seeded them in the hothouse for planting out in August)

- Green manures are growing rapidly now

- Purple Sprouting Broccoli is large in preparation for covering our Broccoli needs in late Aug, Sept and Oct.

Recently I bought some Pink Eyes in preparation for planting out in August.

For the time being, I will continue to potter about and when the sun shines do a bit of weeding as well as harvesting, but this is the time of year I like to take as much of a break from veggie gardening as I can.

Till next time

Broccoli "Arcadia"

Jerusalem Artichoke - left in ground to pick as we eat

Kale "Borecole"

Mizuna and Mibuna

Turnip "Hakueri"

Parsley

Garlic

Leeks

Tic Beans as Green Manure

Brussel Sprouts

Kohl Rabi

Carrots "Merida"

Cygnet January Weather Averages

January Weather results are in and are as follows:

January	2013	2012
Max Avg	24.5	25.1
Min Avg	9.8	11
Highest Max	40.6	37.7
Lowest Min	5.4	5.6
Rain	27.3mm	69.3mm
Avg Wind	5.3 km/h	4.6 km/hr

It seems the warmer than usual start to summer has subsided with max and mins lower this month compared to last year. This combined with the very hot record day and dry spell might explain why the indeterminate tomatoes seem to have back off a bit in their growth compared to last summer. However the Break O'Day variety is large and covered with large toms. The Rouge de Marmande is a little disappointing in comparison to last summer so far however.

Last Sunday I planted the following in preparation for late Autumn and winter:

• Mizuna
• Rocket
• English Spinach (English Winter Giant and Tyee)
• Kohl Rabi

And seeds have been put in punnets in the hothouse for later transplanting of the following:

• Brussel Sprouts
• Cauliflower (mix from Inspirations Nursery) - I found last year this mix did well and the cauliflower matured at different times for longer harvesting)
• Broccoli (Arcadia and Purple Sprouting) - Purple Sprouting are fantastic, and the Arcadia seemed to handle the winter well and produced massive heads with heaps of side shoots which kept us in Broccoli for months
• Kale (Red Russian)

This weekend I will be planting about 10 metres of Carrots (Merida) and Beetroot (love Derwent Globe and Bulls Blood). Lettuce and Cabbage (Savouy King will also be planted. Last year I did Swede (Tasmanian Butter) however we were not hugely keen on the taste so will be skipping it this year and will do some turnip instead. The spring turnips were quite tasty steamed in thin slices.

We had 16mm of rain in the past 5 days which is more than half of our Jan rainfall. This has given things a perk up and I got out last night after the recent rain and hosed to ensure more water got into the soil thanks to the rain. Fingers crossed Feb is not as dry.

happy gardening

Jerusalem Artichoke next to cauliflower