..and everything else!

So, what else has been happening around the Old Miners Cottage?



As you can see, everything is flowering and looking lovely. We've got some corn growing, and beans to grow up the corn. I had planted squash seeds, but they didn't germinate. (I'm attempting to grow some more and I'll transplant them in between the corn if they germinate.)
Spartagus the Asparagus is very tall this year and seems happy!
We grew some purple broccoli next to Spartagus, and it was just lovely. I'm letting it go to seed and we'll be growing more of that again next season, for sure!

We were shocked to see the comfrey come alive again and now it's even flowering. Lovely little purple flowers.



Also out the front is this little fig tree. We planted it bare-root this last Winter, and it's showing off some lovely leaves now. A rogue potato is growing next to it. :)



Out the back I've gone crazy with the seed planting (trying to catch up before the summer really hits - I've been a little late this year). They're right next to the water tanks, and I'm determined not to let them dry out this time. :)



Over on the chook yard fence, we've planted a choko vine in a pot with the bottom removed. Hopefully this little thing goes crazy and provides lots of shade and chokos!



Speaking of shade.. We made some adjustments to the lid of the worm farm, giving them a little more air flow. Crossing fingers they survive this summer's heat.



I've left one variety of carrots to flower and go to seed. They're such a lovely carrot, I really want to plant some more! It's a rare yellow rooted carrot, and very tasty.



The fruit trees in the back yard have flowered already, have lovely leaves, and even some maybe-apples:



And this maybe-pear:



Even the lemon tree has quite a few little lemons and a few flowers. The nasturtiums are the real show though! They're doing a great job of covering the ground and keeping the grass away from the lemon tree. Funny though, these nasturtiums were suppose to be non-trailing, bushy types! I was disappointed when I found out, but they're trailing all over the place in their second season. Yay!



As for the chooks, we had no luck last weekend (our contact got cold feet I think!), but this weekend we're attending a poultry auction that has many interesting breeds available. There should be Dorking chooks and fertile eggs available as well, and all kinds of other poultry equipment. It should be a good experience! We're really looking forward to it.

Until next time!

Worms and such

I was almost right, the worm farm did take a little longer than we expected, but we did finish it before the week was out! 2 days ago, to be exact. :)



What do you think? We've fed them and they seem happy. It's amazing how much bath there is for them to fill up. The full "Worm Factory" didn't even quarter fill the bath.

Of the 3 raised garden beds we have in the backyard, the freezer (wicking bed) is the most productive at the moment. We've been picking bok choy from it almost daily, and now the bok choy is starting to flower.



Under the bok choy is spinach and celery. The spinach is only now starting to get large enough to eat as baby spinach (very tasty!), and I imagine the celery will take a little longer still.

Just to prove that we do eat from the garden, today's lunch (well, part of it, anyway!)



The purple leaves are from the beetroot (it was steaming at the time), and I only picked a few peas today. I frightened a Blackbird in the process of foraging today - it frightened me too! The broccoli are side-shoots from the remainder of the plant we'd harvested earlier. This was the first time we've eaten any of Spartagus the Asparagus though, and boy was he sweet and yummy!

So, now the worm farm is up and running (with worm juice aplenty), the next big task is getting the chook pen ready. We would like to do our part for the rare chook breeds, so we're thinking of getting Dorkings. Nothing is final yet, and finding them could be another matter entirely.. but we'll see! We still have a chook house to finish, and a very secure yard to build them.

Until next time!

Our old miners cottage, 1 year on

It's now been a full year since we moved in to the Old Miners Cottage. The garden looks a million times better than it did, and the house? Not quite so much, but we're definitely going to work on that soon.

We've planted another 11 trees out the back just recently. They were donated by the council to try and stop some of the spray drift from herbicides coming onto our property. They're planted about 2 metres apart and a metre away from the back fence on the council's side. We've supplemented this by planting 6 native climbers on the fence.



Our tallest tree is one of the she-oaks we planted about 6 months ago. The soil down the back is quite a heavy clay with plenty of rocks, so we're happy with their progress!



We've been collecting the rocks from around the garden, and the rocks from the council land that were being bulldozed. They've always got plenty of bugs under them, and hopefully will provide some habitat for the local lizards and skinks.

The last couple of days we've been working on the new worm farm. Last summer we nearly lost all our worms in the heatwave, so this is a must before next summer! We got the bath for $20, and the rest is recycled from around here. The corners are being held up by star-pickets, the bricks under the bath are a little extra support, and it won't be visible once we're done with it. :)

The lid is made up of the boards that were on the wall in the loungeroom! I knew they'd come in handy one day. We expect to be finished by tomorrow, but of course, if I tell you that, we'll have something come up and it'll be a week! :p



This is Marty working on the second half of the lid!



Being cast iron, the bath should be a nice cool home for the worms all year round. We've got it located under the big deciduous tree, too, which was the coolest place to be in last summers 40°C weather.

So, at last count, we have 39 young plants in the backyard along the fence, and we're gearing up for spring planting of potatoes and pumpkin (and marrow!). The solar hot water system may be a couple of weeks off, depending on the plumber's availability.. and we've checked our electricity usage. If what I read was correct, in roughly 26 hours, the hot water system used around 12.4kWh and everything else used 1.7kWh (the bill says our average use is 11.4kWh per day). I'll keep checking, though, because it seems like an awful lot of electricity for hot water! Either way, it'll be great to finally ditch it! :)

Until next time!

Rain and computer issues...

After a few computer problems and a major upgrade of my software, I'm back with more pictures and updates on the Old Miners Cottage! (It really shouldn't have taken this long.. *grumbles*)

Taking an idea off Aussies Living Simply, we used old roof tiles as a border for the extension to the garden bed out front. It will create a lot more garden bed, and it will look a lot nicer than the old, rotting away railway sleepers.



Not bad for only 20c a piece, saved from landfill by the local tip-shop.



At last, we have a flower blooming that isn't pink. :)



Not forgetting the sunflowers, of course. One is just starting to open up. It's just lovely! The other shouldn't be too far off. You may be able to see from that photo that we have, indeed, had rain. Everything in the garden is looking a little better for it.



The mini-corn has corn cobs starting. This will be interesting. We've had plenty of wind to pollinate them during the last few days, and the bees are enjoying the flowers too.



The water tanks are still not operational as yet - just 3 more leaks to go! One popped-up underground where we weren't expecting it, and the others are fairly small - Marty and I will fix them tomorrow with luck. :)

The worms have had a boost as of yesterday. We purchased 1,000 more worms. There are Reds, Tigers and Blues now making their home in among our existing worms. We're planning on ditching the "Can 'o' Worms" as soon as we get the worm-bath set-up. They should be able to maintain a more stable temperature in a cast iron tub.

Until next time!

More losses

Yesterday proved too much heat for the worms - even sitting under the big cool tree in the backyard. Sadly, most of the worms have perished in the heat. :(

The remaining ones (they must be super worms!) we brought inside! Hey, there is a use for a room with no floor. ;)

The weather outside is over 44°C (111°F), so hopefully they're a bit safer inside even though it's 34°C in here. Crossing fingers!

PS: Corn seems indestructible. :)

PPS: The potato partially came back last night - cross fingers for them today.

General garden update

Glenda - Hi Mom! - wanted to know how the worms are going!



They're doing OK, but I think their activity level is slowing down due to the hot weather we've been experiencing. I managed to find some:



I'm a little worried - we'll find somewhere cooler for them, I think.

Elsewhere in the garden, the beans are doing great!!





The beetroot is having limited success - most have died off - but I'm not giving up just yet. The one or two that did survive are doing great, which is encouraging.. I intend to plant some more seedlings, but directly into that area rather than into a paper-pot this time.



(It's all a learning experience!)

And I'm crossing fingers and toes that this (and some others like it) is a carrot this time, and not a weed. :)



Here's something we had no part in - they could be apricots, but we're not entirely sure. They don't taste wonderful, but they've weighed down the tree!



We've taken out the no-dig garden bed's contents - it was a little sad to pull out perfectly good corn, but we'll start again.



Oh, and good news, we discovered the missing ingredient in good compost - water! It was dry and cold and wasn't working at all.. with the addition of some water, we now have heat! Finally!



Until next time!

Pea-straw galore!

We took a little trip today to a farm about 10 minutes from Rupanyup to pick up some pea-straw bales. It was a huge farm, with a friendly dog and chickens. We got 13 bales of straw to take home with us all for only $45! What a bargain! We'll be right for pea-straw for quite some time now! See, there are benefits to living out country. ;)



Thanks much to Michael and Mum for the loan of the truck. There are a few times when the little Daihatsu won't quite do the job.



Ignore the mess in that shed - the green bath is not yet being used by worms, and everything else is just waiting for a purpose.

I've planted a couple more potatoes in cages by the corn, and hopefully they'll survive. We've ran out of chip-oil for trapping the earwigs - looks as though we're going to have to make a lot more chips - and soon. :)

I'll be sure to take a pic of the worms tomorrow - they're doing really well. We've changed the way we feed them - we now use a food processor to chop the food scraps nice and small, and it works quite well. They can eat a lot more, and much quicker. We're now using all the parts of the worm farm, and they produce quite a bit of worm juice for the garden.

Friday already

We have a worm farm! Although, it's something I regret now. Originally we were going to use an old bath to keep the worms in, but I was unable to find one. Worrying about the worms being in their "packaging" for the last week, I decided to go out and get a commercial "can of worms" style worm farm instead.





Today I found at least 2 baths available for sale at the local "tip" (technically known as the waste transfer station). Argh! How frustrating!! I guess we needed at least 2 worm farms anyway.

At least the worms looked happy in their new home. :)




See that grin? :D

For some better news, we got our first seed germination yesterday! The chives have popped! I can almost taste them already. ;)

One of the chives yesterday:


Today:


Spring is almost here, and the trees around the garden are bursting into life already. I'm not sure exactly what most of the trees are, so it'll be a surprise summer.



Since we moved in, the keys have confused us. We could use the front door to get out, but not to get back in - none of the keys appeared to turn the lock. Strange.. So, the "solution" has been to use the back door to enter the house. That was fine, until I realised that I didn't need a key to get in the back door. A simple shove would open it. Argh! So I played with it yesterday and managed to get the latch to click into place and close properly. Of course, I forgot all about that this morning when I left the house out the front door..

When I came home, the back door wouldn't budge. Yep, I managed to close it properly, but it wouldn't open back up again. I guess on a good note, I now know that all the windows and doors are quite secure. With the motivation of not wanting to pay $140 for a locksmith to come from the next town to open the door for me, I finally jiggled, kicked and pried the back door open again.

I've since dismantled the back door lock, and "fixed" it - which of course means that I can't put it back together again! I can open it from the outside to get in, but not the inside to get out. Haha! So, frustration got the better of me and I tried to find a key for the front door again.. and.. I found it!! It took some WD40 and a lot of jiggling, but I finally have a key to get in from the front door! Hooray!!

So, now that everything smells like WD40, and the doors no longer squeek, it's time to say goodnight for another day. You can bet I'll enjoy my bath tonight. :)