A Year in our Vegetable GardenWelcome to "A year in our Vegetable Garden" Follow us through a year in our Vegetbale and Fruit Garden. See the preparation, planting, sowing and growing that occurs month by month through the seasons until the ultimate harvest. We live on the semi rural outskirts of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia. Our climate is deemed to be a cool to temperate climate. We'll keep this page up to date as we progress, sharing our successes, problems, wins and failures. We'd love you to join the journey! You can do this two ways: Subscribe to this page using the RSS feed (orange button on the navbar - unsure? have a look at the explantion page on RSS)and get notified when this and other pages update Or Join the Members' only area. This area will be more interactive, with ezines, favorite recipes, advice from our qualified horticulturist if you get stuck and lots more. We also include a year in our berry and fruit tree gardens and follow our backyard chooks as we raise another years chicks. We begin in winter 2009, in the southern hemisphere.
Winter 2009Green ManureWe have 4 vegetable beds and 4 berry beds each 1.2 mtrs x 3.0 mtrs.We have been progressively building up the soil levels of these beds for a few years, normally as a crop is cleared, we improve the bed whilst it is left fallow (vacant) This year, we have added large amounts of stable horse manure, chicken manure, blood and bone and our own compost.
This bed was put to grow green manure this winter. It was cleared of last years Capsicum and Chilli crop and in the bed rotation plan will be used to grow Spring/Summer leaf crops such early lettuce, then maybe corn and companion planted pumpkins,zuchinni and cucumbers. I still have some rearranging to do... Winter Greens
This is our winter greens bed ready for planting.
Each plant was placed in a small pocket of commercially available compost to help it get a good start. We have already harvested the late summer planting of croccoli and cauliflowers. Unfortunately due to extreme summer conditions and what is now a 10 year drought, we did not have sufficient supplies to see us through until this crop matures.
We've planted a mix of broccoli, cauliflower, spinach and asian greens. The spinach and asian greens will mature quickly and be replaced with successive plantings and then some early summer lettuce. Legumes
In this bed, we have a crop of early peas. We're fortunate to not get frosts in our area so can easily get away with a spring maturing pea crop, that is complimented and then replaced with beans. Root Crop
This is our winter root crop bed. The remnant broccoli crop has just about finished sprouting and was removed only days later. The new root crops of garlic, spring onion and potato onions all planted out in and around the broccoli. This bed will remain a root crop bed throughout spring and summer. Late Winter 2009Green Manure
Winter Greens
At 60 days after planting, the first Asian Greens are ready to be progressively harvested."
Root Crops
Early Spring 2009Green Manure
At the end of Winter, the green manure was chopped up with a sharp spade and then dug into the bed with a garden fork. 
After it was all dug in, the bed was heavily mulched with Sugar Cane Mulch 
It's now been 3 weeks since the green manure was dug in. We've had an unseasonably early Spring this year and it seems to have sped up the composting process. This is the result, a bed ready for planting. This will be our cucurbit bed, growing pumpkin, zucchini, melon, cucumber and companion planted sweet corn.
Winter Greens
The brassica's above were all fed with a solution of our fertiliser tea which really gave them a boost. 
We have already harvested most of our Asian Greens, this was one of the last and was getting a little "long in the tooth". After a weekend away, we returned to find the two warm days were just too tempting for it. This will be left in the bed to form seed for an autumn crop. Legumes
Our legume bed this spring is planted with shelling peas, snow peas and dwarf french beans. Although a little early in our area for beans, we trialled sowing them "under glass" and have done well. 
The snow peas are well on their way. With some of the earlier planted one's starting to flower. Once the flowering commences, regular picking will encourage more and more flowering and a good crop should be on the way..
Root Crops
In the Onion bed, things are progressing nicely. The Potato Onions are starting to divide and the garlic plants from the first planting have developed nice thick stems.
Early October It is now early October and we are well into Spring. The Asian Greens are finished for now and we are harvesting Cabbages, large heads of Broccoli, Spinach, Spring Onions, Asparagus and early showings of snow peas. The Cauliflowers are just starting to show signs of forming flower heads and we should be picking those in a couple of weeks. Sqeezed into some spare space next to them, we have picking lettuces coming along nicely and a mixed Italian lettuce seed row just starting to pop through. View the Year in our Vegetable Garden from Spring onwards here Return to vegetable Garden Homepage |
