SPRING GREEN NOTES
Contents:
Growing tomatoes
Reducing Plant Disease Problems
What to
Sow Now
Seed Sowing
Asparagus Care and Hollandaise Sauce
Garden Calendar August, September and October
DELICIOUS, HOME-GROWN TOMATOES
Growing your own tomatoes and harvesting the sun-warmed
fully ripe fruit is one of the rewards of gardening.
Start with seed of a heritage variety, full of flavour. Tomatoes are self-pollinating, so you can have several varieties growing at once and save the seed for the next season. If you live in a warmer area, try the medium-sized, disease-resistant ‘Tropic’. Plant ‘Beefsteak’ for big, tasty tomatoes, excellent for slicing; ‘Cherry Yellow Pear’ is a prolific bearer of mild, sweet fruit. Information on Successful Seed Raising. When it is time to transplant, plant the tomato seedlings deeper, first removing the seed leaves and planting up to the 1st set of true leaves. This deepens the extent of the root area and speeds maturity. Keep the plants growing vigorously and disease at bay with regular applications of Natrakelp seaweed fertiliser or Granulated Kelp.
If you suspect fruit fly will be a problem, an effective and easy organic solution is to simply cover the fruit with a PestGuard Bag
. Alternatively you could create a fruitfly-free zone within your garden by erecting a frame and covering it with PlantGuard or Vege Net.
DETERMINATE OR INDETERMINATE?
Determinate tomatoes are also described as ‘Bush’ types and usually grow between 90 and 120 cm. They usually don’t
require staking. Indeterminate tomatoes are also known as ‘Climbing’ types and usually grow between 1.8 - 2.4m. They need staking. Height can be reduced by tying the tomato bush to a stake 1.5m high and then allowing additional growth to just flop over or by pruning.
Once you have achieved a bumper tomato crop, preserving either as chutney, sauce or semi-dried will mean you can enjoy your harvest for many months.
SPICY TOMATO CHUTNEY
2 tablespoons oil (to fry spices)
30 - 40 chillies, finely chopped – very mild ones (or 3-6 Birdseye)
20 cloves garlic, finely chopped
250 g fresh ginger, finely grated or chopped
5 kg tomatoes, peeled and chopped
6 tablespoons ground cumin
2 tablespoons turmeric
2 tablespoons black mustard seeds
4 cups cider or brown vinegar
3 tablespoons salt
3 - 5 onions, chopped
3 cups sugar
2 large green apples (optional)
Heat the oil and fry the spices, garlic, ginger and chillies in a large, heavy-based saucepan (not aluminium) until lightly cooked. Add the rest of the ingredients and simmer slowly for hours, until the desired consistency is reached. The saucepan should not be more than 2/3 full. Apples are optional, they can be added at the same time as the tomatoes, first peel and finely chop. Stir often. The chutney will start to stick when it is nearly ready. Heat clean jars, standing upright in a baking tray, in a slow oven, without lids, until very hot. Take chutney off the stove and bottle and seal jars immediately. Jars with plastic or plastic lined lids are best for chutney because the vinegar corrodes metal. After sealing, wash down the outside of jars (if sticky) and cool on a towel or tea towel, on a bench top, out of draughts (cold bench tops e.g. granite can crack jars).
REDUCING PLANT DISEASE PROBLEMS
A variety of microorganisms including fungi, bacteria, viruses and nematodes can cause plant disease. While it is useful to identify the cause of the problem, most organic solutions to tackle diseases are aimed at prevention - by improving the natural balance within the garden.
LONG TERM STRATEGIES TO COMBAT DISEASE PROBLEMS
The overall design of your garden plays an important part in creating and maintaining ‘garden health’. Make sure that the soil is well drained, that airflow is good and that only plants that like the shade are planted in shady spots. Good plant selection alone can make an enormous difference to the health of the garden.
PLANT SELECTION
Selecting the plants most suited to your area, whether
ornamentals, vegetables or fruit trees will reward you with
minimal disease problems. At its most basic, being suitable
means the plant evolved in a climatic zone similar to your
own. So a plant native to the Mediterranean such as a fig or
grape will do best in areas with dry summers. If your area
has wet summers than be prepared for problems with
Mediterranean plants and do your best to select a planting
spot with excellent ventilation and good drainage. If you
live in an area with hot, humid summers then it makes sense
to select plants that have developed in these areas; most
European vegetables have an Asian equivalent that is likely
to be more disease resistant. So try substituting snake
beans for French beans,
Angled Luffa
or New Guinea Bean for zucchini,
Kangkong
or
Ceylon Spinach
for silverbeet and so on. Getting the timing right can also
reduce disease problems; avoid planting vegetables prone to
rust, powdery or downy mildew just prior to periods of
expected high humidity.
SOIL HEALTH
Plant health is as dependent on the soil, as our own health is on what we eat. Pay attention to feeding the soil and its micro-fauna. Just as many pests are controlled in an organic garden by predatory insects, so can many diseases be controlled by a diverse and abundant soil life. Increase the organic matter by composting, green manuring and mulching. Mulching acts as a barrier and helps restrict the spread of fungal spores from the soil onto the plant. Trace elements are critical to plant health; seaweed is a good way to add these essential nutrients - try Natrakelp or
Granulated Kelp. Avoid high nitrogen fertilisers, especially in summer when fungal problems are at their height, as soft new growth is very vulnerable to disease.Golden rule: Stay out of the garden when it is wet.
This is definitely the time of year when fruit fly prevention should be on every gardener's mind, especially those who are hoping to harvest delicious fresh fruit and vegetables. Green Harvest believes only an organic solution will do, because contaminating your fresh produce with systemic insecticides seems to defeat the whole purpose of growing your own!
Here are some questions to consider when deciding on a fruit
fly control strategy:
Are you a home gardener with just a few plants or trees to
protect?
Is the fruit up very high, or easy to reach? Or are you a
commercial grower?
Do you have limited time for managing your plants? Is
regular weekly spraying an option, or would a “set and
forget” product suit you better?
Do you also need to protect your fruit from other creatures,
such as birds, bats or possums?
Our products to deal with fruit fly can be divided into 3
categories:
EXCLUSION:
An easy “set and forget” method – by installing exclusion
products such as covers, bags or sleeves as soon as the
fruit is set, you put in place a simple but effective
barrier against the egg-laying female fruit fly. This will
suit gardeners with a home garden to protect with fruit
within reach.
To buy Exclusion Products
TRAP:
These pheromone or “sex attractant”-based products are used
to trap and kill the male fruit fly. Both the Bugs for Bugs
Fruit Fly Trap and the Wild May Fruit Fly Attractant and
trap are useful as monitoring tools, an effective “early
warning system” to help you recognize the start of the fruit
fly season. Traps for monitoring should be in place by late
winter, in a position that you will easily notice and so
maintain. Many people find that by trapping large numbers of
male flies, the local population of breeding fruit flies is
reduced and that this helps reduce damage in subsequent
years. Many gardeners will be familiar with the
disappointment of only noticing the fruit fly when it is too
late and the fruit is stung and full of maggots.
BAIT:
Eco-Naturalure Fruit Fly Bait
is the only product that attracts & kills both male & female
flies. To be effective it needs to be reapplied every 7
days. It is particularly suited to larger gardens, bigger
orchards or situations where the trees are too tall to reach
the fruit such as mangoes or trees that are very heavy
bearing such as citrus.
More information on organic fruit fly control…
SPRING
CITRUS CARE
Prune citrus lightly after all danger of frost has passed.
Pruning is only necessary to remove dead-wood and keep the
centre of the tree open and branches from crossing. Always
remove shoots or suckers from below the graft as soon as
possible, as they steal vigour from the tree and if left too
long, leave large wounds for disease to enter when they are
cut. Raising the ‘skirt’ so that foliage does not touch the
ground will make fertilising and mulching jobs easier. To
‘skirt’ a tree remove low shoots so that the lower edge of
the canopy is 60 cm clear of the ground.
-
Citrus trees are very hungry feeders with high requirements for trace elements; a regular spray with a seaweed fertiliser such as Natrakelp or the application of either Granulated Kelp or Shuttle Seven will supply this.
-
Fertilise citrus in early spring, a one-year-old tree will need 4 to 8 kg of well-rotted animal manure, a mature tree will need between 20 and 40 kg of well-rotted animal manure. Only apply fertiliser to moist ground then mulch well, keeping the mulch and manure well clear of the trunk, to avoid collar-rot. Never place fertiliser close to the trunk or in heaps; spread it as evenly as possible to just past the drip-line of the tree.
-
Watch out for the egg clusters and nymphs of the Bronze Orange Bug from spring through to early summer. At this stage they are easier to control than the larger, dark brown adults that appear late spring to mid summer. For the nymphs use a least-toxic soap spray such as Natrasoap.
-
Check in August on lemons, limes and grapefruits for
Citrus Gall Wasp which causes
swellings on the twigs. Prune off and burn immediately.
Insectrap is a non-toxic sticky trap
that attracts and kills Citrus Gall Wasp.
-
Citrus Leaf Miner causes ugly distorted leaves with silvery trails in the leaf tissue. Eco Oil is a non-toxic control, spray when new growth is about 1 cm long, reapply every 2-3 weeks. October and February are crucial times to spray.
-
Band citrus trees with horticultural glue to keep ants and other crawling pests out, use either Tanglefoot or Trappit Barrier Glue. Sticky barriers are very effective at reducing scale attacks.
CITRUS KIT
Includes:
Eco Oil 500ml
Trappit Barrier Glue
Grafting / Banding Tape
1 Insectrap
Organic Citrus Care Leaflet
PG121 $49.50
To order.....
Books with practical
information on citrus include the following:
Citrus: A Guide to Organic Management, Propagation, Pruning, Pest Control and Harvesting
ORGANIC STRATEGIES FOR NEMATODE
PROBLEMS
Nematodes or eelworms affect the growth of a wide range
of plants, including rose, silverbeet, potato, carrot,
tomato, lettuce and zucchini. They are tiny creatures
that burrow into the roots of your plants and stimulate
the development of galls, or lumps on the roots. The
infected plants are stunted and they wilt rapidly in hot
weather. On potatoes they can cause wart-like lesions on
the skin. Nematodes are a particular problem for
gardeners with sandy soils and in humid areas. When
harvesting infected plants it is important to remove as
much infected root from the soil as possible, as
nematode eggs can hatch out of the roots as they
decompose. Do not place the infected roots in a compost
heap at it is unlikely to get hot enough to kill the
eggs. Instead if your garden is big enough place the
damaged plant material under a native tree or shrub that
is unlikely to be a host plant for the nematode, so that
they starve. In a small garden you may need to put the
plant material into the garbage.
There are a range of actions you can take to control the
nematodes, some of which may have undesirable
consequences. Digging fresh chicken manure into a hot,
dry soil, something normally to be avoided, has been
shown to reduce nematode numbers. Leave the soil
undisturbed for at least 3 weeks. Drenching with water,
molasses or sugar can also kill nematodes, but will have
a negative impact on the earthworms.
The best organic strategy is biofumigation - using
decomposing plants to produce gases that kill nematodes.
The most effective plants to do this are
marigolds and
BQ Mulch. The old gardening adage that marigolds stop
nematodes is unfortunately only partly true - to have a
significant effect, the marigolds must be chopped up and
dug through the soil. The same applies to BQ Mulch, a
dwarf brassica. Once incorporated into the soil, the
plants release a bio-fumigant gas as they break down.
Soil solarization is also very effective for both
nematode and weed control. To do this successfully lay
clear plastic sheets on moist soil during the warmer
months. The plastic must be pulled tight as close to the
soil surface as possible with the edges buried. The aim
is to keep the heat in. Leave in place for a minimum of
six weeks.
Salad mixes, mesclun, baby
leaf and microgreens are new terms for many gardeners
although they have been available in supermarkets as a
packaged salad item for many years. So what are they and
are they worth growing in the home garden?
Salad Mixes, 'baby leaf' or 'mesclun' are mixtures of
green, leafy vegetables grown in a seedbed and picked by
removing the outside leaves at a 'baby leaf' stage.
Salad mixes or 'mesclun' were originally French; the
name comes from the word mescla, which means 'to mix' in
the local dialect of Nice. The idea was to make a salad
that includes every taste and texture sensation: bitter,
sweet, tangy, crunchy and tender. The original recipe
was a combination of early shoots of rocket, dandelion
greens and lettuce. Other ingredients in a mix might
include chicories (syn. radicchio), beetroot greens,
asian greens (tatsoi, mizuna), spinach, kale, and
mustard greens.
For further information on growing salad mix
For a range of seeds suitable for salad mix
After
a very cold winter, we are looking forward to a productive
spring in the garden. In frosty areas like ours, it will be
too cold to put out frost-tender seedlings until
mid-September. Keep a garden diary so that you have a record
of the last frost for the year, to help next year’s
planning, as it can be very disappointing to have seedlings
burnt to a crisp that you have lovingly raised. We like to
get an early start with many spring vegetables, especially
tomatoes, by starting them in a warm spot ahead of time. We
use
Mini Propagators for this and a heated propagator tray,
but the top of a hot water system or a sunny spot on a
veranda works well. Remember to use a good quality
seed-raising mix as it has the necessary aeration to allow
seeds to germinate successfully. For more information
see.....
Successful Seed Raising.
A great benefit of raising seeds yourself is you have such
an enormous range to choose from compared to bought seedling
punnets.
For those of you who have to deal with frosted gardens, remember that spraying a seaweed fertiliser such as Natrakelp will help reduce damage to frost-tender plants. Even though frost-burnt foliage is unsightly, resist the desire to cut it off until all danger of frost is past.
SEED STORAGE: The best place to store seed is in a sealed container in your fridge. Seed stored in a hot garden shed or garage that can reach temperatures greater than 40° in summer will simply die. Seed stored open to the air where it can take up moisture will lose viability. The book Seed Production for the Australian Home Vegetable Garden explains the botanical basis and methods of saving seed in the home garden.
Early spring is a good time to plant perennial food plants such as yacon, asparagus, Jerusalem artichokes, waterchestnuts, ginger, turmeric, galangal and chokos. Potatoes can be planted into well-mulched beds, only use certified seed potatoes to avoid introducing damaging virus diseases to your garden.
In August plant flower seedlings of sweet alice, cosmos, marigolds, phlox, salvia, nasturtiums, snapdragons, verbena and statice.
Sow vegetable seed of broccoli, celery, Asian vegetables, cabbage, lettuce, peas, spinach, silverbeet, radish, coriander, beetroot, rocket, turnips and spring onions. Japanese turnips are sweeter than common turnips and very hardy. Plant carrots and parsnips from seed only, root vegetables should not be transplanted. If you haven’t tried Sugar Snap peas, now is your chance!
In September sow vegetable seed or seedlings of silverbeet, lettuce, radish, spring onions, carrot, cabbage, herbs and beetroot. After all danger of frost has passed plant out cucumbers, capsicum, cape gooseberries, eggplant, okra, zucchini, rosella and tomatoes. Soil temperatures need to be around 20° C to germinate seeds of warm season vegetables. To check, see if pumpkin seeds are germinating by themselves from old compost, if so, then the soil is warm enough. Sow larger seeds such as beans, pumpkins, melons and corn directly in the ground. Remember that corn needs to be grown in a block not a row for pollination to be adequate.
Plant flowers to attract beneficial insects for biological control, try our Good Bug Mix.
Plant a green manure crop of Japanese millet and cowpeas in any unoccupied beds to improve the soil for summer planting.
In October plant seed or seedlings for Christmas dinner, especially colourful, open-hearted lettuces like Red Mignonette, butter beans, golden button squash, cherry tomatoes.
ASPARAGUS
By now, if you
are lucky enough to have a bed of
asparagus, the old tops should have been
cut off and compost and well-rotted
manure applied to feed the bed for its
spring flush of growth. Asparagus is
easy to grow in both subtropical and
temperate climates. It thrives on lots
of rain and has no
problems with pests or diseases. In fact
in old, abandoned gardens, asparagus can
be seen growing years later amongst tall
grass and weeds. We harvest by a
rule-of-thumb, if the spears are thicker
than a pencil we cut them before the
spears branch, usually at approx. 20 cm
high, if they are skinnier, we leave
them to develop and feed the crown.
Fresh asparagus is delicious steamed
with a Hollandaise sauce, flavoured with
fresh dill.
More information on growing asparagus
....
Hollandaise
Sauce.
Have you been put off by the time consuming method using
a whisk and double saucepan? Try this;
it takes only minutes to make in a
blender!
- 125 g butter (4 ozs)
- 2 egg yolks
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- salt to taste
- fresh herbs
Melt butter in a saucepan over low heat. Heat to bubbling but do not let brown. Meanwhile, place in blender the other ingredients. Cover the blender, switch to low speed, immediately uncover and pour in the hot butter in a steady stream. When all the butter is incorporated, turn off. If using herbs, add chopped herbs and switch on until combined. If too thick, thin it with a little hot water.
GARDEN CALENDAR
This information mainly applies to northern NSW and Queensland and other subtropical zones.
-
Prune winter-flowering grevilleas, by removing seed heads and cutting long shoots back by a third, to promote bushiness.
-
Bananas need management to produce good-sized bunches including regular removal of suckers. Each clump of bananas should be made up of a mature plant, a half-grown plant and one sucker only. Allowing all the suckers to grow will mean that bunches are either small or non-existent. Preference in
sucker selection should be given to those with
spear-shaped rather than round leaves and on the side of
the plant that you wish the clump to move in. Fertilise
with 400g of complete organic fertiliser after the
emergence of the first new suckers and again 8 weeks
later. Mulch well. Tidy the plant by removing yellowing,
old leaves and if a bunch has developed, remove the
flower bell. The flower bell drips nectar and attracts
possums and bats; it also uses nutrients better saved
for the fruit.
Banana bags help fruit ripen and keep the birds
away.
Bags are half blue and half silver to reflect heat. -
Established passionfruit vines should be fertilised in early spring, use up to 1 kg of blood and bone with 100g of sulphate of potash added, spread onto moist soil and mulch well.
-
Prune citrus lightly in spring after all danger of frost has passed. Pruning is only necessary to remove deadwood and keep the centre of the tree open and branches from crossing. Always remove shoots or suckers from below the graft as soon as possible, as they steal vigour from the tree and if left too long, leave large wounds for disease to enter when they are cut. Raising the ‘skirt’ so that foliage does not touch the ground will make fertilising and mulching jobs easier. To ‘skirt’ a tree remove low shoots so that the lower edge of the canopy is 60 cm clear of the ground.
-
Citrus trees are very hungry feeders with high requirements for trace elements; a regular spray with a seaweed fertiliser such as Natrakelp will supply trace elements. Fertilise citrus in early spring, a one-year-old tree will need 4 to 8 kg of well-rotted animal manure, a mature tree will need between 20 and 40 kg of well-rotted animal manure. Only apply fertiliser to moist ground then mulch well, keeping the mulch and manure well clear of the trunk, to avoid collar-rot. Never place fertiliser close to the trunk or in heaps; spread it as evenly as possible to just past the drip-line of the tree. Check for Citrus Gall Wasp on lemons and grapefruits, which cause swellings on the twigs, prune off and burn immediately. More information on organic citrus care......
-
Divide
Queensland Arrowroot to increase the
quantities you have of this useful
plant. Our fruit trees have a
semi-circle of Arrowroot planted a few
metres below each one, to make mulching
the trees quick and easy. This also
traps any down-slope movement of soil
and nutrients.
-
If your peach or nectarine trees had peach-leaf curl last year, they will need to be sprayed with Lime Sulphur before the buds swell. Once fruit have formed, thin fruit to one peach per node and bag the fruit, to protect from fruit fly.
-
Custard apples should be pruned now, cut back leaders, remove water shoots, prune laterals and skirt trees. Band trees, such as citrus and custard apple, with sticky barriers, use horticultural glue, to keep ants and other crawling pests out of trees. Sticky barriers are very effective at reducing scale attacks.
-
Make sure fruit fly traps are in place by late August.
-
Pineapples should have old fruit stalks removed, leave up to 3 of the strongest and healthiest suckers that are nearest ground level to bear the next crop. The soil should be acidic so avoid using any lime or dolomite in the planting area. Apply a complete fertiliser at the rate of 20 g per plant in September. Always mulch pineapples extremely thickly to avoid the need to weed near those spiky leaves.
-
This is a good time to clean out a water garden. Divide waterlilies every year if they are in a container, every 3 years if they are on the bottom of the pond. Re-pot into fresh, slightly clay soil with either pulverised cow manure or a slow-release fertiliser added. Binding the fertiliser into solid clay balls helps to stop it floating away from the roots. Top with a thick layer of sand or clean gravel to stop the water becoming murky.
SEPTEMBER
-
Test the pH, excessive acidity or alkalinity will interfere with uptake of nutrients by plants. Remember never to apply lime at the same time as fertilisers as this leads to a loss of nitrogen, caused by it converting to ammonia and off-gassing. Allow 3 weeks between liming and fertiliser applications. Never add lime to a compost heap as this also leads to a large loss of nutrient into the atmosphere.
-
Fertilise pawpaws (1 kg of pelleted fowl manure per m2). If your soils are boron deficient then add 5 g to the mix, as pawpaws need plenty of boron. Remember that green pawpaws can be eaten as a vegetable. They make a good substitute for squash in a curry and are delicious in a salad.
-
Put least-toxic snail pellets out in containers close to young seedlings.
-
A wide range of fertilisers are available, with the word ‘organic’ being used rather freely. A good choice for the home gardener is an ‘organically certified’ poultry manure in pelleted form. Use up to 300g to the square metre in the vegetable garden, only ever apply to moist soil. Blood & Bone is a popular choice with organic gardeners, it is much higher in nitrogen (N) & phosphate (P) than pelleted poultry manure but it can be lower in potassium (K).
-
Weed control starts now, keep any bare ground mulched. In orchards you can get rid of all household paper scraps by soaking in water prior to spreading on the ground. Cover with at least 5 sheets of newspaper or flattened cardboard boxes. Cover this with mulch. Try the least-toxic herbicide product called Slasher.
OCTOBER
-
Citrus Leaf Miner causes ugly distorted leaves with silvery trails in the leaf tissue. Pest Oil is a non-toxic control, spray when new growth is about 1 cm long, reapply every 2-3 weeks. October and February are crucial times to spray.
-
Train vines regularly. Plant a new passionfruit, as they only last a few years before succumbing to Woody Passionfruit Virus.
-
Providing a bird bath in a sheltered position in your garden has pest control benefits! It will attract the small, insectivorous birds that do a great job cleaning up scale and aphids.
Watch for aphids on soft shoots of citrus and roses, check for beneficial insects such as Hoverflies and Ladybeetle larvae before controlling them. If some of the aphids look like little brown balloons, they have been parasitised by a micro-wasp. Spray Natrasoap as a least toxic control in the absence of predators. -
Prune spring-flowering shrubs when flowering finishes.
