Inspirations and Daydreams

We’ve been back in Australia for almost two years now but there isn’t a day that goes by where I don’t think of how great it would be to head back to Japan. We do have plans to move back in the future but as we are eagerly awaiting the birth of our first child it won’t be for a little while yet.

I first became interested in vegetable gardening as a young child of about 10 (I believe) after a regular holiday trip to our house by my Scottish Grandmother. She immigrated to a farm plot in Bathurst, Australia from Scotland as a young Post-WWII wife and mother and knew the benefits and need to be semi-self sufficient in regards to the feeding of oneself.

Of course as a 10 year old boy I was mostly interested in getting muddy and playing with a few worms, but together we managed to set up a small veggie plot in which we planted corn, radishes, beans, beetroot, carrots, strawberries and a few herbs. I kept up the maintenance of my little garden after Nana had returned home but was always too impatient and picking things early. The veggie patch soon gave way to make room for a wooden half-pipe ramp and my newly found skateboard obsession though......

I never thought much about gardening from that point on although strangely I always maintained an interest in watching ‘Landline’ for some reason, which is a weekly Australian agriculture and farming programme and I later went on to University to study aquaculture. Stranger still, I developed quite a good pair of Blue Thumbs working in the aquaculture industry specialising in the growing of phytoplankton for use as live feed in hatcheries for the farming of prawns/shrimps for a number of years before heading up to Japan.

Japan is a country of contrasts on so many levels, not the least of which is the difference between the city and the country. I lived in Nagoya City (the third largest city in Japan) but one of my many jobs involved my taking a 40 minute train trip out of the city. Within 10 minutes on the train out of the city the concrete jungle gave way to rice fields and areas where just about every square metre of land that could be utilised to grow something edible was farmed.

My wife’s family owns a large orchard in Nagano where they commercially grow apples and pears and also watermelons, peaches and numerous vegetables for their own consumption. We would often take trips to Nagano during the various harvest times and help pick a few boxes of fruit.

Here we are in the family orchard in Nagano picking apples in Autumn and pears in Summer.

As a family we would also go on daytrips to surrounding farms during the year to partake in the eating of various fruits and vegetables. Here we are with our Nephew and Niece in Shizuoka gorging ourselves on strawberries.

Over time I started to feel a bit guilty returning to my city apartment and back to the life of a voracious consumer in Japan. On our return to Australia I was determined to get back into vegetable gardening even though I knew we would be continuing a life as apartment dwellers.

I think I’ve done alright so far with my little plot here on our balcony in Australia but I can’t stop daydreaming about a house in the country in Japan, getting down and dirty in a ‘real’ veggie garden and trading in my Blue Thumbs for a nice Dark Green pair!

Improved Apollo Tomato

Tomato: Improved Apollo

What: Yates Improved Apollo Seeds
Where: 3 x yogurt containers.
When: 22 November.

Sown in: Mixed Potting Soil
Fertiliser: Blood and bone.

Advertised Germination: 10-12 Days.
Actual Germination: 8-10 Days.

Advertised Maturity: 12-14 Weeks.
Actual Maturity: 28 weeks.

I thought I had saved a bunch of seeds from the previous Reggae Roma Tomato plant but despite searching high and low I couldn't find them at home and couldn't find any seedlings at the local nursery where I got the original plant, so I have decided to branch out and try another variety. "High Yielding" it says, but can it beat the 60 tomatoes I got from my first Reggae Roma?

2 December 2009

10 December 2009

I've moved the best two plants into two self-watering containers.

27 December 2009

Both of these plants suffered badly from a lack of sun combined with excess water, however I chopped them off and side shoots just might salvage them yet.

17 January 2010

This plant took off from side shoots several times only to die off again.

February 2010

I persisted however and ended up with some very messy main stems (that's a random Bok Choy plant on the right).

March 2010

I'm glad I stuck with this plant as although it it quite messy it has taken off in a big way in the last month and is starting to produce fruit.

10 April 2010

This one is now over 7ft tall and at last count had 50 tomatoes on the way.

29 April 2010

I returned home from 10 days holiday to find this plant suffering heavily from being over-watered. I tried to salvage it but in the end I picked off all of the Tomatoes as the plant was on it's last legs so to speak. Even after all of the dramas this plant has been through I still managed to harvest just under 4kg of Tomatoes from it! I put all of the green tomatoes into a plastic bag with a ripe red apple and they all started to colour up nicely.

May 2010

Dirty Black Summer: Winter in the Summer Time.

Yes you read that correctly and it is official, Summer is going to be my Winter and this is despite summer here on the Gold Coast having an average temperature of 24.1 C - 75.4 F!

We moved into this apartment last year in March and we had plenty of sun back then, but now I have quickly seen my small plot go from getting around 6 hours of fierce sunlight per day to getting about 3 hours of weak sunlight just before it gives way to the moon.

I can only assume that the slight seasonal change in the daily wondering of the sun has been just enough for it to catch the edge of our building and making it MIA for the better part of the day…..

Unless I can convince the building manager from the adjacent apartment to erect a massive solar reflector for me there’s not much I can do except consolidate what I’ve got for the next three months and start making plans for the return of the sun in Autumn.

I don’t like my chances though………

Garlic Chives

Garlic Chives / Nira

What: Seed (Yates).
Where: Small Black Pot.
When: 7 November 2009.

Sown in: El'Cheapo Potting Mix.
Fertiliser: Thin layer of RICHGROW: Organic Blood and Bone + Trace Elements & Sulphate of Potash 100mm below surface.

Advertised Germination: 10 - 21 Days.
Actual Germination: 10 Days.

Advertised Maturity: 8 Weeks.
Actual Maturity:

27 December 2009

Getting there, I reckon another month and I'll be happy to start harvesting.

17 January 2010




February 2010




10 April 2010

Making self-watering containers out of buckets.

I use a lot of recycled materials in my small garden including 1.5L soft-drink bottles, 1L yogurt containers, 3L ice-cream containers and 20L buckets for raising seedlings and for growing out various crops. The following steps outline how to construct a very effective self-watering container from a 20L bucket and a product I have recently discovered.

Step 1: Of course is to collect and thoroughly clean a bucket, in this case I have a couple of 20L buckets sourced from a bakery.

Step 2: Drainage holes need to be cut into the bottom of the bucket for instances when the self-watering reservoir overflows. I didn't have a drill so I just used a sharp knife to twist drill a couple of holes into one sufficiently large hole.

Step 3: The holes need to be covered sufficiently to allow water to flow out but to keep your soil in. A thin layer of coarse gravel would be ideal but I've opted to recycle a couple of 'body scrub sponges' that I've uncoiled.

Step 4: I recently discovered this product at my local nursery which for $4.80 saves me a lot of time setting up my own dodgy self-watering insert! Basically it's just a bowl with a flat perferoted lid that can collect water at the bottom of your container, which can be utilised by roots when required.

Step 5: I place a thin layer of soil in the bottom of the bucket to accommodate and stabilise the plant water well and then because I'm growing plants that need supporting I've inserted an old broom handle and stabilised it with some wire also sourced from the bakery.

Step 6: Then as I do with all of my containers I add a few layers of soil with blood and bone, Water-Storage Crystals and a Rechargeable Solid Water bag as outlined here: http://veggie-might-sp8.blogspot.com/2009/08/water-management.html

The Finished Product

Knock together a trellis from some cheap fencing and you double the range of vegies you can grow in them.

Zucchini

Lebanese Zucchini

What: Seed (D. T. Brown).
Where: 20L Bucket modified to a self-watering container
When: 12 October 2009.

Sown in: Yates Premium Seed Raising Potting Mix.
Fertiliser: Thin layer of RICHGROW: Organic Blood and Bone + Trace Elements & Sulphate of Potash 100mm below surface.

Advertised Germination: 6 - 10 Days.
Actual Germination: 6 Days.

Advertised Maturity: 8 Weeks.
Actual Maturity:

19 October 2009

It's starting to get very crowded in here! Lots of flower buds on the way though.

7 November 2009




20 November 2009

It's quite easy to see the difference between the male and female flowers even at this early stage:

These plants were in a position that had very limited sunshine and as such started to get mouldy leaves and what not. I pruned off all of the mouldy leaves and raised it up to get some sun but so far there's been nothing but a steady stream of male flowers developing. There looks to be a few female flowers forming but they shrivel and die long before they even look like blooming.....

10 December 2009

I lost two of the plants, one is on the way out but the last has had a growth spurt! Despite its growth I've got nothing to show for my efforts. There have been a bunch of female flowers but they shrivel and die before getting anywhere near blooming...

27 December 2009

THE ZUCHINNI BLUES.......

I planted 4 zuke seeds about 10 weeks ago and so far have zip to show for my efforts >_<

I haven’t had any trouble growing lots and lots of these:

But for no apparent reason they quickly turn into these:

Cucumber

Lebanese Cucumber

What: Seed (D. T. Brown).
Where: 20L Bucket modified to a self-watering container
When: 12 October 2009.

Sown in: Yates Premium Seed Raising Potting Mix.
Fertiliser: Thin layer of RICHGROW: Organic Blood and Bone + Trace Elements & Sulphate of Potash 100mm below surface.

Advertised Germination: 6 - 10 Days.
Actual Germination: 6 days.

Advertised Maturity: 8 Weeks.
Actual Maturity: 7 Weeks.

19 October 2009

It's time to knock together some sort of trellis for these plants I think.

7 November 2009

Trellis is up and just in time! It looks like I'll have to extend it if these plants keep growing so fast. Lots of flowers and a few cucumbers on the way if I've hand pollinated them correctly that is.

20 November 2009

It didn't take very long for that cuke to go from the above shot to this!:

1 December 2009

Despite a desperate lack of sun there are plenty more like this on the way, they are yummy too!

7 December 2009

These plants don't get much sun but they are producing well and look quite healthy!

10 December 2009

The lack of sun hasn't done these plants any good and they have lost a lot of leaves, however what remains is still producing ok for the time being.

27 December 2009

These plants started to suffer badly from powdery mildew so I cut off all of the foliage and after 2 weeks and a dose of liquid fertiliser side shoots have taken off and are producing more and larger cucumbers than ever.

17 January 2009