Sustainable Gardening in our Continually Surprising Climate
How best to feed backyard birds? Professor Darryl Jones from Griffith University, Queensland, has written the first sensible, science-based guide to feeding wild birds in Australia, says Paul Sullivan, the CEO of Birdlife Australia.
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.
Novice food grower? Whether you’re a fruit farmer in England, a market gardener in Thailand, or a home gardener in Brisbane, we all need economical, effective solutions to protect our food supply and within budget. And that’s the kind of practical advice I’ve been providing for over thirty years. Step into my world of low stress, productive gardening…flowers are included!
Chinese potato (Plectranthus rotundifolius) has so many common names there’s just one meaningful conclusion: it’s a productive plant valued by many cultures.
Cultivated in tropical and subtropical Africa and Asia, this perennial relative of coleus produces clusters of edible tubers about the size of a peanut and which have a nutty flavour. Sometimes referred to as a ‘lost crop of Africa’, Chinese potato can be easily grown in soil or containers, it’s cute and it’s definitely one warm climate heritage root crop you experiment with in a balcony garden.
Suddenly, a public health crisis has prompted more people than ever before to spend more time growing food than ever. We live in a nation of garden cities, our food gardens are an open invitation to dine – what could possibly go wrong? Keeping pests and diseases firmly in their place involves safer solutions, a little gentle manipulation and gardening together as a family.
The government is right to say Australia grows a surplus of food, but suddenly the cost of buying that fresh produce has leapt, a consequence of crippling drought followed by catastrophic bushfire and then, in places, flooding rain. As we garden in an increasingly surprising climate, the reality of organising a reliable flow of nourishing food to provide a household with regular, thrifty meals falls on those who have suddenly become unwaged. In some places, nurseries are being stripped of seedlings and packets of seed as a nation prepares to overwinter in self-isolation at home and in the garden. What climate zone is my garden in? What can I grow now? Why is crop rotation vital for success? Can I grow food in pots? So many questions to answer.
Help! If planting marigolds (Tagetes spp.) in Australia to deter grasshoppers helps these pests to breed, why do well known authors and garden clubs pass on misinformation? Are marigolds useful for anything other than ornament? How do I control the grasshoppers plaguing my garden? asks Vivienne in Queensland.
Anyone can buy compost in bulk. But these products are often highly variable and sometimes even unsuitable. The traditional alternative is to sow green manures and to make your own compost. If you need bulk compost, consider the sandwich mulching technique. You’ll need a soil pH Test kit and, ideally, get your soil laboratory tested to check for nutrient deficiencies and contaminants.
In recent years, families who garden together have become the most prominent visitors to my annual Open Day. It’s delightful seeing these gardening families, because that was how I started life: in an English family that gardened and holidayed together. Planning, harvesting, saving seed, cooking, bottling, gathering materials for gardening were activities we did together.
Fast food: By learning how to recognise self-sown edible plants in the garden, you’re on the way to the quickest free meal you’ll grow.
The Wartime Kitchen and Garden television series and book by the BBC. The big swerve in 19th century British horticulture away from ornamental gardening to domestic food security. A television series and a book explore low tech solutions, reuse, thrift, and home grown food.
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?
