One month no blog!

OMG-Its been over a month since I blogged on the mound - though I have some excellent excuses and the main two meaning that (a) I moved to Sydney and (b)I handed over blogging duties to a less-than-diligent blogger (you know who you are!)

Just the same, the mound goes on and there's been quite a bit of work done this past month as I've been travelling back at least 3 or 4 times in last 7 weeks to plant, water, rip down, rack, shovel, harvest, cut and whatever else needed doing.

It hardly needs to be said in light of the recent bushfires how hot its been- and the local Fire Chief was right- the ground has been really dry this year. leaving the mound for week without hand watering meant everything dried out- cucumber practically died, tomatoes shrivelled up, the mound was crispy on the inside several layers down!

The lorrikeets had been enjoying the cherry tomatoes and we weren't managing to harvest any because as soon as they were evenly slightly ripe, several birds could be found sitting inside the tomato bush feasting. We decided they'd had their run and cut them down and planted beans in the mound where the cherry tomatoes had been. This hopefully will also give the eggplant that was planted in the front a chance to grow- it was a bit overshadowed and competiting with the tomatoes.

I cut back the other tomato bushes, but didn't cut them down- Mum thinks that the tomatoes will give us a second crop and we decided there was no harm in testing this theory. I pulled out some of the scrubby bushes that were in the 2nd mound, along with the sweet potato which was starting to smother capscuim, carrots etc. I shifted the sweet potato to the very back mound and to under the passionfruit.

If you remember, the cowpea and millet had been planted under the passionfruit as a green manure and had actually dried out lovely in the heat. We harvested lots of dried cowpea seed pods and then I just whipper-snippered down the remaining plants. The Japanese millet had also gone to seed, though we didn't harvest this, just let it fall. Cowpea and Japanese millet are 'green manure' because they are nitrogen-fixing plants- but they have to be left to break down in the soil for the nitrogen to become available to other plants.

We enjoyed eating some the cowpea (a lovely little brown bean about lentil size) but decided to save the rest for replanting. We plan to start a new mound- leaving a gap between the end of the corn bed wide enough for a wheel barrow, the new mound will almost be a continuation, though much shorter in length.

A pile of horse poo has been dumped there in preparation, and instead of going with more summer crops, we thought to prepare this for winter crops. So- more cowpea and japanese millet have been planted into the horse poo, with the idea that hopefully this will grow and be cut down in time for planting winter crops into this mound. Dynamic lifter, lime and blood and bone were also used, though no lucerne or cardboard this time.

I've started a new seedling area- especially being away from the house, no-one else was remembering where I had all the seedlings scattered about, and a few were suffering in the heat. I've now got the seedling rack down near the mound and next to tap so its easy for a neighbour to water. I've got beetroot, carrot, lettuce, spinach, rocket, artichoke and I'm not sure what else coming up-(hopefully the other unreliable blogger will let us know!)

The aspargus I planted from seed sent up three shoots from 8 seeds- all the information I could find on the internet said -do not try and grow asparagus from seed- so I'm very chuffed with 3 out of 8. The asparagus has its own 'special' place (inside an old glass fishtank)- its got water in the bottom with a raised plastic shelf which the asparagus sits on- it means its protected, warm and has plenty of water. When the seedlings look a bit stronger I will plant out into an asparagus bed. I did transplant them once already from the tiny seed raising trays (re-used from the seedling we bought from bunnings) to a deeper pot. I didn't want them to become root bound or suffer lack of nutrients in a tight little pot as I plan to keep them sheltered for a while yet.

Ok- well you're probably due for some photos.

Hassler the other relucant blogger to keep us up to date! : )