It is that truly beautiful time of the year, where the days are just starting to get shorter, the sun is not as hot as it was a few weeks back and the evenings are so mellow. The Coral trees have lost most of their leaves, the White Stinkwoods are just starting and the Wild Figs are still hanging in with their leaves. This is the only time of the year when the shade is sometimes not enough during the day.
We have been doing an online permaculture course, as well as reading quite a bit about the permaculture principles, and both Michael and I have been working hard in the garden. We have decided that Michael will be more involved with the vegetable garden. He is to help with layout and fences and earth moving etc. Michael is also better at growing from seeds than me, so he will be helping with that.
So far it is working out well as he has put up a fence around one section of the patch. I have had such damage from little buck coming in from the kloof and eating my seedlings, as well as our own chickens doing a bit scratching in the wrong places.
The more we are learning about permaculture, the more we realise that we are more or less on the right track already, but just need to refine a few things.
One of the new things we are making is a banana circle. You basically plant three or four bananas in a circle, it is basically a circular swale, with the inside of the circle becoming a compost heap for kitchen scraps etc. On top of that, the bananas grow and, and bear bunches on the outside. Bananas are gross feeders and thrive on nutrients from the decaying organic matter in the central hole. You then start planting other vegetables like sweet potatoes around the outside of the circle, as well as climbers like beans to grow up the bananas. We’ve done the first one already.
We also have a cool new greywater system for the veg patch. The water from the kitchen sink runs through some mulch (that gets changes regularly) into a water storage tank, and from there it waters the patch.
Something that every garden should have are a few bug hotels. This could just be bunches of twigs tied together, skulls or feathers, basically hiding places for the good guys in the garden to hide away in. It is gratifying to see the bugs move into their new hotels almost immediately.
Michael took out honey last week, he got quite a bit of nice dark honey.
Jbay Garden 