Improvement Plans for the next 12 mths

metal bed in triangle garden

• Garlic
• Lettuces

IBC Wicking Bed on porch

• Grape
• Passionfruit (??)

Under the Frangipani

* use slasher weedkiller on the space

• freesias
• other bulbs
• meadow seeds
• poppies

Big Vegepod

• Passionfruit up the north side from vegepod?

In front of lounge room chook run

• sugarcane, lemongrass
• ginger, galangal, turmeric
• dahlias in front? Or too close to the grass?
• fig? In a deep pot?

In front of chook yard

• kumquat - citrus, likes rich soil
• mulberry - suitable for chickens to shelter under and eat from
• apricot - likes lighter soil, not clays: build a mound? (needs potassium and phosphorus more than nitrogen), feed once a year in early spring
• black sapote
• lychee - fragile, wants protection

various thoughts - fruit trees

Chill units (number of hours below 7C): Thornleigh's average winter temp is 11.9 (17.5 + 6.3, divided by 2) which puts it in the 600-800 chill units according to Heritage Fruit Trees, although apparently one can extend the chill units simply by keeping trees out of the sun for longer.

I'm sure I've already posted these thoughts somewhere...

APPLES:

Tropic Dorsett: v low chill, flowers in late August, fruit set by mid September, will need its own netting, harvest late December early Jan

Golden Delicious: harvest mid-January

Gala: late Sep-early Oct '22 flowering, harvest mid-January

Braeburn: (winter harvest, late), flowering late Sep-Oct '22 flowering, harvest mid-January

Anna: flowering Aug-Sep

Dorsett: flowering Aug-Sep

Granny Smith: never flowered, (winter harvest, late)

Akane: never flowered

APRICOTS: Reader's Digest and Forty South

Tilton : early Feb harvest, 600 chill hours (low), but it's sitting in sun from pretty early in the morning.

Paterson : Jan harvest, 600 chill hours (low),

Unknown (backyard): most likely a low-chill apricot, it gets marginal sun through winter.

I'm wondering if I should maybe get plumcots, which are supposed to be like apricots but hardier?

AVOCADOES:

Sheppard: type B, 2.5m with plenty of flowers but very little pollination: may require an A type to go with it I guess it required a really good season of rain so the flowers didn't all fall off. I can easily harvest an avo or two a week right now, with still at least a dozen on and more fruiting.

Note to self: don't ever look at how much you've spent on fruit trees over the years... An awful lot of them have died in their pots before they ever got into the ground...

CITRUS

:
Tri-Citrus (Bi-Citrus?): Oranges, tangerines - might have had a lemon/lime at some point
Kumquat

Makrut Lime
NOTE: neighbours have a lime tree and are more than happy to gift limes

BANANAS

Banana circle - at least one Red Dacca, the others are unknown, none have ever fruited - probably not enough nutrients

PINEAPPLE

three (3) in pots; have never worked out a good place for these to go.

MULTISTONE

apricot: lots of leaves, no fruit
donut peach: died 2022
nectarine: cut it off 2023 - it never usefully fruited, always rotted before I could harvest anything
plum: full of blossoms and fruit - yellow flesh, starts off very green, ripens to a violet-purple blush

PEACHES/NECTARINES

white peach - on dual stone
yellow peach (clingstone) - single
white nectarine - single
white nectarine - on dual stone

hardware:

Veggie patch AU - clips and clamps

dear diary - 6th Dec

OBSERVATIONS: The rodents have basically destroyed all the fruit in the backyard, and are working on the fruit trees. They haven't hit the avocados yet (so far as I can tell) and they may not be able to get to them on account of the avos hanging. Depends on how smart they are - whether they realise they can gnaw the things off and then eat them.

Got pest managers in to set traps and baits, and the rats have reduced around our lawn, but are still in and out of the chicken yard, and along the neighbour's fence. I think they have them under their house, too. Wondering if I should move the rat bait boxes into the chook yard...

In the front picket fence bed, the elderbush is shooting everywhere. So is the mugwort. The mugwort I still have a half-hope of digging out, but the elders put out roots all over the place. And when you dig up one, then another just keeps going! Not sure if mowing them will do the job. Am hiring a local company to do the lawn as often as needed - next one in the week before Christmas.

CHOOKS: Shantung has gone back for another implant - she had a swollen belly. Si-si has also been sitting down a fair bit; I found her just parked on the grass this morning. Might be a leg injury. I'll bring her water and some food later. A day or two later, she's recovered and seems to be in good spirits. But while Shantung is pretty spirited, she's not all that spry anymore and her abdomen still feels swollen even after they took out the fluids from it. Basically, there's another pathology going on, and the vet may not be able to do anything short of surgery. And I'm not really willing to pay for another surgery.

The chooks are being allowed to run pretty much across the front yard. They make whining noises when they're confined to the yard; there's not much there to eat or play in there, and they like nesting in the triangle bed under the citrus. It's low enough to give them cover, and thick enough that they don't feel exposed.

PRUNING & PREPARING: I put the chook tractor back on the Crepe-Apricot bed, but nothing much is happening in there - the girls don't seem to much like going in there right now. Might be the open-airness of it? Need to cover it with one of my new sacks.

I'm going to severely prune down all the backyard trees next year. Especially the Flavor Supreme plum, which doesn't produce anything at all. Or maybe I should do that now? Let them spring back over the summer/autumn, then maybe fruit in winter/spring next year? Need to think about that.

I've decided to cut down/dig out the front nectarine in the triangle garden, because it never produces edible nectarines - they go mouldy far too easily and don't grow to a decent size. If I cut it down, I could use the stump for grafting. But if I dig it out, I could put an apricot in its place. But I wonder if it's never done well because it's sharing the space with the golden peach... Also, if I could dig up the golden peach and reorient it so it's more upright, that would be excellent.

PLANTING: I'm not really in a planting mood, tbh. Should toss some stuff down - lettuces, radishes, beets, etc. Green mulches, etc. anything that will grow in the coming weeks/months. (Coriander? Needs/wants cooler weather.)

Put tiny baby potatoes in the SMALL VEGEPOD 2 (King Edwards). Trying to decide where to plant out the peanuts.

Planted out the various pumpkins into spaces where they have a chance to grow and spread (I hope), we'll see how they do! I should put something under the apple trees, but I'm still trying to kill off the grass weeds underneath, I think...

RIPENING: Peaches now, very rapidly. Lots of the potatoes in the triangle garden potato bed.

HARVEST: NECTARINES. I'm pretty much asking everyone to come by and get nectarines. Done with preserving - did that last year, still had crazy numbers, now mostly looking to give away fresh. Including making local connections if I can.

NOTES: Sydney Edible Garden Trail is next November - 4th and 5th. Before then, I would like to:
- change the chicken tunnels from the plastic wire to metal tunnels. Also make them a little wider than they were.
- change the Apricot-Avo bed to a seating space (not enough sun in summer) Maybe also consider the Avo-Shed, although that could be perennially leafy greens and maybe some green shallots which don't need all that much sun.