Conserve water during droughts by fixing leaks, using water-saving appliances, collecting rainwater, choosing native plants, and minimizing outdoor watering.
Prepare your garden for drought in Australia by selecting native plants, improving soil health, using mulch, and employing efficient watering techniques.
Lavender is a beautiful and fragrant herb that is relatively easy to grow. Growing lavender offers a range of benefits, from its beautiful fragrance and visual appeal to its culinary, medicinal, and aromatherapy uses. Growing lavender offers numerous benefits and rewards. Here are ten reasons why you should consider growing lavender: Fragrance: Lavender is renowned for its captivating fragrance. The soothing and aromatic scent of lavender promotes relaxation, reduces stress, and enhances the ambiance of any space. The mere presence of lavender can create a calming atmosphere in your home or garden. Beauty: Lavender plants are visually stunning with their…
A worm tunnel planted in the garden can help dramatically improve your garden soil. It is a bucket with holes in the sides for worm entry that is planted in the garden for worms to crawl in and out of and feed on the organic matter inside the bucket.
When we decided we needed to protect our food growing space from local species such as Native Bush Rats and the introduced rabbits which are a major pest in Australia, I set the challenge to do as much of it as possible from recycled and upcycled items. The first thing we needed was a secure fence to keep out the critters that wanted to get to our food first. We live and garden right next to a patch of remnant native vegetation which is wonderful for the local species, but not so wonderful for our food gardening efforts. We sourced…
Rhubarb (Rheum rhabarbarum) is one of my favourite summer staples for desserts. Stewed with apples, or served with ice-cream it can be a refreshing healthy change from stone fruit. A herbaceous perennial which originated in China is grown for its attractive succulent rose red, edible leafy stalks, and is one of the lowest calorie plants you can eat. The stalks are rich in several B-complex vitamins such as folates, riboflavin, niacin, vitamin B-6 (pyridoxine), thiamine, and pantothenic acid as well as Vitamin K, iron and can help the body convert inputs to Vitamin A. While you can buy stalks of…
Summer vegetables are plentiful and easy to grow in most climates. But when the days get cooler and shorter, my thoughts turn to root vegetables. They are easy to grow and can stay in the ground until I need them. What better way to use your winter garden than to prepare for winter roasts, soups or warm spring salads by planting some or all of these great root vegetables. Potatoes (technically a tuber) Baked, steamed, mashed, fried - the humble spud does it all! If potatoes are a staple food in your household during winter for their warmth, energy and…
I’ve often considered carrots an uninspiring vegetable, always served with chops, beans and potatoes, often served in salads, sometimes added to hearty winter vegetable soups. Carrots are in season for the most part of the year in a Mediterranean climate and can easily be taken for granted or overlooked, considered boring, or not worth growing because they never seem to be very expensive. We always seem to have carrots in the fridge and when we don’t we automatically buy more. According to the World Carrot Museum (yes you read correctly, there is a group of people dedicated to preserving the history and…
If you are anything like me, you are already planning which fruit trees you will buy when the bare rooted trees are in stock at your local nursery, or you are scouring the catalogues or online stores to find just the right variety for your spot. Knowing how to calculate your chill hours will make selecting the right tree even easier. Chill Hours is a calculation of how much time your fruit trees spend below 7 deg C per year. Knowing how many chill hours you get in your location each year will help you to choose the right sorts…
Anybody who has ever cared for a garden knows about weeds. They’ve seen them, cursed them, pulled them out and squashed them. Some gardeners have even sprayed them. But weeds can be your friend in many ways. They are great indicators of what your soil is like. Bare soil left to its own devices will attract the pioneer weeds – the ones that establish first and can survive on whatever the soil provides and what ever rainfall you receive. Some weeds have strong tap roots to go down deep and plant themselves firmly in the terra rossa. Although these can…