A similar link in Mother Earth News
I should like to make one of these for next summer.
Showing posts with label links. Show all posts
Showing posts with label links. Show all posts
12 May, 2020
14 April, 2020
Chooken-keeping Resource List
Jackie French's Chook Book
Yes, this is 'Diary of a Wombat' Jackie French. Her Chook Book is helpful about principles and methods for those of us who still like a good hold-in-your-hand resource to read through.
Jackie French's Backyard Self-Sufficiency
She has a whole section on 'small barnyard animals' in which chickens are briefly mentioned. But the whole book is a good introduction to planting and eating more from your own garden.
Linda Woodrow's Permaculture Kitchen Garden
The author who first made me realise that I could keep chickens in the garden and how to make the 'downsides' of chickens an 'upside' for the garden. The downside is that she focuses on the method she uses in the garden, not the principles. That said, the concept of using chickens as not just egg-layers but as mulch-makers, manure, food scrap processing, insect and pest control, and garden clean-up was revolutionary to me, and broaded my perspectives in so many ways. The book is some twenty to thirty years old, but the concepts are very relevant all the same.
The Google.
Yes, you get a lot of results, but you can refine searches. I'm in suburban Australia, so I prioritise those who live in other parts of urban and suburban Australia. Good for general information about things before you get down to the specific. Also, lots of videos from people (mostly homesteaders) who have ideas about chicken coops or advice on how to integrate chickens.
Special mention to Self Sufficient Me whose video on chicken bullying I just watched as advice on how to integrate our two new chickens (the New Shanghai) with the old ones (Original Recipe).
Pinterest
Yes, it's full of pretty pictures and glorified stories of happy clappy chooks and their perfect pristine pens. But there are some gems in there, if you're willing to read up. All knowledge is worth having.
Local gardening groups.
I'm the current president of Permaculture Sydney North, and an active member of Crop Swap Sydney/ My garden was in the Virtual Sydney Edible Garden Trail this year. These are all local groups to me, and important knowledge networks - people who have done this before, or who are having the same problems, or who might have solutions to your problems that you haven't thought of yet.
Facebook Groups
There is almost certainly a group for your locality or area.
Mine are:
A small matter of courtesy
Join a local group, by all means. But please don't just barge in and ask your question. Start with a search - for Facebook there should be a search box either at the side of your screen (desktop) or along the top of your screen (mobile app). Chances are, other people have asked the question before and received many helpful answers. Read through them all, look at the arguments and think about how they do or don't apply to you. Sometimes it helps to ask a similar or related question on the same post, so whoever comes along afterwards can find all their answers in the once place.
30 October, 2019
various videos
Many videos for watching later
Self-watering raised bed construction
Wicking beds - Sustainable Gardening Australia Footprint Flicks
How to make a wicking bed container food garden for Randwick
Self-Watering wicking bed
verdict: pretty useful.
Wicking bed how to.. A self watering garden bed: close
Self-watering planter: relevant because this is probably close to what I want to do.
Hugelkulture Pots
Hugelculture: In A Pot! (nursery trick)
How to build and install underground watering system
DIY Underground Watering System
Annual Backyard Hugelkultur Maintenance & Planting Out The Beds
(too long-winded)
Pretty good, lots of tips and ideas
Why Crop Rotation is a waste of time
Interesting argument.
13 August, 2019
how do you like them apples?
Quite a lot, actually!
On Saturday I went to the garden of one of the women at my Permaculture Gardening Group who was going to take us through Pruning, Air-Layering, and Grafting.
The part I was really interested in was the part where she offered scions of her apple trees. She has FOURTEEN kinds of apples in a suburban garden, most of them grafted on individuals trees. It was AMAZING and I came away quite inspired in several dimensions.
I did have about six apple types before I got a bunch of her scions. Four arrived already grafted on a single rootstock: Anna, Granny Smith, Golden Dorset, and a mystery apple (I lost the tag that indicated what type it was, but it might have been a Jonathan?). And two were individual trees from my mother: a Golden Delicious and a Gala.
I got about nine apple scions from her: Akane, Adre Sauvage, Blenheim Oragne, Tropic Sweet, Tropic Dorsett, Tropic Anna, Egremont Russelt, Kid's Orange Red, and Yates.
I have two more apples coming: a Pink Lady with a Braeburn grafted to it. The Braeburn is because my sister loves them, but they don't grow them commercially this far north because the climate doesn't support it - Braeburns are cold-weather trees.
So, yes, we should be covered for apples through the season. Assuming I can get a harvest from them.
And, more importantly, that I can successfully get the grafts to take...
Right now, I'm thinking of which ones I should graft together - cross-pollination requires multiple cultivars flowering around the same time.
Having looked up various apple types, I'm reasonably sure there are maybe 4 pollination groups:
P1: Anna & Golden Dorset
P2: Tropic Sweet, Tropic Dorsett, Tropic Anna, Egremenot Russet.
P3: Akane, Andre Sauvage, Blenheim Orange, Kidd's Orange Red, Yates, Granny Smith, and Golden Delicious, Pink Lady
P4: Gala & Braeburn.
The strikeouts are already on the one tree, along with the mystery apple, which is most likely in a similar pollination group. I could add to the existing multi-apple, I suppose but more than four is probably pushing it, and there are other rootstocks available.
So, probably a mix of P2, P3, and P4 on the Golden Delicious and the Gala and the Pink Lady:
Golden Delicious: Tropic Sweet, Tropic Anna, Blenheim Orange
Gala: Akane, Andre Sauvage, Tropic Dorsett, Yates,
Pink Lady: Braeburn, Gala, Egremont Russet, Kidd's Orange Red
I think some of it will very much depend on what takes. It could be a bit of a hit and miss.
The pruning unit was educational too. I've been pruning my apples like my stone fruit and...that's not the way to do it apparently... But the multi-apple has a few blossoms - at least one of the branches appears to be a tip-bearer rather than a spur-bearer, which might explain why I haven't really had any fruit from it at all! I've been pruning it back and probably pruned off all the fruit-bearing shoots! and then there's nothing left to enable cross-pollination...
Ah well, we garden and learn. I just wish I'd learned a bit earlier.
a bunch of apple-growing links
University of Mass: Spindle Pruning Apple Trees (video)
Fruit Grower’s News: Tall Spindle Design for apples - I’m still trying to find a proper/definitive description of spindle systems and how to prune trees into that shape.
Kimmel Orchard: Tuesdays With Tyler high density orchard plantings - there’s a whole series about orchard care in here.
How to prune apple trees in winter: summer for fruiting and growth, winter for vigour.
I’m also going to need to read up on apricots soon. I’d like one really good harvest out of the backyard apricot before it gives way to probable gummosis. *sadface*
26 June, 2019
food forest links
Gallifey Permaculture: what works for them - AU
Permaculture Apprentice: Creating A Food Forest Step By Step Guide
My Smart Garden: Creating A Food Forest - AU
Shrub layer:
Tree Lucerne (Tagasaste)
Acacia Cognata (cousin It)
wormwood,
southernwood,
rosemary,
lavender,
hyssop,
lemon verbena,
citronella,
scented geraniums,
tansy and
other shrub sized daisies and
mountain marigold
ABC Fact Sheet: planning your foodforest
10 December, 2014
various links
Specifically looking at fruit tree companion planting.
companion plants for fruit trees (NthAm)
companion planting vegetables (NthAm)
Also have feedly'd a bunch of Australian blogs, including artist as family which I regret missing on their 'through Sydney' leg (or even their 'through Kiama' leg. Would have been awesome to see and hear their story!
a pocket full of seeds: as someone who tends to spot 'bald patches' of earth and think "dammit, that could grow some [insert vegie of choice here] very nicely," I rather like the secret subversion of it!
Also: Joel Salatin in Sydney 21st Feb | intro to permaculture
21 August, 2014
relevant links
Jackie French: The Magic Of Groves
Actually, her whole site looks pretty good!
I don't know that I want complete self-sufficiency, but as much fruit as we can eat and farm out to the family, along with a variety of tasty vegetables sounds exactly like my sort of thing.
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I need to start remembering what to plant when. And keeping track of the phases of the moon. Might also help with my own personal emotional/physical cycles.
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Settlement is in just over a week. I suspect that the day we get the keys I will go over and just sit on the stairs. Or inside. Or on the lawn. Just to get a feel for the place and the neighbourhood and the house and the yard.
...I wonder if the real estate agent will take the sign away, or if B1 and I will have to wrestle it out?
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