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Home » Edible Gardening Blog for Melbourne Based Gardeners » 2015 » September » 24

Daily Archives: September 24, 2015

How to Grow Cucamelons in Melbourne, Mouse Melon, Mexican Sour Gherkin. — Cucamelons are becoming an increasingly popular edible plant in Melbourne. More and more people are asking me how to grow them, and from where to source the seed. Last summer, I grew cucamelons for the first time, they were amazing. Here’s our guide on how to grow them, it’s pretty […]

How to Grow Cucamelons in Melbourne

This entry was posted in How to Grow on September 24, 2015 by Leaf, Root & Fruit

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The Impact Of Compost On Garden Soil: A Case Study August 3, 2021
What is the best compost method? September 17, 2020
The Leaf, Root & Fruit guide to Covid-19 Panic Induced Edible Gardening March 17, 2020
Garden Ecosystems Part Three: How to Turn your Garden into a Resilient Ecosystem September 2, 2019
Garden Ecosystems Part Two: Attracting Beneficial Insects into the Garden August 26, 2019
Garden Ecosystems Part One: Pest Predator Dynamics and Balance August 20, 2019
Plant Soil Conditioner Trial March 6, 2019
Spring Planting Guide for Melbourne August 22, 2018
How to Grow Great Tomatoes in Melbourne August 16, 2018
Day Length and Plants (Photoperiodism) July 30, 2018

leafrootfruit

A few early morning moments from our garden. What'

A few early morning moments from our garden. What's happening in your patch?

#inmygarden #morninglight #carrotflower #nettedenclosure #solitude #reflection #grateful #kyneton #chickentractor #berrypatch #blueberries #justbecause #cropprotection #ecosystem

Today was an exciting day in our household. We wel

Today was an exciting day in our household. We welcomed a hive of bees into our garden. We're new to bee keeping, but Caryn has been doing plenty of research to ensure we are responsible apiarists. With her calm and methodical approach the bees will be in great hands.

We're looking forward to watching them buzz around the garden, assisting with pollination and making plenty of delicious honey.

#bees #longlangstroth #honey #pollinators #honeybee #beesuit #orientationflight #macedonranges #kyneton @waggleandforage

These two strawberries represent a pair of firsts

These two strawberries represent a pair of firsts for our household...

The first ripe strawberries of the season
The first harvest from our new netted enclosure

I'm not sure which one I'm more excited about!

It will be a tasty, albeit meagre dessert at ours tonight.

What's happening in your garden?

#firstharvest #cropprotection #strawberry #berrypatch #desert #nettedenclosure #frommygarden #centralvictoria #sprummer #summeriscoming #abundance #growyourown #pickedtoday

What a great day it was today for gardening. Melbo

What a great day it was today for gardening. Melbourne Cup day is a rough guide to when tomatoes can be planted out in Central Victoria. The weather forecast for the next week looks pretty good so we planted some of our tomatoes into the garden today.

We use a trellis method that I have refined over the years. It involves running wire mesh horizontally between star posts. This allows the plants to grow up through the mesh whilst being supported and allowing good airflow. No string required with this method!

We place some insect netting over the whole garden bed straight away. This creates a warm microclimate to help the plants establish. It will also prevent birds from taking fruit as it ripens and will stop any fruit fly infestations should they find their way into our veggie patch.

See our blog post for more information on growing great tomatoes:

https://www.leafrootfruit.com.au/how-to-grow-great-tomatoes-in-melbourne/

#melbournecup #gardening #tomatoes #growgreattomatoes #springplanting #beatthebirds #QLDfruitfly #trellis #gardeningwithchildren #kyneton #macedonranges #heirloom

Next Thursday is the first one of the month... whi

Next Thursday is the first one of the month... which is the day I send out our very popular newsletter and planting guide.

A lot of work goes into putting the newsletters together. There's content to write, photos to take and a very helpful volunteer who reviews it all to check for typos and grammar. We get a lot of positive feedback about the newsletters, so all the hard work is worth it!

Like many Victorians we were without power for a lot of the day. Our internet was also pretty patchy for most of the day. I was supposed to be focusing on admin today, but instead of spending the day doing admin, I grabbed the camera and headed outside to take some snaps for newsletter. This little fellow stopped by for a quick look at what I was up to. After resting for a minute on the camera lens, it was back to the apple blossom, working hard to pollinate the flowers.

If you haven't already done so, you can sign up to our mailing list here: http://eepurl.com/g8-ZhT

#busybee #newsletter #storm #camera #infocus #canon7D #espalier #honeybee #signupnow #gardeningadvice #plantingguide #gardenguide #melbourne #victoria #kyneton #macedonranges #centralvictoria #ediblegarden #vegetablegarden #fruittrees

Asparagus is coming thick and fast now... at this

Asparagus is coming thick and fast now... at this time of the year it becomes a staple, when not mulch else is producing in the veggie patch.

A few weeks back we were struggling to harvest any spears. An infestation of Red Legged Earth Mite was stunting the growth of the spears and causing them to dry out.

To remedy the infestation we weeded the patch thoroughly as RLEM like to hide and breed up amoung weeds, particularly flat weeds such as cape weed. Then we gave the plants a good feed with some general purpose organic fertilizer and plenty of chicken manure. The result was the RLEM disappeared within days and the asparagus started producing whopper spears such as these.

What's happening in your patch at the moment?

#asparagus #kyneton #veggiepatch #gardenpest #spring #gardeningwithkids #giantproduce #spear #dinnertime

A great day for a spot of soil prep today... This

A great day for a spot of soil prep today...

This bed is destined to become our sweetcorn patch this summer.

The girls love soil prep days... Plenty of bugs and worms for them to peck at. I'm generally against hybrid chooks. However, these Hylines have a huge appetite and therefore forage a lot more than heritage breeds. It makes them great for turning compost and soil. Because they eat a lot, they also poo a lot... Which means extra nitrogen for our corn crop this year! They help with pest control. These girls have become an essential part of our team. The eggs are just a bonus!

Chooks courtesy of @3bearsfarmhq

#springtime #hybridchook #hyline #chickentractor #rotaryhoe #soilprep #springplating #compost #permaculture #headsdownbumsup #gogirls #eggscelent#marketgarden #kyneton #macedonranges

Weeds.... all gardeners have to deal with weeds. O

Weeds.... all gardeners have to deal with weeds. One plant that is a bit weedy in our garden is asparagus. We find asparagus spears popping up all over the place in our garden. The children and I discovered this monster spear growing in a patch of self-sown poppies. We discovered it a bit late and the spear has grown a far too long. The stem will be tough and woody, but the top third might be edible. There's a smaller, but still very much monster spear growing at the base, it is already too long to fit on a dinner plate.

Ironically, our main crop of asparagus is suffering a pest attack from red-legged earth mite. The sap-suckers are damaging the emerging shoots and the quantity and quality of harvest has been very poor compared to other years.

Our upcoming workshop in the Science of Edible Gardening series will spend some time exploring weeds. We will look at why they grow where they do and how we can use them in reading the landscape. We will also discuss different methods for managing weeds and what we find works well for us.

The lock down in Melbourne prevents some participants from attending and means that we have some spare seats available for this event. Regional Victorians who would like to attend the workshop can get $50 off the ticket price by entering the code ASPARAGUS (all uppercase). Please note there are only three tickets available at this discounted price.

#asparagus #discount #gardenworkshop #spear #gardenwithchildren #weeds #readingthelandscape #weedsasindicators #weedcontrol #organic #surprise #regionalvictoria #kyneton #macedonranges #covidsafe

AFL Grand Final Day.... Over many years of growin

AFL Grand Final Day....

Over many years of growing tomatoes I have found that for Melbourne based Gardeners the last week of September or first week of October is the optimum time for planting tomato seedlings into the garden. The AFL Grand Final is usually the perfect reminder to plant my seedlings. I usually sow my tomato seeds in July, this enables them to grow into large, healthy plants that have started to develop flowers. I found the July sowing, combined with the late September transplanting would result in harvesting ripe cherry tomatoes by early December and slicing tomatoes by Christmas.

The climate in Kyneton is very different to Melbourne. So we will be delaying planting until early November. Those of you in the outer suburbs of Melbourne and regional Victoria would probably best to also delay transplanting their seedlings.

How are your tomatoes coming along this year?

#afl #grandfinal #tomatoes #seedlings #growyourown #transplant #lockdowngardening #melbourne #covidtomatoes #timing

First asparagus harvest of the season. I love grow

First asparagus harvest of the season. I love growing asparagus as it is so low maintenance but provides abundance when in season.

It's not a crop for those in a hurry though. It takes plants a few years to grow and build up enough energy to put out large quantities of big, thick spears.

What's happening in your patch?

#asparagus #spring #veggiepatch #perennial #perennialvegetable #lowmaintenance #patience #Kyneton

Happy First Day of Spring... What a cracking day

Happy First Day of Spring...

What a cracking day to be as busy as a bee in the garden.

What are you getting up to today?

#savethebees #springtime #firstdayofspring #apricot #blossom #backyardorchard #fruittree #divinity #blueskies #nofilter #lockdowngardening #greatdayforit #busyasabee#macedonranges

A few update photos on our epic netted enclosure p

A few update photos on our epic netted enclosure project.....

The structure itself was completed back in May. Since then we have had a very wet winter which delayed soil prep and planting. However, August has been quite dry, which enabled us to make some good progress.

Sixteen free standing fruit trees and eighteen espaliered trees, have been planted into the orchard section of the netted enclosure.

We have also planted out the berry section with 22 blueberry plants and 8 different cane berries.

Now that the bulk of the plants have been planted into the netted enclosure we’re keen for the rain to return to keep the soil moisture levels up and help "settle in" the trees. The next steps in this stage of the project are to install irrigation and begin spreading wood chip mulch.

I'll post more updates once the mulch has been spread and more of the trees have broken dormancy.

#beatthebirds #nettedenclosure #birdnetting #barerooted #centralvictoria #kyneton #permaculturevictoria #harvestprotection #backyardorchard #epic #espalier #berrypatch #lockdowngardening #drone #foodscape #heritagefruittrees

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