Vege bed ready

Each year I manage to reclaim a little more space for growing beds. This year with the use of a couple of sleepers I managed to reclaim a 750x2400 bed from what was a bigger compost heap.


It's got a 200mm layer of mushroom compost as the base and 200mm of organic loam as the topsoil. Fantastic.

I'll put two lemongrass plants at the back against the iron, and this year I'll plant some radishes and carrots then turn them over to late season tomatoes perhaps around January.

I'm off to work today, which I'll start before the sun comes up, but I should be home in time to get the radishes and the carrot seeds in, before dark.

A fresh garden bed is always so full of promise. When in gets a little established after a few years it's time to either fully replace the soil or plant it out to fruit trees.

And I keep hunting for new patches to claim.

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Footy today

A great parents match and then a trophy presentation:

What for the roses today? Confider or Triforine?

So a look at the roses tells me I need to do something. The black spot tells me Triforine, the aphids tell me Confidor. The "all in one" rose spray is a little too broad spectrum on the insecticide - the pyrethrum in it will kill all the good bugs as well. Confidor only kills the things that stick their suckers into the plant.

But I think the roses can cope with a few aphids for this week. It might be Triforine, knock that black spot back a bit.

UPDATE: I had some cupric hydroxide left over from spraying the fruit trees. That was perfect for the roses for black spot.

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Compost is hot!

Last week I got two tonne of mushroom compost delivered. It took me three days to shift it, but in that time it had become pretty active. The evidence is on my lawn.


You can see where the pile was delivered, but the heat within the pile was enough to kill the grass in the middle. The lawn will recover, but compost is hot.

My buddy tell a story where his compost heap caught fire in summer. Always a bit of a concern.


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Complete D on Spanish Garlic

Great time to load them up with complete D fertiliser.


A few more months, but they're looking good.

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The lawn will have to wait another year

Sometimes the garden won't wait, you either do the job when it needs to be done or you wait another year. My kikuyu lawn is ready to be scarified. I've cut it down to the lowest level and spring is on the way.

It's a job for this weekend to hire a scarified for a half a day and de-thatch the lawn. It rips out all the dead matter opens up the soil and rejuvenates the lawn. Perfect world every year, real world every three, I think it's been five for me.


The year you've done it, the lawn is as good as any designer lawn.

But it won't happen this weekend. I have a football morning for my boy, exams to mark, final assignments to mark, other assignments to mark, a course to write and a whole day in at work for the very important job of representing our programs to one of our key markets.

So perhaps the job will wait until next week, but more likely it will wait until next year.


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A footy game on the weekend!

Wow. I've never been happier to get a date wrong in my life. I had thought my work's "Open Day" was next Saturday. As open day is my greatest opportunity to contribute to our selling effort it's a personal mandatory attendance, a not negotiable.

And an open day sat would've meant I missed the game.


I had already broken my 7yo boy's heart by telling him I was out.

I was delighted to be able to unbreak it. So people can call me a "half back flanker" again, and for the right reasons this time.

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