Scare Cat: The Most Thoughtful Ever KK Present

Given that I spent six hours on Christmas eve putting the nets on and there's another four to go, this secret Santa present was very thoughtful.


Keeping the birds off the nashis, plums and figs needs to be a multipronged attack.

Many thanks to Chris Graves.

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A Case of Mexican Beer and Emergency Chill Down

The power of suggestion. The car that passed me as I walked out of Bunnings had a case of Mexcan beer in the boot. What a great idea. Hot home and it was a little warm, no ice in the freezer.

So I'll use a convenient method involving some frozen stock and a deep saucepan. Emergency chill down.

And apparently this new Blogger+ app works ok too.

Milk appears to kill downy dead

I put a post in the other day where I sprayed with milk. I've done it a few times recently because the weather is shocking for downy mildew.

I think Juliet Henderson was right. Milk 10-20% kills downy mildew dead. When it's growing it looks fluffy and a little white on the back of the leaf. And a berry hit with downy looks like a furrball.

But with this milk spraying the grapes have got some grey on them, but not that rampant mildew growth. That grey I only ever saw at the end of the season, thick and ugly and the grapes were beyond redemption.

So perhaps milk works. It's gentle and organic I suppose (whatever that means). And the best thing for me, when I spray they smell reminds me of the days I'd work in a National Foods cheese plant.

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Carrots: Apparently I can grow something else

It needs a sandy loam soil and not too much fertiliser as well as a long time unharried to mature. Amazing it got all that with the chooks scratching around them.



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Artichoke a pretty flower

I got a little unexpected luck here. Somebody gave me a tiny artichoke plant a year and a half ago, got three flowers in the first year then took some bad advice.


At the end of last spring after their flowering, I was told to cut the plants down to the ground. It went against everything I know about gardening but the person advising was very sure of themselves. It was bad advice. The whole plant languished through summer, then winter and was slow to move in spring. I got a flower a month ago and thought that was it.

But then we got a flower just then. Nice. So my plan is to let the artichoke run through summer, build strength up and then cut it down to the ground in early autumn.

That's how I hear to do it with asparagus, too.

Live and learn. The person who told me to cut early had a bad season too. I'm sure my way will work better.

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Milk: Last line of defence against downy mildew

As the forecast is for some serious rain and warm temperatures I want to put up some defence against downy mildew on the grapes.

But the poor vines have had a lot of spray already this spring. Cupric hydroxide, copper oxychloride, sulphur, lime sulphur. "three sprays before Christmas" is the wine industry standard. I am seeing some funcicids damage


More about my dosing than number of sprays. But for a gentle option this timeI've gone for milk (10-20% in water). John Lamb has been talking about it for years but I was convinced when Juliet Henderson, winemaker and Uni of Adelaide MBA graduate suggested milk - unprompted when I was talking about it last year.

I'm at Edan's tennis now


And the rain has started. The kids'll have to stop soon I think. And I hope the milk is doing its job.

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Vichyssoise: yes leeks, deliberately

I put leeks in about four months ago. Playing golf on Wed with an Englishman I told him I was growing leeks and his answer was "what, deliberately?". I've only come to notice the Wales / England antipathy.

But they're ready:


And perfect timing for our three good family friends - Hillier/Harris/Habel to come together tonight and start with Vichyssoise. So I toook all those leeks and two onions, gently sweated them off with a lot of butter for about 20mins, without browning. Added a lot of pepper and will test for salt sometime.


Finely sliced some potatoes, sweated them down a little and then added two cups of stock. Hilariously ham stock mad from last Christmas's ham bone and frozen.


It's just bubbling now and will be ready to hit with the stick mixer soon. Then I'll chill it and tonight stir in some cream. But of course there'll need to be a non-dairy version.

Now, my freezer has no more stock in it and my garden is free of leeks. You shall be spared leek stories for at least nine months.

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