Permablitz inspiration - Sunday 26 November 2006

It's been a while since the last post, too long in fact. This Sunday it was just me (Marie Antoinette) in the patch but I was all fired up and doing the work of two. I was inspired by having participated in my first permablitz at the house of Nelson and his family in Springvale.

After helping with seed planting, lunching and viewing Nelson's fine veggie garden, I tagged along with seasoned permablitzer Dan on his visit to the house of Vilma whose backyard was the site of the first permablitz about 6 months ago. Mint tea (mint from the garden) was followed by some delicious pupusas, which are a kind of tortilla and are a specialty of El Salvador, where Vilma comes from. Goodness growing in Vilma's small backyard includes broad beans, parsley, rosemary, mint and much else besides. The sheet mulching, and perhaps also the dense planting, seems to have kept most of the weeds down.

Harvested
- A big kickass salad, made up of spinach, chervil, parsley, coriander, dill and one ickle immature garlic.

- Sweet peas - oh my lordy they are good.

- Two beautiful artichokes, proving that they love being hacked.
- Potatoes - a few very small ones so eager to grow that they've popped up out of the ground (should have mounded them). In fact there are voluntary potatoes popping up all over the second patch. I think that the potato section in that patch will be ready to harvest in a few weeks.

- Some small broccoli heads - from the first patch.

Activity
Planted snake bean seedlings in the second patch, including 6 or so in the mulched section.
Mulched two sections of the first patch.
Did a ****load of weeding in the second patch.
Watered.

Observations
I left the very leafy cauliflower in the first patch, but I don't hold much hope that any heads will develop - I reckon the time has passed for that. Little One's rhubarb is still just contemplating its navel. As Little One predicted, the tomatoes in the first patch are not doing nearly as well as those in the second. Perhaps her prognosis of nitrogen-sucking gum trees is correct. No rat attempts on the sweet peas - as yet. Perhaps the inter-planting of mint throughout the second patch, and the sprinkling of wild mint around the peas, has helped.



In a week's time I'm off to do a two-week residential permaculture course in Leongatha. Hopefully this will herald a whole new era for Land for Veggies.

Marie Antoinette