Chook feeders

It was time to add permanent feeders to the mobile chook run / tractor. 

We talked about the design over lunch one day and after a trip to the hardware shop, Dave built and installed the feeders - one for grain and one for water.

Here is the water one....note the water can be added from outside the coop

And here is the grain feeder.

I am sure this is Florence...the smart chook, my chook of course :) using the feeder perfectly :D

We needed a quick door redesign as we had a constant escapee in the group. 

Dave added a frame of poly pipe to hold it nice and sturdy. There is mesh at the top, so the small gap at the top is fine. We have had no escapees since the new door..Thank goodness!!

We truly had NO idea how she was getting out lol

The chickens have settled into the system well and now give us 3 eggs most days.

We have SUN and BLUE sky!!

What a beautiful sight after SO much rain.....

BTW, the tree with the yellow flowers on the right, it is called Golden Penda. One of my all time favourite trees!!

Guess what!!..it is raining LOL...

Vegy Garden update.

Our four garden beds are turned over, fertilised, mulched and have recieved the first of our seedling and seeds.

So far we have in

* eggplant

* tomatoes

* basil

* chillies

* lettuce

* parsley

* spring onions

* pumkins

* corn

* ginger

* tumeric

* watermelon

* snow peas

In the herb area

* garlic chives

* mint

And Mister Finley is never far away!!

Our flowering Golden Penda!

I absolutley love this tree in flower. It is our Golden Penda and it is located just near the pool, outside our sunroom..where I can enjoy it all the time.
Here is the tree

And a close up of the flowers....DEVINE!!!

We have had lots of birds visiting it also...

Garden update!!

Just a quick one.

Here is a pineapple that is ready for harvest. We have harvested two others this past week and BOY were they sweet and juicy...After eating, I always dry out and re plant the top part of the pineapple.
Gotta have pineapples growing in the garden in the Tropics!!

Over the last two days, the kids and I have been preparing the veggie gardens for planting. There are 4 gardens here and the kids have called them summer, autumn, winter and spring.
In the tropics, you tend to plant after the wet season, but I might try some corn soon. I got corn through Cyclone Larry so as long as I heavily fertilise and mulch, we should be ok.
The lonely one plant in the first garden is ginger, there should be a lovely big chunk buried in there.

Next: our passionfruit vine. It is growing on a trellis on the Western wall of the house. It is doing a great job of protecting that wall (our bedroom) from the sun.

and see our lovely watertank!!

And our dog.....

Close up of the fruit....might go and pick some now, they are making my mouth water!!

My love of frangapanis

My all time favourite tree!!

Stunning!!

Blue lake beans soon.

Lucas and I planted these two days ago.
Should be enjoying these in the next month or two!

There fairies have been!

Look how HUGE this fungi is!
I found in our garden by the side fence.
Mollie said this is where they fairies come for their celebrations and because I am not a fairy, I can only take one photo!

In this house, what else would be so close at hand...thanks Dave, nicely faced!

Eggplant garden.

The kids and I have been overhauling the vegy gardens in preparation of the coming growing season.
Here is garden number two which will be the eggplant garden for the next 4 months.
We fertilised, mulched, planted then foliar sprayed.

Now......... this should have been a quiet time for me to reflect and enjoy our hard work and gently discuss with the children what our plans where for gardening tomorrow BUT NO

Dog bashing into me playing while I am taking the photo

Mollie whinging about the smallest spider

The cat chasing my worms in garden number 1

AHHH!!

Heres hoping for a better gardening day tomorrow!!!

Moon Gardening Calender

Look what I got for Christmas!!

Moon Gardening Calender

I am using it with my vegetable growing this year. Click the link above and have a read, it is very interesting and the people who designed it have been using it for 20 or so years live up at Kuranda, so close to us!

YAY!!! Look at my corn!

With the help of bucket loads of fertiliser, we have fully formed corn!!
And it is beautiful and sweet.

The Mango season has started....ALREADY!!!

Yep....we have a bumper crop on the tree with harvesting a couple everyday.
We have had early rain so maybe that has bought them on earlier. In previous years, it was around mid December is all started.

Here is the fruit bowl

And the kids...hoeing in!
I think I better get some mango recipes organised...I think I am going to need them!

Bountiful Harvest!

Lucas and I went out this morning for a walk in the garden and harvesting

This is what we returned with

A stack of mandarins, passionfruit and cherry tomotoes. Later we will harvest chinese veg, herbs, spring onions and corn for dinner.

Also it was time to dig up

Ginger and tumeric!

Will use them in our Chinese pork mince and rice dinner tonight.

Saving our Mandarins!

After the cockatoos had their third go at the tree, resulting in this


We picked alot of them


Juiced them


The juice is beautiful and sweet


I am now off to make another couple Mandarin and Poppy seed cakes as we still have heaps of fruit.

Watch out below!

And guess what is below - the washing line LOL!
I have learnt to stand on the far side of the line - out of the danger zone.
Can't wait for them to be ready though - yummo!

All ready for February planting!

I have spent a week getting the three vegy gardens ready for Feburary planting.

I pulled out spent plants, turned the soil over, added heaps of horse manure and now letting it settle for planting in a couple weeks time.

Planting in the tropics

I wanted to get a document together about what to plant monthly for our region.
This is what I came up with.
For other regions, look at eden seeds website for planting guides.
Planting Guide – for the tropics (from Eden seeds)
http://www.edenseeds.com.au/

ANY MONTH
Bush beans, climbing beans, beetroot, cabbage, capsicum, chilli, corn, eggplant, gourd, Luffa, mustard greens, radish, sunflower, watermelon.
JANUARY:
Rosella
FEBRUARY:
Asparagus, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, carrot, cauliflower, celery, cucumber, leek, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, tomato, zucchini, rosella
MARCH:
Board bean, onion, parsnip, pea, salad greens, shallots, turnip, asparagus, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, carrot, cauliflower, celery, cucumber, leek, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, tomato, zucchini. , rosella
APRIL:
Board bean, Buckwheat, herbs, kale, asparagus, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, carrot, cauliflower, celery, cucumber, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, tomato, zucchini, onion, pea, salad greens, shallots
MAY:
Board bean, Asparagus, broccoli, carrot, celery, cucumber, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, tomato, zucchini, herbs Buckwheat, kale, onion, pea, salad greens, shallots
JUNE:
Asparagus, broccoli, carrot, celery, cucumber, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, tomato, zucchini, buckwheat, herbs, kale, onion, pea, salad greens, shallots
JULY:
Asparagus, carrot, celery, cucumber, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, tomato, zucchini, buckwheat, herbs, kale, salad greens, shallots
AUGUST:
Asparagus, carrot, celery, cucumber, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, tomato, zucchini, herbs, kale, rosella
SEPTEMBER:
Asparagus, carrot, celery, cucumber, lettuce, marrow, okra, pumpkin, rockmelon, rhubarb, silverbeet, button squash, zucchini, herbs, rosella
OCTOBER:
Asparagus, carrot, celery, lettuce, rosella
NOVEMBER:
Asparagus, carrot, lettuce. , rosella
DECEMBER:
Rosella

My flowers!

Here are some of my favourite flowers in our garden.



Oh, frangipani - love the colours, love the smell. The kids are always bringing the flowers to me and arranging them on the nature table or for a centre piece for the dinner table.











Lovely hibiscus - all around the pool is a must. We have a few varieties which need a little up keep at the moment but nothing a prune and a little white oil (homemade of course) won't fix.



I will get the variety names soon.


To make white oil
* water, squirt of detergent and a slurp of oil in a spray bottle and spray on little insects sucking at your favourite plants. Best to spray late afternoon to protect the plants from sunburn.

My journey to Luffah

Here is a luffa growing on the side of the carport. Two seeds planted in our raised garden produced hundreds of luffa vegys. You can eat them when they are the size of a zucchini but we didn't really like them.

After they dry out, here are the kids peeling them. Many mornings of rubbing the skin off and collecting the seeds

To this, a dried luffa - handy for all uses of sponges.

Our Gardens

Garden 1 (above)

Garden 2 (above)

I love vegetable gardening. The kids and I spend many hours of pleasure planting, fertilizing, mulching and harvesting - yeah!

It is such a empowering feeling of producing our own food.

Some of our all time favourites - tomatoes, lettuce, capsicum, chillis, eggplant - yum, beans, corn - dd favourite, various herbs and this year we even got some strawberries. I tried a potato cage but wasn't very successful - remember to use certified potatoes next time!

As a family, we go out at meal times and harvest - what a buzz!

A very proud mother moment - ds harvesting his own tomato to put on his homemade bread for lunch - his choice and his favourite - hooray!

My objective for this year was to learn to seed save. I had success with corn, eggplant so far!