Harvesting flax seeds (linseed)

With the very hot weather, we've only been able to work in short bursts, but we're getting through the harvesting of the flax / linseed.



Initially, I was cutting the tops off the plant, but found the extra work involved with taking the bolls off the stems afterwards was not worth it. So, we're stripping the bolls directly from the plant into a bin.



From there, the bolls are put into a food processor, which breaks them up into a powder - but doesn't seem to harm the seeds. Then we can either sift or blow off the light stuff and leave the heavier seeds behind.

Any suggestions that might improve the process are gratefully received, though! :)

Until next time.

Wild and wooly

The weather has taken a turn for the worst. Strong winds, rain.. the linseed / flax don't look altogether happy.



We really don't know when it's time to harvest it! The flowers have just about all finished, and it was looking really good only yesterday!

It's not all bad, though! There is always someone who'll enjoy the extra water. :)



I couldn't count them all! So cute! I imagine they're eating the wrigglers (mosquito larvae) that have overpopulated the pond. Lets hope so, anyway!

Until next time!

A wet spring

It's been a little while since I showed off the garden, and I have to show off these little linseeds / flax plants. Their little white flowers are so sweet.



There's always one in every crowd, though. ;)



Yep, one single blue flowering flax. We've tied a little string around the base and will be sure to grow more of this one next season!

Our little pond has got even bigger! No wonder we never saw water like this last year.. the plumbing from the stormwater was leaking all under the shed floor! This year it's all going into the water tanks and out the overflow into the backyard..



.. which is a good thing for the poor shed, and an interesting situation for the backyard. I think we need some water-loving plants back here! :)

This wattle doesn't seem to mind, but we're thinking rushes and poa grasses. :)



This is the dry side of the yard, but the picture demonstrates the dead grasses on the council owned property. The neighbour's property looks similarly dead, too.. The area directly behind our property is council owned, too, but they have not sprayed there (yet?). We've been keeping the grass down with a push mower! It's not even that hard..



I take it that this little bird is eating the aphids on the roses. The yellow roses fend for themselves in that regard, but I sprayed the aphids off the roses over the cottage and Spartagus the Asparagus had a few on him, too. (Sprayed with a stream of water, that is! It works a treat.)



I've been planting so many seeds lately, I've ran out of room in my mini greenhouse. Marty was kind enough to make me a cold-frame to house some of them.





I'm so excited! I just want to sit out there and watch them germinate! The seeds in the mini greenhouse were planted in a home-made seed raising mix, and the compost I used was far too alkaline. I'm sure they won't do anything, but I'm keeping them in there just in case. After all, some of the beetroot came up after I over watered them. :)

Until next time!

From around the garden..

The flax is flowering!



Lovely little white flowers, and more than one on each plant. They have not needed any additional water, either.

..and here's a Redback spider we encountered in the corrugated iron we have stored ready to make the chook pen!



Until next time!

False Spring Update

The linseeds are growing well! The rains have not been very frequent, but they seem to be thriving anyway. Keeping the weeds down has been a challenge, but not impossible. The red-legged earth mites have not bothered them again this season, so, I guess there's nothing left for them to do but flower and give us their seeds! Crossing fingers!



Spartagus the asparagus has been completely fooled by the warmer weather this winter. We're not going to hesitate to eat these lovely looking spears!



The peas and snowpeas.. what can I say? I planted them far too close together, and didn't give the snow peas enough of a structure to grow on. Combine that with some strong winds, and we have a pea jungle. We still get peas from the vines, but they're difficult to find and get to. When I'm out picking peas, Marty says I'm foraging. :)

In front of the peas there you can see the carrots. I let the weeds overtake the carrots earlier, but now it's mostly carrots and grass now. We're both looking forward to home-grown carrots again.



We improved on the structure for the second crop of snow peas, and they're reaching up to the first string line now. The peas (behind) are nearly to the top of the potato cages, and there are some cabbage dotted around the place, but they're only small still. Behind the garden bed there is the green oven and the pigface is filling it out nicely now.



And lastly, here's a shot of the space between the footpath and the front fence. We planted these about a month ago. They're suppose to be native to the area and very tough, with a little yellow "ball" flower in summer (but don't ask me their names, because I honestly forgot!). We've had a little trouble keeping the water up to them while they establish, but we're keeping a close eye on them. Marty makes a point of weeding them regularly, so they don't get overwhelmed.



Despite the warmer weather, we're still getting very cold nights, and this morning quite a heavy frost was covering most of the garden. Thankfully none of the plants suffered, except the lemon-scented gum out the back. Hopefully it'll cheer up once spring really arrives.

Winter colour

Marty features as the photographer in today's post.

I just had to show off his awesome photo of one of the 6 Rainbow Lorikeets in our tree this afternoon. Amazing pic Marty!



The tree is blossoming, although it's still winter. So are many of the other trees around! I hope they'll be ok.

Oh, and here's a quick update on the Flax in the front garden bed. I wasn't quite dense enough with the planting, so the weeds have been difficult to control. I don't know how big they're going to get, or when we'll see flowers.. but they've been interesting so far. Next year we'll have a better idea of what we're doing, I think!



Otherwise, we have yet more trees to plant out the back along the fence line. They are all native to this area and should really help feed the local birds (and provide a slightly nicer view as a bonus!).

Until next time!

It's greening up

It's been too long since I last showed what's been happening around the house and garden - so I thought I'd do a general update tonight. We've been pottering around doing odd jobs lately, so nothing too exciting!

We can only hope that these are flax / linseed plants! I can't find a good picture online of what they are suppose to look like at this stage, but we're weeding out as much of the other grasses and weeds as we can - and keeping ones that look like this.



By the looks of it, we'll soon find out what these little plants are.



Broccoli is coming along nicely. There are 2 out of the 3 plants that have grown large. I think I planted them too close together though. We've been overly generous with the well matured horse manure, and this morning I gave them a little sulphate of potash too.



The flower heads are just starting to appear. Hey, I didn't notice that big green caterpillar on there when I took the photo!! See how well they hide? Marty and I check them daily for bugs and aphids.



The peas and snow peas are going crazy and flowering. It feels like only yesterday I was covering the new seedlings with shade-cloth to protect them from the too hot weather.



We've left some of the purple king beans on the dying bushes to collect the seed for next year.



The newly planted peas on the ex-potato cages are just starting to poke-through the soil. You just can't have enough peas!



Here's a half-finished project - this is a water tank buried over an old (unused!) septic tank. We dug out the weeds and have thrown some of the Beneficial Bug Blend on it. Both flowers (I hope) and weeds have come up nicely - but I'm only half way through pulling out the weeds.



The big tree has lost many of its autumn leaves, but we're not going to rake them all up. The trees suffered during last summer, so the thinking here is that the leaves will help provide some much needed nourishment for them to recover over winter and next spring. This picture also shows the new water-tank garden bed. It's not yet filled, and we're still considering where to put it - but it's cut, painted and the sharp edge is covered by plastic pipe.



The lettuce bed is still going strong - we've put more Beneficial Bug Blend seeds into the garden bed around it. We're both looking forward to the winter flowering plants that will hopefully germinate.



We havn't had much rain lately (although, we're expecting some on Friday), but we've been using the water from the tanks since it did rain. We havn't used town water for the garden once since then! That'll save us a little money off the bill - and it means we can water whatever we want, whenever we want to. (Stawell is still on Stage 4 restrictions.)



We're looking forward to eating some parsley soon - and we've been lucky to have all the oregano we could ever want. :)



The chest-freezer garden bed is doing great! I finally got rid of the weeds (once I'd identified them, that is) and now the bok choy and other seedlings are going crazy.



Here's just a small selection of bricks found in the soil when we were planting trees. They're everywhere! Also, the local magpies are great. They're a bit like having wild chooks - but without the eggs. ;)



We're trying to get organised with the wood storage. Marty and I knocked-up this wood storage in an afternoon. Now we just need some proper wood!



Did anyone say bricks? :)
We've been collecting these whole bricks for a long while now - I think there's just about enough for a BBQ next summer. haha!



Here is the pile of broken bricks we have yet to deal with. We've got a few ideas on what to do with them.. you'll have to wait and see!



Until next time!

Hooray, it's Flower Day!

Today is "Flower Day" - a great day to plant flowers, peas, broccoli and linseed! How do I know this? Cosmic Garden told me so! ;)

I've been looking forward to today all month. We started by finishing the preparation for the linseed bed. Since we took out the rose-tree, we have been adding horse manure and turning the bed over regularly. What was lifeless sand has turned into lovely looking soil. Today we added compost and sprinkled over the linseed/flaxseed, followed by another light layer of compost.



Watering the linseed bed was all the proof we needed that the soil preparation went well, as the water soaked-in beautifully - rather than beading-off!



I planted out some broccoli which had been waiting for over a month. They're in the 3rd garden bed in the front, and should do well considering the amount of manure in there!



Oh, this "volunteer" plant came up the other week, and I have no idea what it is. I'm thinking a pumpkin vine? Any ideas? It must have come from the horse or pig manure..



We got some hose for the water tanks and hooked them up. There was not yet enough pressure to bring it out of the long hose, but the short hose worked well to fill up the watering cans.

Earlier in the week I placed rocks around the round garden bed in the back, and had been adding a little horse manure and compost. Today I added a little more compost to it, and planted the beneficial bug blend into it. I'm looking forward to seeing what pops up!



We did some preparation for some more peas to go into the 3rd garden bed in the front garden. We plan on getting them in the ground tomorrow - we're going to try something a little different - using the potato cages for them to grow up onto. It'll post a picture of what I mean tomorrow.

The compost heap is going along really well. We turned it yesterday and the heat can be felt on top of the carpet cover! Marty found this colourful bug on it.



We sift the larger bits out of the compost before using it in the garden.



Lastly, here's a little update on the broccoli - slightly eaten, we pick off bugs every day or two - but otherwise looking pretty healthy.



Until next time!