Our online garden diary.. garden4you offers professional and affordable gardening services in Ellenbrook and surrounds such as lawn mowing, border care, weed control, pruning and hedge cutting.
Friday, December 7, 2012
Saturday, November 10, 2012
Moss Terrarium
I've seen a few photos of these terrariums around for a while now and thought since I have some time, and I've had the required materials lying around for a while.. that I would give one a go.
Supplies:
Supplies:
- Glass jar or bowl - lid or no lid is fine
- Soil - We used a mixture of regular potting mix and vermiculite
- Moss - Im sure you can find yourself some moss.. we gathered ours from the local pine forrest
- Decorations
Step 1:
Clean out the jar/bowl and put at least an inch layer of soil in the bottom. The moss doesn't need much soil but you can use more to make it more visually appealing, try making your hills or mounds now.
Step 2:
Add moss and push down firmly, we used a spoon to 'tuck' the moss in around the edges. Lightly water until the soil is moist.
Step 3:
Add decorations.
Step 4:
Wednesday, October 24, 2012
selling some:
dill, thyme, oregano, coriander, joy tomato, eggplant, capsicum mix |
hot and mild chili, italian and moss parsley, sage (lookin pretty rough), mint cuttings and rosemary |
Labels:
business,
garden4you
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia
Aquaponics..
sump tank on the left and our soon to be fish tank on the right |
Hurry up and grow!
the greenhouse is filling up.. |
still not finished the shelving but enough space for now |
ranbo has a mate finally =] |
Preserving herbs..
The bottles were put through the dishwasher on the sterilise setting, then I rinsed them with a bit of vinegar to make sure they were clean.
For our oils we used a mixture of dill, thyme, bay, basil, garlic, ginger, green peppercorn, chilli, parsley, mint, coriander, sage and a good quality olive oil. You can decide which flavours you want.. mix and match, its your oil. Bruise the herbs and push into the bottle, slightly warm the oil on the stove (verrry slightly, i could still stick my finger in it) and pour into your bottles over the herbs. Store in a dark cool place or in the fridge if it contains garlic.
We will never use all this.. they make good gifts, and the parents put up with us making a mess of their backyard, so its only fair to give them some of the produce.
Aquatic Plants.. update
The lid of the CO2 reactor bottle, cut the tube on an angle to get it through the hole |
The CO2 tube needs to be deep enough in the bubble counter to be under water |
CO2 reactor with the yellow lid, bubble counter is orange |
the bubble counter produces about 3 bubbles per second and is diffused into the aquatic tank via airstone |
Labels:
aquaponics,
aquatic plants,
CO2
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia
Sunday, October 14, 2012
Pallet Box Recycling
standing upright |
Step 1: I cut two sheets of chicken wire to fit on the inside of the bottom of the pallet and affixed them using cable-ties either side of the pallets center beam. Pallet designs vary but it is important to affix the chicken wire tightly. from both the top and bottom and the sides. If you are using the pallet horizontally then if the chicken wire is not attached tightly the weight from the 6-8 bags of potting mix will cause it to droop.
use zipties to hold the wire in place |
Step 4: Plant your seedlings. N.B. I drenched the soil before I planted to help the soil retain shape.
Labels:
garden bed,
herbs,
pallet,
recycling,
seedlings
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia
Tuesday, October 9, 2012
Busy Busy Busy..
tomatoes - remove the first cotyledon leaves (the two leaves under the first true leaves |
plant deeply, to the first true leaves. The white hairs on the stem will all turn into roots when under soil. |
seedlings for sale! |
We have plenty of leftover seedlings again this year and trying for the first time to sell some. Having some luck selling herbs but not alot of people seem to want the veges.
the aquatic plant tank |
Our aquatic plants are doing well with the addition of the CO2 reactor. I will post some pictures with a how-to when I collect some good plastic bottles ><
Spring Onion Seed Saving
spring onion flowering, some have gone to seed |
The second season for our spring onion and they have begun to flower. To save the seed wait for the flower heads to almost completely dry (you may lose some seeds but there will still be plenty), we cut the heads off and leave them in a paper envelope for a week or so to dry completely. Shake out the seeds into the envelope.
If any chaff or foreign material gets left with the seed, using two bowls pour the seed from one into the other using a light breeze to separate the chaff from the seeds (this is called winnowing). I store my seeds in an airtight container in the fridge.
Monday, October 8, 2012
Gnomes should be Illigal
Like gardening, I thought collecting garden gnomes would be addictive so have held back buying one every time I see them.. We got given our first gnome as a gift and I think he looks a little lonely...
Sunday, October 7, 2012
The Greenhouse
The greenhouse is almost complete! Lights and electrics all in place, just waiting on some shelves.. We will be mostly focusing on having an aquaponic setup in there but there is plenty of space to start our seedlings for planting in the patch.
Labels:
aquaponics,
greenhouse,
seedlings
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia
Saturday, October 6, 2012
Making Money?
We grow a lot of marigold as its pretty rotten smell keeps away plenty of pests and attracts predatory insects |
More dill and coriander |
Labels:
business,
garden4you
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia
Aquatic Plants
The Aquarium |
For the growing medium in the tank we have decided to use an equal part mixture of aquarium gravel, vermiculite (which we have soaked and squeezed the air from) and aquarium sand. We wanted something nice and loose to allow us to easily push the roots into place.. if that fails we will change change over to expanded clay and root the cuttings in rockwool.
With the exception of some parasite plants (that feed on others sugars/starches) all plants need CO2 to survive. Besides water, plants are mostly made up of carbon compounds. They feed on the CO2 in the air in a process called photosynthesis to produce energy for themselves and oxygen as a waste product. The amount of CO2 found naturally in our water is very low, and to speed up the growing process we made a cheap homemade CO2 injector.
Using a 2L airtight container (it really does need to be airtight) as our CO2 reactor we drilled a hole through the lid and inserted some air-tube. Use silicone to reseal around the tubing. The tube then goes into our 'bubble counter' submerged in water... This helps us keep track of how much CO2 is being produced and helps remove any yeast that might get out of the reactor. The next tube stays above the water level in the bubble counter and heads into our tank to be dispersed by an airstone.
To create the CO2 put 2 cups of sugar and about 1/2 tsp of yeast in the reactor then fill to about 3" from the top with luke warm water (too hot and you will kill the yeast).. put your hand over the top and give it a good shake then put on your lid with the air-tube (remember this is producing CO2 and with nowhere to go you will have yourself a pretty big mess, let alone its probably pretty dangerous). The CO2 is created as a byproduct when the yeast eats the sugar and will take a few hours to start producing some decent bubbles!!
If you are going to try this please research a little more.. plants do not photosynthesize without the sun, therefor will not be removing the CO2 from the water during the night, if you are keeping fish in your tank you will need to swap the reactor for an air pump at night.
Labels:
aquatic plants,
CO2,
photosynthesis
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia
October Plans
almost ready to start harvesting! |
We had some sun this morning so decided to get into the garden and remove all of last seasons crops and make some room for our next batch of seedlings. Whilst the greenhouse is nearing completion we have been using a few cheepo mini-greenhouses to get an early start on some of our families most eaten veges though since its been pretty warm lately we have been hardening them off and they are surviving the weather well.
this side is a bit bare.. on the other hand at least the compost bin is full |
Over the next few days we will be transplanting our broccoli, chilli (a few different heirloom varieties we have been collecting seed from for years), eggplant, leeks, tomatoes (another one we like to grow heaps of heirloom varieties) and we tried our luck with a few turnip... though I doubt anyone will convince me to eat it.
Planting Guide for October
Plant straight into garden; asparagus, beetroot, borage, broccoli, gooseberry, carrot, beans, cucumber, daikon (japanese radish), artichokes, lettuce, kohlrabi, yacon (sunroot), oca, corn, sunflower, spring onion, silverbeet, salsify (swiss chard), rocket, rhubarb, radish, pumpkin, potato and parsnips.
Start in greenhouse; sweet majoram, rock melon, ladyfinger (okra), NZ spinach, marrow, celery and celeriac.
Underlined is what we are planning to plant, italics is what we have in the patch ready to harvest.
Labels:
lettuce,
planting guide,
spring
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia 6069
Friday, October 5, 2012
Yay.. Some Sun!
Spring is finally here and we cant wait to get planting! We still have some of last seasons crops in the beds but have decided to get the soil prepared for the weeks to come. First things first though, we wanted to save some seed from our lettuce that has begun to flower.
After years of wasting money on overpriced seedlings and seeds (and wracking up a pretty hefty collection of empty pots) we decided to start collecting our own seed. The idea for our garden in the beginning was to become a little bit more self sustainable but now its more of an addiction we need to save all the money we can! Collecting seed can sometimes be a bit of a hassle and most people will probably not bother, but for us it feels pretty rewarding.
Our process for collecting lettuce seeds:
- wait until at least half of the flowers have gone to seed
- cut the entire top of plant off and place upside down in a paper envelope to dry
- when dry we will shake the seeds from the plant into the envelope and hopefully save ourself a few extra bucks on seeds!
Labels:
lettuce,
seed saving,
spring
Location:
Ellenbrook WA, Australia 6069
It Starts...
We have halfheartedly kept a garden diary now for several years, mostly scribbles and plant notes. Now with all that is going on and all our plans for the vege patch we have decided to keep a proper garden diary, and we thought at least as a blog anyone interested will be able to help us or maybe hopefully learn a little something through our agricultural success or failures (We really are not enjoying the white cabbage butterfly this year!).
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