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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Garlic Harvest Time

Now I can just let it dry gently


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December rain: the pluses and minuses

Urge, the downside will be the way that all my vines will be covered in downy mildew by Tuesday. I have sprayed three times already and will spray again this weekend, but the Red Globes and Sauvignon Blanc will be little clusters of grey mould.



But I have three garden tanks each about 1000l. The 3kl drinking tank is filled with clean winter water and closed off.

But the three were down to 60% and by end of today will be full and flowing out to the lawn. The lawn is already a little fresher. I'll get some fertiliser onto it before tomorrow's showers and that'll green it up for summer.

Generally this bit of rain is a good thing.

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Serendipities: Self seeded snapdragons

In a bed of Dutch iris bulbs I'm due to pull up this Sunday:


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Wire over the butternuts

This will be interesting. I planted butternut pumpkin into freshly tilled soil. The problem with freshly tilled soil is the way the chooks love to make dust baths in it. So the wire over the top has solved that, and it will be an interesting little experiment.


I expect the vines will grow up through the wire and the pumpkins will sit on the top. And the eggplants will probably grow up through it too, as long as the mites don't get them.

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Clean, fresh and from the garden

We managed to get an artichoke this year


Which I boiled with my garlic and a bay leaf


And the same garlic was use with fresh cut parsley and oregano


And mixed in with some oil and pasta for a great, quick dinner. It was even vegetarian.


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