What's coming to a table near me

Whilst most of my attention has been gonig to clearing new areas of the food forest, other plants have still been busy doing what they do.  So here's a glimpse of what's on the way. We've got five banana circles now with four hands of bananas busy ripening and getting fat.  Three are in the first circle I put in - can you spot them in the first photo below?

A la carte dining

The more we put food plants onto our property, the more visitors we have that come and enjoy what's on offer.  But this one is just for the birds

Little by Little

As I go back to work next week, its been full steam ahead in the garden. Thankfully we've had rain and cooler temperatures, but still, its dirty,sweaty work.  And the other gift is the help I've had from Beau and Greg, who are taking it in turns (wise men). So the top swale where the apple and macadamia trees are was next on the list.  The grass was as high as your shoulders and needed the same treatment as the lower swale had just had.  So we stockpiled manure and mulch and got to it.  Here's what it looked like when we started.

What's potting

I was out removing more grass today (surprise, surprise but more on that in the next post) and low and behold - apples

My new forest sprung a leak

I'm so pleased with the expansion of the food forest, but with the first rain came the first problem.  We'd taken so much grass away, which was great, but it left loose soil along the swale and especially where one swale drops into the one below, not so great.  So there was only one thing to do - slow the water down through the little gully so I didn't lose all the soil and mulch with the next rain.

I had read a post on Milkwood's blog about Yuni Bowls (http://milkwood.net/2011/11/04/making-a-zuni-bowl-let-the-water-do-the-work/) and whilst it wasn't quite the solution I needed, it gave me the blueprint of what I had to do.

The problem was a steep gully where the one swale tapered off and turned downhill to allow the rain to be captured in the lower swale )you can see the swale curving to the right in this photo).  A large tree stump stopped us continuing the swale straight along contour and so this seemed to be the best solution.  But with the removal of all the grass and the first dumping of rain, the problem became clear.  So I went to the local landscaping store and hand picked some cast off standstone and voila

 Well perhaps not quite 'voila'.  Those rocks were heavy! And rather than just laying the rocks down the slope, I dug three small pools to slow and capture the water as it moves down the gully.  The idea is not to create ponds per se, but just to slow things down and avoid erosion.

Creating more forest

Mad I know, but as I was taking some time off, the thing to do was obviously to work on my food forest in the height of summer.  Thankfully, I had help from my friend Beau and together over a few days, we cleared the next area of the food forest and since then, I've been busy planting and weeding as the area starts to establish itself.  The first thing we had to do was to remove all of this.

updates

When you're on five acres and fairly ambitious, you keep starting new areas of productivity and then realise you have to maintain them to keep them working for you.  So when I'm not watering (which is a lot as its still very dry here), I'm walking around all the newer areas I've given a make-over to and doing a it of maintenance on the weeds etc.  Eventually I hope the weeds will be overtaken by the ground covers I've planted.  Now I know some weeds are edible, but I'd still rather feast on sweet potato or pumpkin - call me crazy.  So of my projects in the six months, lets look at some before and afters

New entrants

A few things have aligned in recent weeks to allow some new entrants into our food chain here at Barefoot Cottage.  We've been working hard to clear and new areas of the food forest and we've been to two markets, one being the local market where they are a few store holders who breed local natives and the other being the Brisbane Organic Growers Inc (or BOGI) fair.  So we've been able to pick up a few additions and plant them out in our new areas of the food forest.
The first new face is a wonderful native elderberry or a honey bush.  After having seen many episodes of River Cottage, we are wondering if we'll be able to make elderberry wine or something similarly alcoholic from the flowers.

View from the verandah

For something a little different, I've taken some shots from the verandah.  As we live in a valley, the verandah gives us a wonderful aspect through the trees and out onto the property.  As I'm mostly in the garden, I don't spend as much time enjoying those views as I'd like, but I live under the fantasy that once the food forest is more established, I'll have more time to park off.  We'll see.

This is the size of the verandah and one of the things that attracted me to the house.  Some of the trees beyond are ours and others belong to the neighbour, whose boundary fence (but not his house) is quite close, and he took a barren piece of hill and turned it into a forest of his own.

Looking out in the other direction, you can see some of the trees that the birds love to pop into for a snack. You can also catch a glimpse of the pool in the bottom right hand corner, which is quite filthy right now as we let it go over winter.

Planting out

A few weeks ago I took some pics of the nursery.  Everything was thriving and so I've done a bit of planting out.  I also wanted more space to plant other seeds, so it was time, ready or not.  Firstly, the tomatoes went in.  They are a heritage breed called money maker.