In The Garden This Week

 A quick snapshot of a couple of raised garden beds in our garden. Our Zucchini plants and Strawberry plants are doing well at the moment.

Today's Tomato Size.

Macalister - my cross I did last Summer.

 

In The Garden Today

 Not much happening in the garden today, but enough to keep as a memory for down the track. 

Firstly, the Red Onions got pulled, thanks Jan, as they had bolted and we would have lost them if I'd left them in the soil.

 

First up a look at my tomato plants and where I'm at with them. 

Then, I bagged a few more flower trusses, as can never have too many bags on. Looking at this photo you wouldn't think so.

Then a photo showing the curling ribbon I use to mark my trusses I bag.

Bolting Onions

We've had a few of our Red Onions bolting, so first thing was to cut the flowers off. Tomorrow we'll pull the ones that bolted and these will be dried and used first. 

 

No point wasting them.

 

How are yours going?

 

 

 

It Has Arrived

 We got our new Covid Camp Oven today, so now it needs a good hot soapy wash, then it needs to be seasoned, a job Jan will do later in the day.

For those that are not familiar with what I've called it, then the lid should say it all. It's a 12" diameter Camp Oven, so should do everything we want in it.

Waiting on Our New "Covid" Camp Oven

Our new Covid Camp Oven is stuck in the Mail Centre in Melbourne somewhere after being posted a week and a bit ago. We ordered the new 12" oven from Billman's in Castlemaine and have been hopeful of trying it out soon. 

This new oven will make our 4th Camp Oven, having a Metters, a Furphy and a China stamped one, so we're holding out to cook our next roast in the new one, if it ever arrives.

While the oven has been ordered, I have increased some of our pit items, as shown.

Off And Running - Tomatoes

My tomatoes are starting to load up. This is one of my new cross, which I named Macalister after our river here. It's a cross between the red fruited Nicoleta from Romania and Sweet Ozark Orange from USA.

It'll be interesting to see what comes out of the cross, colour wise.

Unpredictable Wind

 We live on the Gippsland Plains, with the mountains visible to our north and it gets windy here mainly over the Spring. It gets windy enough to wreck a vegie garden, including tomato plants and anything else that grows low, like zucchini's.

Two years ago it got so bad we had to go to Bunning's to get star posts so we could put up a shadecloth surround to break the wind. It worked and now we are seen putting up our shadecloth wind break, because we've found it works.

We now have a frame around/over the tomato bed and have enough shadecloth to make a great wind-break around the garden. In the photo below, we have the shadecloth set up for wind, but if it gets hot we can simply open up the existing "wall"and protect from the sun.

Zucchini Cross - Update

As a follow up to previous post.

The year before last my wife crossed a Gold Rush Zucchini with a Jade Numbat Zucchini. For those that aren't familiar with these names, the difference is that one is yellow, the other light green. Last year we grew some seed and from the variations we saw, weren't lucky enough to save seed, so we're trying again this year. Early indicators in the early plant growth show that some plants are going to be different. If you look at the two photos, one plant is showing strong signs of the yellow in it's leaves, while the other is a strong green. Interest will show us if any colour changes in the fruit show up early. A friend who grew these seeds last year got a green fruited plant, while all ours were yellow.

 

Zucchini Cross - Doing Well

 Jan's crossed Zucchini she did are doing well and you can see them growing bigger every day. These are F1 seeds from the season before last, hopefully this time we'll be successful and get seed.

Red Onions & Garlic - Doing Well

 Our Red Onions are really starting to thicken with good sized bottoms and over the next month should fill out nicely. These were ones we bought at the local Nursery when seedlings became in short supply locally during the early part of the Pandemic. We'll grow these again next year as we're very happy with how they've grown.

 

 

Although the bed of Garlic is looking good too.