It has been a strange summer. A few hot weeks in November promised record heat, but in reality my airconditioning has spent far more time off than on this season. Every now and then we have had a couple of days of proper summer but in between the weather has been remarkably cool, even cold. Just a few weeks ago we had an overnight temperature of 1.4 degrees C and a day where if you took into account the wind chill factor it was 4 degrees - in January!
As a result my poor garden is confused. The maple trees have twice started to turn their leaves red, only to decide to green them up again. And my tomatoes which took off like crazy in November went on hiatus for the longest time. But now, despite the weather, they are producing like crazy and I'm loving it. There is nothing quite like a burstingly red tomato straight off the vine and my vines have produced enough that I've been able to supply my parents with more than one bag full of them.
My garden is quite tiny, but it is productive. As well as the tomatoes, I've got cucumbers, lemons, spinach, rocket and lettuce plus a heap of herbs - lemongrass, bay, basil, rosemary, thyme, parsley, sage and mint. It is so incredibly satisfying to wander out the back and pick a few leaves of this, a sprig of that, a lemon, a bunch of tomatoes. At the moment the salad I have for lunch each days includes quite a bit of home grown produce and I'm sure it tastes better for it.
There is quite a movement encouraging people to grow their own food. In Australia we live on some of the most productive land. Everything you grow means that much less has to be grown with industrial fertaliser, transported, handled multiple times etc. We will always need our farmers, but we sure can help feed ourselves.
I dream of one day having a giant veggie garden and I'm sure it will happen, but in the meantime just the small amount I produce makes me very happy in deed.
Oh I would love to have enough land for a large veggie garden. In the meantime I'm just looking forward to the day when we get our tiny backyard tidied and the veggies growing again.
ReplyDeleteI think it is amazing how much you can squeeze in a tiny garden, but yes, I have such plans for rotating beds, perennials like rhubarb, space for pumpkins (I did grow one once, it nearly took over my entire garden and the neighbour's too) and maybe even a chicken coop!
DeleteI love reading about gardens - I'm a student without my own house, so unfortunately I can't grow anything at all (except in pots). Lovely to hear you're enjoying it so much!
ReplyDeleteSarah, pots can be great. Nearly all my herbs are in pots because I've discovered if you plant them in the ground they go feral. Thanks for the comment!
DeleteWhat an awesome veggie patch you have!
ReplyDeleteI have just started mine, so far it's a few herbs and a fig tree but I plan on digging up some flowers to make room for lots of veggies, I think growing your own is not only cost-effective and environmentally friendly, but it's also satisfying to be able .o feed yourself from your back yard/
Oh, I am so jealous of your fig tree! I agree, it is so satisfying to feed yourself - plus useful like this morning when I realised that our lack of weekend shopping meant I was facing a very meager lunch before my garden intervened.
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