SUMMER, at last!

Globe artichoke in flower

Summertime, and the living is easy!  And we're singing and humming along!  So, so happy!

Finally, summer has arrived.  We have had a sporadic, half-hearted attempt at summer, up until now!  The Land of the Long White Cloud has certainly lived up to it's Maori name, Aotearoa, ALL summer long!  Up until now, that is.   Yep, world-wide, weather patterns have changed.  When most Kiwis should have been out in and on the water, yelling, whooping, skiing, surfing and swimming, we've been holed up inside, scrounging for wet weather gear and even the odd woolly jumper to ward off the unseasonable chill!

Welcome, Sunshine!

 So all's not been roses and sweet peas in the garden, I mean, everything is late in the edible veggie patch!  God, in all his wisdom, forgot to put stop-cocks into plants, so much of our tomatoes and plums split while still green, in the persistent, non-stop rainfall, inviting fungal infestations and fruit flies, way before they were even ready to be picked!  But such is the life of the gardener.  We run with the ups and downs and do our best to dodge the weather gods' wrath.  Mouldy nectarines had their "good bits" chopped out to make nectarine compote (still yum!) and the fruit fly-infested plums were thrown to the birds (double treat for them - fruit and flies!). Luckily, there's still some left though, and to ensure a steady supply, I shall have to bag the remaining fruit on the trees, or else the birds will continue their feasting and leave us with nothing.  I simply tear up strips of recycled fabric and peg them around the fruit or tomatoes.  Then there's the plight of my beans.  Beautiful bean wigwams one week, rusty the next from too much rain!  Had to pull them all out to stop the fungal spores spreading to other veggie crops!  And the weeds.......Weeds that love all that extra rain, having grown to Empire State Building proportions!  Oh, boy!  The joys of weather gremlins!

At times, we have wondered how the sky could hold so much rain up there!  Huge reservoirs of mammoth proportions!  While parts of our country have had not a drop, we have considered building an ark in our backyard!  It was consolation to hear that we weren't as bad off as Wales, who had 81 days of continuous rain!  

So in the middle of summer, the rain seems to have moved on and the sun has managed to part the clouds in a last ditch attempt to shine on us and finally ripen our fruit!  The sun is so very, very welcome!  

We all love the sun!

Having been thwarted by weather and other events and circumstances, my garden has been a little neglected, but since then, I have been working methodically, slowly but surely on trying to control the jungle it's become.  Patch by patch, I am gaining control and winning the war on weeds.  You don't realise how big your bit of turf is, until you hand weed it, every square centimeter of it!!

I have begun a systematic clean up programme, and am happy to say that finally, I can look out and see a little order arriving in my backyard!

Bee Fodder

After a gigantic herb garden sort, chop, divide and ruthless weed culling yesterday morning, our compost bin is overflowing with the fall-out, but now we can see the lovely herbs and access them for our meal prep enhancement.  All the "off cuts" have been put to good use and I have dried many herbs in my second-hand dehydrator to be stored and used over winter.  I try not to waste much in the food production arena, it would seem self defeating! Which reminds me, I have a big bowl of Omega plums waiting to be processed today.  I may just freeze them for later processing into jam or compote in winter when fruit is scarce.  I have already made 8 bottles of spicey plum chutney.

Before:  Herb Jungle

After: Herb Garden

After our gardening mission yesterday, we headed off for a drive and then a splash into our local waterhole on the Uretara River.  Cool and refreshing!  What a lovely way to end our summer's day.  I LOVE summer!  Especially, a long-overdue one!

Splash into Summer!

Healthy Soil, Healthy Food

Ending of Winter.  Time to prune and tidy up the garden for the Big Spring into Action!  We end up with unsightly heaps like this below.  Bring in the trusty little home gardener Masport mulcher.  It is the Winter gardener's Best Little Helper.  Chews up branches and spits them out in teeny little pieces which can be spread on bare ground as a weed-suppressing mulch, which ultimately breaks down over 9-12 months to feed and condition the soil.

What a mess!

Chewing through the fallout, one branch at a time.

The only downside of this exercise is that our little mulcher takes branches no bigger than 4cm diameter.  And often gets jammed, so I have to wait for the branch to dry out and shrink a bit before I can pull it out and start again, sometimes waiting 2-3 weeks for that process!!

The bigger branches which can't go through the mulcher are chopped up with my electric chainsaw, for firewood.

Smaller branches are chopped to size to keep as kindling for next winter's fires.

Mulch is distributed on cardboard for walkways, or straight on the ground around fruit trees etc.

I leave the mulch to stand for 5 weeks before distributing, as it can leach nitrogen from the soil as it decays.  It works to suppress weeds and over time, fungi decompose the woody chips and help to condition and enrich the soil.  We are also lucky enough to have a local tree chopper guy who dumps fresh wood chip for us when we ask, as we would never be able to produce enough on our own.  We used to have to pay for loads, so this is a truly valuable contact!  If he is in the area, it saves him travelling to dump it.  We both win!!

Before: A mess!  Weeds have overgrown this area of the orchard over winter!

Day 1, halfway weeded.

Day 2, job complete and area is mulched for weed suppression.

Asparagus bed and path weeded for spring growth.  I have been busy!  This area will need mulch too, if I am not to weed it all over again in 2-3 weeks time! 

Untreated sawdust makes a good "floor" in front of the bee hives.  It suppresses the weeds and is soft and spongy to walk on.  Mike occasionally collects a large bag-full from a local woodworker.

Peach tree weeded and pathways mulched.

Bee foraging garden weeded and mulched.  Note how the frosts have killed the grassed area!

All  those weeds and prunings end up returning to the soil as wonderful rich compost!

Time to sort out seeds and plan for a busy sowing season ahead!  Yay!  Love this activity!  A time of planning, renewal and growth.

Compost feeds the crops

A brown seaweed sits in water, steeping out all the goodness.  I use this, highly diluted to feed food crops, also use it concentrated, in the compost bin to help accelerate the decomposition process.  Every couple of weeks, I head down to the harbour and collect a bucket full.

Sea lettuce collected from the shores of our harbour, steeped in water or added directly into the compost bin provides a good source of sea-rich nutrients.  It can be used as a direct mulch on garden beds, however, I do not collect enough at any one time to put this into practice.

The worm farm in the foreground, provides vermicast and worm-wee tea, which is also diluted and fed to hungry growing food crops.

Winter crops fastapproaching harvest.

Celery looking good.  Healthy soil = healthy plants.

The citrus is looking good; lemons, limes, mandarins, grapefruit and oranges all ripening nicely, thanks to healthy soil!

Recently I have enjoyed making a couple of log bug-homes.  It's a simple idea I found on the World Wide Web.  Drill several different gauge holes into a section of log.  Add a hook on the top, some rope and hang it in a tree.  Now I just need to wait and see who takes up residence.  I added a roof of old floor vinyl to protect the top from rain.

I spied this wonderful sight below, while out walking in Katikati.  Someone has used big water bottles with the bottoms cut off, as mini glass houses to protect his/her new seedlings in the veg bed.  Brilliant recycling idea!  Love it!!

And lastly, talking about healthy soil, healthy food..... we are enjoying our smoothies most days - I throw a bunch of garden produce into the blender and whizz away.  Simply deliciously healthy kai!

I freeze fruit when it's in glut, for lean times like in winter - frozen blueberries and cubes of feijoa pulp.  Our one frost-surviving bunch of bananas is slowly ripening in the garden shed, fodder for smoothies over the coming weeks....