Week Four- First Pickings

Now, the garden has been growing for almost a month, and we're seeing the first pickings - or at least the local possum is! It has taken a liking to Mizuna, young radish leaves and the first leaf of a sprouting bean. The radish bulbs are starting to swell, and we did get some parsley this week.

We have caged our bush peas and beans. One other little sideline has been comparing the development of bush-planted and seedling-planted peas, the ones grown from seeds (on left) are much stronger.

The no-dig garden now has baby spinach planted. The spring onions have got over transplant shock remarkably well, and the garden only awaits the tomatoes and capsicums seedlings that are being grown in the laundry.

Next week should see more changes with an animal-proof fence going around the garden (but it won't stop the possum)

Week 1 of garden trial

The two gardens have now been going for a week and its's time for the first update...

Sieved Soil Garden

This garden is predominantly used for plants whose seeds are directly planted. These include peas, beans, radishes, carrots, giant red mustard, mizuna (an asian green), lettuce and chinese broccoli (Kai laan). The climbing plants are at the back. The two plants you can see are oregano and Italian parsley that have been planted as seedlings.

The big development in this garden is the arrival of the first germinated seedlings. So far, radish (front left), rocket (back left, trust me -it's there), chinese broccoli and mizuna have made their first appearances yesterday. This is a wonderful time in a garden, you can go back a few times a day and see significant changes every time. Now we just need the frosts to hold off for a few days...

The other plants should make an appearance over the next week or two.

The no-dig bed

While the other bed is off to a flying start, the no-dig garden is in a "bedding down" phase. It must be left 2-3 weeks before plants can be introduced. You can see cracks and unevenness in the surface. These are where air and moisture have been able to get down into the lucerne layer and it is starting to degrade. In the process it gives off a slight odour and the garden warms up due to the heat from the rotting process (this is why plants can't be introduced yet).

One good thing about setting up a no-dig garden in winter is that the risk of self-combustion is lower. On the hottest day of summer here last year, one of my friends here had her no-dig garden dry out a bit too much on top and start to smoulder from the heat being generated from below.

The plants in this garden will be predominantly seedlings - spring onions, garlic chives, rosemary, golden marjoram, strawberry, tomatoes and capsicum. The rest will be filled up with greens. Those seedlings being grown from seed are already in their biodegradable newspaper pots, waiting on the worst of winter to pass before being put out.

I am loving this, in one garden I am cheering on new life, in the other I am waiting for the decay to happen before new life can be introduced. These are both key processes in gardening, and also in life...

A new gardening experiment

Last year, I grew a vegetable garden with mixed success. More than in part, this was due to my location's rocky soils. This year I read a book that got me interested again, it is "square foot gardening" by Mel Bartholemew. While this is an English book, there are parts of his gardening philosophy I find particularly attractive, so I decided to make two gardens of this style for my wife and I.


There are two solutions to stony soil. The first is to dig out the garden bed and place a barrier around it...

Then you take the soil and sieve out all the stones...
Leaving a fine soil left.

Sounds a lot easier than it is!

Thus the appeal of "no-dig" gardening





Take a bag of composted cow manure, a bail of lucerne hay and a bail of cane trash...

Spread half of the manure in a layer, then the lucerne, then the cane trash as a final mulch, wetting down each time.

This bed needs a few weeks before it can be planted in, and won't be able to handle root vegetables for a while - but the total construction time was less than two hours.

Which garden will be the most fruitful? Only time will tell, but the native dirt bed is fertilised and ready for planting...


Yes, the author of "The Square Foot Garden" is a retired engineer.

Can anyone guess why I like his design?

Gardening at last

Those of you who know me from college would know that one of the things I was really looking forward to doing once in placement was establishing a vegetable garden - I suppose three years of surviving on institutional food can do that to you!

So, over the last few weeks (Wow, it's been that long already!) I have been working on establishing a vegetable garden. As you can see, it actually has two beds, the first (the one at the back) was established in my first week here and I was finally happy to start planting in it yesterday. The second is only a few days old at this stage, and hopefully I will be able to raise some seedlings to plant in it in a few weeks' time.

So, what is this doing in my faith-based blog? For me, gardening is a beautiful and spiritual. It is a uniting of my physicality with my mind, and a time where I can get dirty and sweaty as I use my hands. It is a time which is so different to the creativity of words that form the majority of my days. Yet still, my mind and spirit are engaged in a different way.

The first point I would like to make is the sheer wonder of creation. The scientist in me knows all about semi-permeable membranes, genetic reproduction and the like, but there is still something wonderful about the anticipation and the sights of first sprouts rising from the ground with the variation between the explosion of a new bean shoot and the tentative searchings of something like chives. The sheer act of relating this wonder to eating reminds me of our reliance on the creative power of God in the world around us in a way that picking up a bag from the supermarket never can. In this way, I am also connecting with the spirituality of many of my congregation who are farmers - at least I am not as dependent on the weather as they are, you can see the tank in the background!

We often have the image of God as a gardener. Yet we can forget how violent an action gardening is. I know Linda's father the sheep rancher refers to himself as a grower of grass, but the vegetable garden needed to be wrestled clod by clod out of the grass lawn. To gain a reasonable depth for the side walls, all of the soil needed to be removed from the whole and then replaced. Additives like manures and mulches need to be worked through the soil before you can even think about planting a crop. A gardener is intimately involved with the garden, the first watering is sweat from the brow. It is far too easy for us to see God as removed and detached, but in the image of Christ crucified we see the ultimate in price paid for creation.

I often see Christian leadership as a gardening function. The image of the trellis in the background is one point in case. When people are asked to do things for the first time, they often need to be lent support and structure, but the same structures can become choking as they grow and develop.

The final thing gardening (and other events in my life at the moment) is teaching me at the moment is how to relax. This morning, after taking the photo, I watched a wasp hunting in the mature bed for about five minutes. Gardening is an activity of attempting to create opportunities for life that many creatures enjoy (indeed, a sterile garden is a dead garden). So this little disruption in the environment at my hands gives me tho opportunity to see life on a smaller scale and relate it to the bigger picture of my faith life and that of my community.

May you all find opportunities for similar moments of connectedness with God, and I'll try to keep you in touch with developments. Please feel free to jump in with the insight you get from your hobbies also.