Usually we find ourselves begging for rain to both save us the trouble of turning on the sprinkler system and also take the heat of our water bills, but honestly, so far in February we have had 201.8mm (yes that's over 2metres!) of rain this month in Terrey Hills. This my friends, is too much rain.
- As a result our Grosse Lisse, Black Russians Roma Tomatoes practically rotted.
- Our beans grew so crazy the nearly grew plain over the top of the entire opera house, shielding it from sun to dry out properly.
- Our long awaited watermelons went kaput.
- The corn bid us sayonara.
- Cucumbers rotted on the ground
CRAZY GROWTH! Before chopping back, that's zucchini bottom right, pumpkin growing over opera house on right, cherry tomatoes growing out on left
foreground - crazy tomatoes and top, the climbing bean that almost collapsed the opera house!
Oh well, you know what? I'm not too upset - this rain was really needed by the farmers and the dams. The tomatoes, cucumbers and beans have fed us well over the summer thus far (I have preserved so many!) and haven't had to buy any at all. Everyone I know with corn had a bad yield this year - due to the super-hot spring we had, so I just chalk it up to experience.
We have some Thai pink and a few cherry tomatoes left (above top, the colour of watermelon), they are supersweet and lovely in a garden salad. The green tomatoes (above, bottom) that came off the rotted vines I will make chutney with.
Celery is going crazy, I'm just plucking it as I need it, and I think soon the rhubarb will be cut back.
New crop of carrots are poking their heads up as are the onions (sorry forgot pics of these)
Zucchini and Eggplant has had a good yield, loads actually I do think we only have a few weeks to a month of these left. They are looking tired.
Hubby and the frills planted up the first part of our autumn baby garden today also - broccoli, cauliflower, savoy cabbage and brussel sprouts. The first three of those we grew from seedlings last year, this year we're doing them from seed. First time brussel sprout growers this year too. Hubby also planted climbing peas (in a pot this time, no more climbers in the opera house after the beans debacle!
We'll be adding to the baby garden in the next few weeks, I'll do a separate post to let you know our progress.
We're coming up to our first anniversary of digging up and beginning our vege garden, it's evolved - we've loved it - a good family activity to both learn how to grow our own, appreciate our toil with love by eating it and save ourselves some money. You don't need to start one in Spring, Autumn was a great time to start a vege garden - a good ramp-up and practice for the spring and summer.
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4 lovely comments:
Ahh all good lessons learnt I agree! Those butternuts look fantastic-how do you know when they're ready?
Garden gone wild! Fantastic. If you're finished with the rain, send it over this way, The Murray could use a top up :)
Well done, I think you did well to keep your tomatoes going that long.
I wondered what the corn problem was, mine and my neighbours were beyond pathetic. I thought we must have put in the wrong variety or something.
Hey Lorraine! You can tell when the pumpkins are ready when their vine starts to brown off/rot/die. It's still going strong, so I guess we'll keep going!
Christie - yes we're right for rain for a week or so I think - I oould handle 30mm over a week, but not 93mm in one day which we had at one point!
Deb - yes I'm quite impressed we got some tomatoes to keep too - should see us through to a bit of Autumn. We did one of those upside down planters too - I'm sure you had one. they took all summer to get ONE tomato off them. Not again, maybe strawberries...?
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