Sunday, February 15, 2015

Back to the Market then into the Garden


Waiting for the bus with all our veges


It was back to the Paraparaumu Beach Market yesterday to stock up for the week.
We had hardly anything left over from last weeks shop, just a few onions, carrots and some cabbage.

Salem has been helping me a lot with the cooking, he's doing a lot of the grating, mixing and even the cooking of some of our meals.
It's so nice having someone else cook.


Three of our lovely girls - Creme Egg, Whittakers and Zebby


The weather has been getting a bit cooler, especially at night so it is nice to have a hot meal with plenty of veges in.  Luckily the chickens have still been laying eggs, not as much as usual as one of them (Caramello) seems to have been broody for a while.


Our two retired girls - Tiger and Ted


We keep taking her out of the nest so she has something to eat and drink but she is so grumpy and likes to boss the other girls about.  She is so not impressed when we remove any eggs from underneath her.


The remains of the celery planted in the garden.

Our girls, the chooks and our duck, get most of our vegetable scraps but we do save a few to plant in the garden.  Quite a few will grow back.

Celery will grow back quite well, along with bok choy, spinach, beetroot tops (you can eat the leaves that grow back) spinach and spring onions.



The bok choy is growing back very well.


We started off growing them in pots but now are putting them out in the small gardens that we have under the eaves.   Along with other seedlings that we have popping up all over the place.



No longer neglected.


Salem has been doing lots of weeding and clearing out the very neglected gardens so we can re-grow our vege scraps.

He's doing such a good job and is very pleased with himself.  He spends hours out there pottering around especially later in the afternoon when the sun is on the other side of the house.  It has been far too hot.


Another garden ready for planting.


We have called these little gardens, his Victory Gardens, we are definitely recycling and re-using.


Clearing another garden to be planted.


Salem has so many plants in pots on our deck.  His tomato plants are growing well and have fruit developing on them, we should have plenty of tomatoes in early autumn.


Tomato plants.


We are attracting the bees with plenty of flowering herbs, oregano is a favourite and the flowers are great with fried tomatoes and an egg on toast for breakfast.


Tomato plants with flowering herbs.


We have been saving seeds from fruit such as tomatoes, strawberries, cherries, apples, plums, you name it.  Anything we eat, Salem will pop it in some soil and things have been growing.


All sorts of seedlings, even pawpaws.


He has also been carefully removing the laterials from the tomatoes and been planting them out too, so we have even more tomato seedlings.  They are doing extremely well.


One of our small rhubarbs.


We love rhubarb!!!!!!
I was picking some rhubarb the other day and as I was pulling off a stalk, part of the plant came away with it.  So off it goes into a pot of soil and we have another rhubarb plant.

Rhubarb is such a great plant,  not matter how you treat it, it keeps coming back with lots of delicious stalks to have with some custard.


Our latest addition to the rhubarb family.

It survives the chickens eating the leaves (which are poisonous but doesn't affect the chickens), nesting in it or getting dive bombed by the duck.  I was wondering why the rhubarb was looking a bit flat the other day then I spied my naughty little duck flying into it and having a bit of a play in it and the comfrey.



The dive bombing duck - finger nibbling time.

Another free food which is growing very well is puha, otherwise known as sow thistle.
A very edible "weed" which is popping up all over the place and we don't mind at all.

Puha is great cooked with other greens, in soups and boil-ups.
The chooks and duck love it too.


Puha growing with a cherry tree in a pot.


This summer has been very, very dry.  I can't remember how long ago we had any decent rain.
We recently had the local council install water meters and are now charges for our water.

Salem was so worried about how much the water bills were going to be so he was put off from watering his plants, so many died.

We had been catching rainwater off our garage roof but there has been no rain so now we store every bit of grey water, water from the washing machine, in buckets, bins, even jars.


Our grey water collection.


Salem can now water til his heart's content and doesn't have to worry about the water bill.  I just received our bill yesterday and even though we have a household of three people, we use as much as one person who is indoors, no garden or lawn.  Our water conserving is making a huge difference.

I can't wait until is rains again as we use the clean rain water for the animals drinking water and duckies "pond" water.  But I've had a look at the 10 day forecast from Metservice, and there is no sign of rain.


Yummy dinner - a plate full of veges.

Wow, I have really rambled on this time.
But I am very proud of Salem and all his hard work in the garden and getting lots of things growing.

There is nothing nicer than just stepping out of the door and picking something fresh and tasty to eat.



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