BACKGROUND
For those that are not following along, we are building a large vegetable garden in the unused area behind the swimming pool. The idea is to be able to grow lots of the veges and herbs that we use and also provide some flowers and a bee haven as well. My husband is keen on hosting bees in the future as well. Me i want chickens...
We are clearing the back garden that was very unkempt. Pulling out all the stones, sifting to get the soil out, repreparing the ground underneath, washing the stones. After all that, we are putting them back. On top of this we are building very large garden beds.
The soil we are creating our own as it would be very expensive to bring in. We are making large compost piles in each of the beds (starting with one main one and working down. So far in a couple of months we have made a lot of our own soil. this soil will be so rich and has so far saved us about $500 in soil i am certain. Grass clippings, garden waste and all the food scraps minus a few for the worm bins. (again they are making soil for us too.) Also lots of the cardboard (without plastic and tape).
THE BACK GARDEN BED PROGRESS
As you can see the beds are in... The area to the left is still untouched and the back slope is still a catastrophe.
Its been a slowing month to be sure. We are still pulling out and washing stones, however we HAVE ALL THE GARDEN BEDS COMPLETED!!!! last post they were still 1/2 done i think.
We are starting to put the stones back in the gaps in between the beds. We need to keep these nice, so lots of weeding early and i'll fill them up a bit more when we know how many stones we have. I also scrubbed the pavers (some of them at the back) with soap and water and its looking really nice i think.
Still a huge pile of rocks to clean on the left hand side though.
All these stones still need cleaning and putting back in here and also down the side of the pool (Ill show you THAT disaster soon)
COMPOST
Here is the progress of the compost. Its super rich, breaking down in days and turning into beautiful FREE compost. If i can i try and ask the local vege shop for a few lettuce leaves or old veges so i can add to the pile as needed. soon we will loose the regular lawn clippings though as its nearly winter.
GINGER
Not sure if you remember me posting about planting some ginger in a pot. Its so expensive here in Australia. like $40 -50 a kilo. for comparison bananas are $2-4/kilo so its very expensive.
Its coming along nicely and there is lots of ginger forming under the surface.
I think we will get lots of pots and we will plant ginger ALL ALONG the side of the pool in the area we pulled out all of the palm trees (nice but ontop of a retaining wall... so ????? previous owners what WERE you thinking... lol
PHOTO GINGER
SIDE OF THE POOL
as you can see this is TERRIBLE at the moment. This was where all those palm trees were. we are struggling getting out all the roots and they keep jolly shooting. Even though i was very bad and used roundup... sorry mother nature it was necessary. This is where pots with ginger will go.
I'm getting ready to put back all those stones that i have washed in here. You can see them all sunning out on the concrete at the back there...
still a bit of digging and root clearing to go though.
This is the area i am working on today... The Dodgy corner...
The Dodgy corner
So this is a bit tricky, its the area in between where we are digging out and not. There was a HUGE stump here that needed to come out.
It took some digging from my husband @azthal about 40 mins in boiling hot heat to yank the sucker out. but it is... out... Thank fully. we are going to put a tiny retaining wall step to make it look a little neater, but i need a bit more digging. The dirt needs to come out more and then the white stones are all going back along the side.
Eventually the back section will need to be dug out too, but i'm not doing that now. Its better than the rest so i'll leave it. WE will take out a couple more stumps though
THE BACK SLOPE -- JUST SIGH
We are getting there. This will unhappily be one of the more last areas to be done i think... but we will be removing and cleaning the stones removing the BLACK BLOODY PLASTIC MATT underneath it, rejuvenating the soil, removing the stumps and planting flowers and melons down here.
also behind the water tank will need some work too... yikes that is a mess as well.
CONCLUSION
So as you can see we are making progress. I'm hoping for a pretty good go in the garden a couple of days this week. I'm close to putting the stones back in along the pool side.
eventually we need to fix under the water tank too and repair the mini retaining wall there.
SOOOO much work to do to turn this into both a "pleasant aspect" and a "productive garden"
I would like to make it pretty and productive. Lots to work to go... better get digging...
...
Why do we come up with these plans in Summer! 15 minutes work and I was wrecked! Cant wait till the weather settles down...Then we will complain its too cold :-p
Oh wow, those pavers were really under all the weeds! It's looking so clean a pretty now. I'm in awe of the effort you've put in to cleaning them and the stones up as well as making your own soil. How did you find the time!?
We had a bird of paradise palm when we moved in and wanted to turn the area to veggie growing. They say that as long as you keep removing the leaves, any plant will die eventually. It took at least two years for shoots to stop coming through! The same with a rose bush we removed.
Lol! It's not that woven stuff is it? I still find strings from that today when I'm digging and it's been years! It seems it could have been worse, though, recently someone shared some photos and asked how they could remove disintegrated carpet that had been used as weed matting. The base fibres had rotten away, so it couldn't be pulled up in one piece any more and there were synthetic fibres everywhere in the soil. The solution seemed to be to remove a whole layer of soil. The lesson here seems to be NEVER use carpet as weed matting.
Love the selfie. You should enter this into this month's Garden Journal Challenge. I've done the countdown wrong, so it is still open. I'll be wrapping up on Wednesday.
oooohhhh what is the challenge... ive been trying to find it.. lol.. apparently did a bad job looking this morning.. lol.. where is it i will go and look!!
Yes the pavers were under all the weeds. and i had to scrub with a brush for AGES to get them to scrub up like that. lots of elbow grease and sore fingers. ha aha
no the weed mat is the THICK BLACK stuff. No oxygen and no water gets through it is hideous. Like black plastic bags but thicker. Vile stuff. kills all soil in sight. not the breathable stuff. (that is in the front garden and bad enough)
as for the selfie i took a few, but when i reviewed them there was too much boob showing lol.. this was the only one at a low enough angle not to be from a garden porn journal... lol
i love bird of paradise, we don't have any though... its just a shame the previous owners planted everything on a jolly retaining wall.
Lol! You even commented on it!
https://peakd.com/hive-140635/@minismallholding/time-to-share-your-gardens-in-april
Perhaps the garden porn journal could be your project: The cleavage edition. 🤣
ooohhhh i thought that was an older post... and not still running?? let me go back and check.... I thought it was a NEW one from after that.
lol... I shall go and take photos in the flowers... lol
If i get bitten by a centipede or something dodgy i won't be impressed.. lol..
I'll go and see what i have in the garden :-) :-)
will post soon
Right @minismallholding lol... i have posted a garden selfie post... lol... my daughter helped me take them :-)
https://hive.blog/hive-140635/@blingit/garden-journal-the-selfie-edition-just-wine-ing-in-the-garden here it is .... lol
I love your compost and its storage. I am also planning to make my own compost, I have I can emulate what you have done. Good afternoon!
Thanks, yes the compost is doing so well... it is such a good idea to make compost and reduce waste to the landfil
it makes such good use of waste.
If you make one, do show us all!
Sarah
Indeed, I will show it when I do make one. Have a nice day ahead.