The culture of winter gardening evolved in Europe, a response to their long, gloomy winters. By contrast, Australian winters are briefer, sunnier and filled with interest – if you know what to do. What is a European winter garden? What can an Australian gardener in a temperate zone do to keep their garden filled with interest? What can food growers grow during the coldest season?
Category: Weather
What To Sow In The Subtropical Autumn?
What food plants can be sown or planted in the subtropical autumn? Autumn can be tricky because crops and pests are responding to our warming climate. Australian summers now last one month longer and winter has correspondingly shrunk. With meteorologists predicting 2020 to be the hottest year on record, the implications in a food garden are clear: some crops will be winners and others losers. Here’s how to keep the odds favourable in your garden.
Lawn Armyworm Marches on Queensland: What Haven’t Gardeners Learned?
Interested in learning how to grow a healthy, vigorous, sustainable lawn which remains mostly green during drought like mine and is capable of resisting lawn armyworm?
Which Trees To Plant At Inverell, NSW, To Cope With Predicted Climate Change?
How do you approach tree planting? “All life on Earth is now experimental. Thanks to a lack of Australian climate leadership, we grow crops and plant gardens in uncharted climate territory. If this is the future of gardening, then we must embrace experimental tree planting for shade, food, fodder and biodiversity”. Jerry Coleby-Williams, Founder of Bellis, Brisbane’s award-winning, affordable sustainable house and garden; Director, Seed Saver’s Network; Patron, National Toxics Network; Patron, Householder’s Options for Protecting the Environment, 2nd February 2019.
Protecting Pawpaw Plants Against Black Spot Disease
If you live in south eastern Queensland and grow pawpaw, it’s worth a quick health check right now. Mild, calm, showery, humid winter weather is perfect for observing outbreaks of pawpaw black spot disease. But how best to manage this common problem?
Mealybug: Kill! Kill! But How?
Question: “Hi Jerry, This year I have had the worst infestation of mealybug ever. My garden has never had them in the past, but this year everything including established Gordonia’s five metres high are white with them. I have lost quite a few hibiscus to them. Is this a bad year? Do you have one of your…
Spring Follows Winter. But Can You Set Your Calendar By That?
“This gardener wonders if the Carnival of Flowers date will alter in order to keep up with changing climate?
In Production Today: Subtropical Spring
“Over the spring to autumn growing season I hope to demonstrate which species – either Comfrey or Queensland Arrowroot – uses the least amount of water to grow successfully, and which produces the greatest amount of organic matter”.
Queensland’s 1 in 30 Year Record Cold Snap
An East Coast Low weather system, delivering force 8 wind gusts, is rattling my windows. Australia’s east coast can experience around ten of these weather systems during the cool seasons. Today’s gales are causing minor delays to some flights leaving Brisbane, and major delays to filming with the ABC’s ‘Gardening Australia’ show. Close to the…
Living With Mosquitoes In The Subtropics
Question: “Hey Jerry, we’ve found mosquitoes to be a real problem for us on the northside this year. An electronic device has been recommended, do you have any views on it?” Barnaby via Facebook Reply: Hi Barnaby, I had to adapt to living with mosquitoes when I moved to the subtropics from warm temperate Sydney in 2003. I’ve…
How Can ‘Dog’s Vomit’ Have A ‘Hive’ Mind? Enter The Kingdom Of The Slime Moulds
“Truly alien creatures…are all around us” Professor Christopher Reid, University of Sydney At dawn you could mistake them for vomited curry, something people find disturbing. They surface during the night, forming moist, sulphur-yellow pools and then tiny stalagmites emerge from them, forming miniature landscapes. As the sizzling Brisbane sun rises their colour quickly fades to…
Cyclone Near Miss And Food Production, February 2015
As Cyclone Marcia gets downgraded to a Tropical Low weather system, my soil and crops have had a good soaking: 236mm in the past 48 hours. No crop losses so far – 106 different edibles available. Lucky conditions for my ‘Red Aztec’ corn and Jerusalem artichoke ‘Dwarf Sunray’, they’re just days from harvest.
Jerry Coleby-Williams 