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i have started a vegie patch. well we have dug up a massive area and composted it.

i have tried to plant some seedlings but nothing has popped up yet (i only did this last week so may be a little impatient)

our only issue in the possums so we are gonna have to build some sort of fence. and maybe the birds.

any tips or ideas for what to grow from old hands? i have joined the diggers club and have the usual toms, herbs, pumpkin, eggplant, aragula etc etc.

i dont think it gets more SOLE than ur backyard!

I think grow what you eat all the time and love fresh. My favs are lettuce, cucumbers and beans. Can't get enough of fresh beans from the garden! And yes, definitely herbs. Other easy ones are snowpeas, broadbeans, shallots, pumpkins, baby spinich, normal spinich. Tomatoes are fun, but we really haven't had a successful organic crop yet. A few rouges have popped up, so will see how this lot go now I have some eco oil for the pests. Zucchini and squash are prone to powdered mildew, but you can get around it with a little time and care.

We have broadbeans in, I planted them for the nitrogen value because I don't really like them (will try fresh ones tho), but they have brought so many bees into the garden so I'm hoping that will increase pollination rate in general. I also plant bee attracting flowers in amoungst everything for the same reason. Bees are super important, you need the little guys to get the best crop.

I'd love some recommendations on how to deal with apartment balcony (thus limited "windows of sunlight) facing (a) east and another facing (b) west (in Sydney).

Last year we managed to get a few tomatoes. I haven't killed my morroccan mint. Garlic started strong before winter but the shoots died off in cooler months and not sure if it's still alive. Sugar snap peas started great guns and again died.
We have killed the hanging strawberries without too much effort. I've noticed my mixed lettuce (whose growth over winter was nil) appears to be making a comeback.

Any thoughts?
Signed,
brown thumbs.

Grocer,

Maybe you can plant some herbs and veggies in a wheel barrow, and that way you can move it around to make the most of your limited light.

Or campaign in your area for a community garden?

purple goddess wrote:Grocer,

Maybe you can plant some herbs and veggies in a wheel barrow, and that way you can move it around to make the most of your limited light.

Or campaign in your area for a community garden?

our plant are on castor wheels now.

our kitchen table is currently a green house as we have seedlings and cuttings all over the place. i want to grow from seed but if this fails i might just buy some seedlings ;P

am kinda making it up as we go. our biggest problem is eally going to be the pests (possums, birds etc) as i think we have pretty fertile soil and reasonable water

Is dill meant to be good for insects?

Ran, we have problems with possums, too. I've tried every bloody product on the planet to stop them smorgasbording on my veggies and roses. The only thing that seems to work it Tabasco and water in a spray bottle, applied liberally every week.

But it you miss a dose, they're back and it's possum buffet time.

**sigh**

I plant pyrethrum daisies in with my herbs and veggies to keep the flying/crawling insects away. Seems to work. And crushed egg shells or talc will keep the snails away, too

my husband has promised to build a fence around the vegie patch. a bit extreme i know but i really want to get the food before the possums do. I have read some studies re: the spray stuff and most of them concluded that if the possum was hungry, it wouldnt stop them!

we are actually going to electrify the fence ;P or so hubbie says. ill believe it when i see it

i guess we'll have to net the fruit trees (but in a few years time as we just planted them)

i guess the other option is to get a dog to stop the possums. then the dog might eat the food though! argghhh

Possumchops, I get broad beans from an Italian man who lives near me and grows a lot of veges and then sells the extra from his front verandah. He told me a delicious way to cook them. Shell the beans and then gently steam them for a few minutes, not too long about 3 or 4 minutes, you don't want to have the skins all crinkly, then toss them in some olive oil with a lot of fresh crushed garlic and some salt and black pepper and finish cooking over a gentle to moderate heat for a couple of minutes. YUM!

The other trick with broad beans is to pick them when they are young. With "older" beans, you can peel the grey skin from the inner green part and just cook them. Very sweet and delicious, but a lot of work! Mind you, I like them anyway, but then I'm strange...

Ran, We grew some garlic in our herb bed a couple of years ago and they did the same thing. They grew back tthe next year and we got a lovely crop of small but very flavoursome garlic, much stronger and more delicious than the shop bought kind. I imagine they might have grown larger if not for the drought, but we did not give them much water because we thought they were dead.