Growing The Growers Filming Trip 2010

Diary with pictures of our trip to the USA and England to meet with people that have successfully encouraged more people to garden and farm organically

Monday, May 10, 2010

Last minute planting

Today is a garden day. The last day that Michael and I will be down in the commercial garden working with Helen and Matthew before we leave.
All the garlic is planted and the earliest varieties are up. Matthew and Helen got stuck into removing a few of our perennial (annual!) winter weeds - nettles.
We then took turns on the tractor. Here is Matthew hard at it spading in some limestone on the area that the chickens cleaned up last summer.



I have been re-reading Gene Logsdon's 'Small Scale Grain Raising' and although vegetables go into recess at this time of year cereals, green manures and broad beans do need to be planted before the days start to lengthen again in July. I want to plant an area that has been really worked over by our chickens last summer to oats. Enough oats to harvest as hay which will mulch next years tomatoes and capsicums. We also have a dear friend that likes spelt. The seed is sitting here in a bag screaming to be planted and I dream about harvesting the bursting heads next summer and baking a loaf of bread. What a lot I still have to learn!
Helen spreads limestone ready for Mike to spade in. Behind her are the beds of early red garlic that have been mulched with straw.




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