Day 7 29/09/14: Tomato Prep and Silverbeet Weeding

OK just completed my hour  for the day, great weather again:)

I weeded the Silverbeet patch and prepared the patch for the tomatoes.

Louise just wants a temp ramp for the wheelchair access, so I don't think I'll need to pursue that any further - the wood we found under the house should be sufficient (shown in yesterday's pictures) so I put them into the garage until when we need to use them.

Tomato Patch (Before):

Tomato Patch (After):

Silverbeet Patch (Before):

Silverbeet Patch (After):

The Silverbeets are ready to harvest.
Louise says to harvest them; for the ones that are planned to be use (eat them fresh) I should cut the lead off down to the stalk and then the leaves will re-grow, then to cook them, place them in a frying pan for ~1 minute with salt'n'pepper and a splash off water on the frying pan (to steam).
Will try it out soon!

Also whilst weeding the Silverbeet patch I stumbled across these roots,,,the first one I dug up and I left the rest that are in there (they are in the far right part of the patch, next to the gate) - I'll ask Bill about them next time I see him to see what they are (any ideas?) and if they are worth keeping:

Tomorrow I'm planning to mow the lawn and if there is time starting on the herb/flower patch next to the back door.
Going climbing tonight :D bought a bike for $35 (£18) from Louise's neighbour that I plan to ride down to the climbing wall...otherwise it's a ~40 min walk.


Ideas to Pursue:
Security light outside wood shed
Herb plants at door (Coriander requested)
Flower bed at door
Path to wood shed / end of garden
Stars to bottom level of garden (currently only middle level)
Repair fences / gates
Shed next to PAB?
Build maze (lol!)

Short term plans:
Re-draw Garden with new plan (maybe not necessary for smaller parts)
Purchase and Plant Vegetables
Remove weeds in garbage bags (Thursday)
Mow Lawn

Day 6 28-09-14: Planting Potatoes and Ramp Ideas

OK back in Rotorua and back to the garden, spent a couple of hours on it today...been excited to get those potatoes planted :D

Spoke to Louise and she is happy for me to use the fertilizer and for the vegetable patch plans.

She also asked me to build a ramp in the front so that her friend in a wheelchair can come visit and there is some wood under the house I can use,

I'll be working on this over the next few days and started on it today, got some wood out then looked into different places/methods for supporting the ramp, will need to run them by Louise when she gets back today...could make a temp one up the stairs, however I also think a permanent one could be pretty easy to build at the front as the section is lower and could look good.

Temp Ramp at Stairs Option:

Would have to look into ways to make it stable then easy to place and remove

Permanent at Front Option:

Would just have to saw off part of the fence and build a support below the ramp and maybe a fence on each side for safety, paint it, could also have a path from the driveway to the start of the ramp (would make the wheelchair transporting / parking logistics easier)

Also thought whilst crawling around under the house that I could make an AWESOME maze under there, maybe even a trap door^^ hahaha! Wont pursue that for now though...but it would be pretty cool / scary to complete,

Under the House:

Anyway today I used the shovel to turn the soil over in the 3 patches (only took about 30 minutes), then planted the potatoes using the dirt sandwich technique that Bill advised, here is what the trenches look like:

Potato Trench 1:

Potato Trench 2:

Wouldn't have enjoyed being a WW1 solider much, tough grind digging those trenches!  Using the right equipment put a lot less strain on my back though which is good.

Dirt sandwich complete and potatoes planted...as per the instructions Bill gave me (30cm apart, fertilizer / dirt / potatoes / dirt), will need to add another level of dirt on top once they start sprouting out of the soil:

Went through the 2 bags of compost:

...and then dug a hole for the scraps (cabbage thrown in):

Easy, been eating the mandarins off the the tree to keep me energized - they taste so fresh ;)

Tomorrow I'm planning to prepare the tomato patch after working on the ramp...the rubbish collection comes Friday so on Thursday I'll bag up the weeds and put them out.

Ideas to Pursue:
Security light outside wood shed
Herb plants at door (Coriander requested)
Flower bed at door
Path to wood shed / end of garden
Stars to bottom level of garden (currently only middle level)
Repair fences / gates
Shed next to PAB?
Ramp in front garden
Build maze (lol!)

Short term plans:
Re-draw Garden with new plan (maybe not necessary for smaller parts)
Purchase and Plant Vegetables
Remove weeds in garbage bags (Thursday)
Prepare patch for Tomatoes
Build ramp (temp or perm?)

Day 5 26-09-14: Weeding Lower Vegetable Patch and Preparation

Done a long session today, nearly 3 hours, back's got some tan from the great weather :D However I'm going away this weekend to see Arj and Karen in Papamoa (am writing the blog from here now, so technically the session was yesterday) so I won't be able to do any work for the next few days. 

Bill came round in the afternoon, we talked for an hour or so further to yesterday and discussed some ideas that I'll need to run by Louise to ensure she is happy before progressing, I also now have access to the garage now so I gave Jill and Derek their tools back...pretty sure all the equipment I will need is in the garage (will add photos in future posts)

Bill has loads of tips and useful information....there is a lot to gardening!  

I'll go into more details as applicable, but it includes topics like what, where, when to plant, quantity to use, how to protect the crops, how to treat the soil, which tools to use for which job, etc.  Really useful! (Thanks Bill ;D) 

Post our discussion, here is the plan:

In the higher vegetable patch: (CLRS) Cabbage, Lettuce, Radish, Strawberries.

In the lower vegetable patch: (PAB) Potatoes and Beans

In the Pumpkin patch:  Pumpkins (obviously?)

Next to woodshed: Tomato Vines
Herbs: Unconfirmed as of yet

mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm Strawberries :D 

We are going to go to Bunning's next week to buy the seeds for planting (will add details of the purchases and prices once done), so got one more week of preparation - I feel that preparation, knowledge and tools are the most important parts of successful gardening, however we will have to see :D

Bill recommended digging holes for placing organic fertilizer in (e.g. the cabbage that was dug up) and food waste...I've added this to my short term plans and will provide details / pictures once complete.  He also showed me how to weed more effectively, grab the snake by its head...which means find where it's roots go into the ground and dig it up from there - the weeds seem to go on forever.

I'll also need to use the Shovel (not the spade as I have been doing!) to bring the good soil from underground to the top in the 3 patches (dark soil is good and so are earthworms)...the shovel is better to use than a spade because it has a longer handle and better shaped head for this type of digging (much nicer on the back).
Dig it up and place it back on top, plan your route also so that you don't step on the soil that has been dug up already because you don't want to pact it together by stepping on it...this way the soil gets air (like when making a fire) and the plant roots find it easier to root the soil.

Next to the wood shed is where the tomatoes will go, I'll need to dig the ground up around there...not too much is required - Bill showed me how far out to dig and this'll be shown in the pictures once I complete the task. 

I have some potatoes that I bought last week and they are ready to plant (first let the potatoes dry out for a week or so that the roots grow a bit out of the potato) - apparently the way to plant them is to and I'll add diagrams as I do this:
Dig a trench about ~40cm deep

• Add 10cm of fertilizer
• Add 10cm of dirt (what was just dug up)
• Add the potato
• Add 10cm of dirt
• Place potatoes about ~30cm apart

I like to call it the potato dirt sandwich...apparently it's not a good idea to have the fertilizer touching the potato directly.
I can't quite remember what Bill said (there was a lot of information to take in!) but I think in a few weeks once the potatoes have started to grow out of the ground, then place another level of dirt on them so they can keep growing upwards.

Thanks again Bill for sharing the knowledge!

Anyway, here's some pictures, was in a bit of a rush post discussion with Bill as I needed to catch a bus to Papamoa and once I get back to Rotorua I'll take some more:

PAB Before:

PAB After:

Doesn't look like a lot, but took me about 3 hours (although probably could have been shorter if I used the right tools d'oh, lesson learnt.  Out in the sun all day though, so worked out well :D)

Cabbages got chopped, they'll be the first contributors to the "organic fertilizer"holes:

Here are some other pictures, Louise's flowers look good:

This picture doesn't do it justice, but the tree blossom looks awesome:

This tree is going to blossom soon, so wanted a picture for it's before and after ;)

Ideas to Pursue:
Security light outside wood shed
Herb plants at door
Flower bed at door
Path to wood shed / end of garden
Stars to bottom level of garden (currently only middle level)
Repair fences / gates
Shed next to PAB

Short term plans:
Re-draw Garden with new plan (maybe not necessary for smaller parts)
Purchase and Plant Vegetables
Remove weeds in garbage bags (check which date the rubbish comes as the bag may be moist)
Dig up holes for natural fertilizers
Dig up patches (good soil to top) with shovel
Dig up trenches and plant potatoes
Prepare patch for Tomatoes

Day 4 25-09-14: Weeding and Planning

So much weeding!  Done 1.5 hours today as I started preparing the next part as well, but feel like I'm making good progress, another great day...the weather here is so nice.

Louise stayed overnight for her work so I still haven't got access to the garage or Bill's phone number (might walk down to his house later today), however the neighbors are very nice people (Jill and Derek).
I helped them yesterday with some chores, had a tea and a chat, and today they were kind enough to offer me some tools for gardening from their garage to use as well as give me some lemons :)...they also have a punch bag, a speed ball and a nice flat driveway (unfortunately Derek can't train anymore as he is 75 and has cancer, which is very sad to hear about,they are such nice people and he was obviously very into his fitness before this)...they are happy for me to use all of it (the driveway will be good to dance on! first I'll need a floor though as the surface isn't great).

I've been using the gateway to do pull ups on the gate in Louise's garden also.

Anyway here are the tools :D

Here's the patch I weeded today.

Before:

After:

Planning to part Pumpkins here, so will call it the "Pumpkin patch"

The cabbage that fell over yesterday...well it fell over again, but the plant is growing up towards the sun so think I'll just have to leave it be, watered them today as well:

To make things clearer, I'll call this patch the high vegetable patch

I started on the next part of the garden as well a bit today, which I'm going to call the low vegetable patch

Current state:

There was some wooden planks laying around that I used to outline my plan for this part of the Garden...I want to make a vegetable patch here with trees on either side and a pathway on top:

So in reference to the below picture here's the plan:
The pathway will be on the right and then a couple of trees at the back and there is already the Mandarin tree on the left...in the future I was considering designing and building a small shed at the end (where the broken gate is) rather than have tree's as it would be a good place to keep all the tools for maintaining the vegetable patches - this is just an idea for a future project, something I'm not going to look into further until the other tasks are complete.

Felt my back strain a bit today whilst moving the wood and weeding, might look into a back support as for this part of the garden I'll need to do a lot of digging !  I'll also need to do something about the gate at the back of this picture.

Now I'm off to town to pie a premium NZ pie :D

Ideas to Pursue:
Security light outside wood shed
Herb plants
Flower bed at door
Vegetable patches
Path to wood shed / end of garden
Stars to bottom level of garden (currently only middle level)
Repair fences / gates
Shed next to Vegetable patch

Short term plans:
Review equipment in garage (need key from Louise)
Re-draw Garden with new plan (maybe not necessary for smaller parts)
Determine flowers for flower bed and vegetables for vegetable patch (research, ask Bill)
Purchase and Plant Vegetables
Create plan for compost / rubbish
Saw wood to correct size for the low vegetable patch
Weed and dig up the low vegetable patch
Research into back supports for digging/weeding

Day 3 24-09-14: More Weeding

Done some more weeding today for my hour in preparation for planting some vegetables.

Was a bit worried because one of the cabbages that is already there (and I want to keep) had lost it's structure and was almost lying on the floor after I had done the weeding yesterday, so to keep it up right I built a little pile of dirt at it's base.  It seemed to work out well, will see how it looks in a few days.
I'll need to speak with Bill and get some tips on what to plant, also I want to put a plank of wood at the end of the patch to square it off from the tree.
It doesn't matter how much I dig up of the earth, there is always more weeds lol...it's easy to get addicted to removing the weeds but they just seem to go on forever!

Ok here's some pictures of the progress.

Before:

After:

Mounds to make the Cabbage upright:

Still not got a plan for what to do with the weeds/rubbish...pile is growing:

Some of the weed roots look like they come straight out of alien...it is hard work digging them up, also some of them I didn't see until I forked into the Earth and then there was a massive amount of roots - I think they are carrots?  Not planning on using them though, so just making the space clear for the new vegetables:

Ideas to Pursue:
Security light outside wood shed
Herb plants
Flower bed at door
Vegetable patches
Path to wood shed / end of garden
Stars to bottom level of garden (currently only middle level)
Repair fences / gates

Short term plans:
Review equipment in garage (need key from Louise)
De-weed area in front of Garage
Re-draw Garden with new plan (maybe not necessary for smaller parts)
Determine flowers for flower bed and vegetables for vegetable patch (research, ask Bill)
Purchase and Plant Vegetables
Create plan for compost / rubbish
Obtain plank of wood to square of patch

Day 2 23-09-14: Cleaning and Weeding

Ok so for my hour today I cleaned up the rubbish in the garden (newspaper, drink bottles, etc.) and started on weeding.  I wanted to check out the equipment in the garage..but realized I don't have a key for this and will need to get a key from Louise - fortunately I found some gloves and a fork to do some weeding with.

Here's some before and after pictures for the weeding.

Before:

After:

And here is the equipment I used (lol) :)

I also realized that I will need to get rid of the rubbish somehow...will look into this.

Ideas to Pursue:
Security light outside wood shed
Herb plants
Flower bed at door
Vegetable patches
Path to wood shed / end of garden
Stars to bottom level of garden (currently only middle level)
Repair fences / gates
Chicken Coup
Gate to Next door
Options for view from window
Options for where to store bikes (garage)

Short term plans:
Review equipment in garage (need key from Louise)
De-weed Vegetable patch
De-weed area in front of Garage
Re-draw Garden with new plan (maybe not necessary for smaller parts)
Determine flowers for flower bed and vegetables for vegetable patch (research, ask Bill)
Purchase and Plant Vegetables
Create plan for compost / rubbish

Day 1 22-09-14: Introduction and Blueprints

Introduction:

This blog will document all the progress I have made in Gardening whilst staying at my Sister-in-law's mother's house (Louise) in Rotorua New Zealand.

My plan is to spend 1 hour a day working on the garden and blogging my progress (with pictures), nice n simple - I have done no gardening before so this will be a learning experience for me, but no worries cos the weather here is awesome :D

Any feedback or comments are welcome and appreciated, I'm ready to learn :)

Unfortunately my camera is a little bit broke (the black dot in every picture).

Day 1: 23-09-14
Today I made a rough drawing of the current state of the garden (it's pretty big!), documented some ideas to discuss with Louise and started a plan for tomorrow.

Rough Drawing:
You can't really see much from this but here it is anyway haha:



Ideas to discuss:
Security light outside wood shed
Chicken Coup
Herb Plants
Flower Bed at door
Vegetable Patches
Path to wood shed / end of garden
Stars to bottom level of garden (currently only middle level)
Gate to Next door
Options for view from window
Options for where to store bikes

Short term plans:
Review equipment in garage
Clean back area of Garden
De-weed Vegetable patch
De-weed area in front of Garage
Re-draw Garden with new plan
Determine flowers for flower bed and vegetables for vegetable patch (research)

Here are some pictures of what it looks like in no particular order:

These mandarins taste so good