All Hallows

Quote of the week, from a ten year old who didn't go on the halloween walk in our town: "Well, I don't know why this stuff is still up," indicating halloween decorations,  "we shouldn't be celebrating it anymore.  And anyways, it's really all-hallows we should be celebrating anyways."

Planting and preparing: Have put in another trellis on the 'back' beds, then sown with beans and corn in one of the beds.  In the other I've put beans, corn and cucumber, and corn and spring onions.  In the first bed, didn't mulch along the bean row.  In the second, mulched the whole lot.  Of interest, something has come along and scratched holes in the soil where the beans are/were.  Suspect it was a bird.

Cucumbers planted in the water 'basins' around the Yacka's on the northern house bed.  Mulched with old pine needles.

Seedlings finally arrived in egg cartons - Tanunda orange daisies and stocks.

Transplanted one pot's worth of tomato seedlings of each variety (gross lesse and cherry) into planting tubes.  About 12 tubes of each type.

Sunflowers transplanted into 4" pots.  Appear to wilt and die after about a week.  Suspect pots too big/exposed (put out under sunlight).  More sunflower seeds put in both soil (with bird wire over this time) and pots.

 Transplanted parsley and a mint into herb patch in sun (central bed, near rosemary).  Mulched.

Soaked (in tubs of water) all pots I could manage to lift etc.  Totaled about 120.  Mulched a lot of the exposed larger ones.  Started populating under the central shade cloth with pot plants between the herbs and silverbeet. 

Mulched silverbeet, sprouts, leek in beds, strawberries in pots.

Tall sloping shade structures built over the two path beds.  Did it with scrap timber, metal, fence droppers and poles for a frame, bound with baling twine, with shade cloth over the top.  Made it so that one has to duck only a little to use the central path, and can stand up inside the structure.  Catches morning sun, deflects the west wind.

Flatter shade stucture over centre of central bed.  Droppers, old prunings and shade cloth.  Need to duck to get under it.  Most of central beds remain uncovered (plants not wilting so presumably okay at present).

Started a hot compost heap on S side of driveway.  Picked up a uteload of scraped up horsedroppings (with hydrophic soil to about equal volume) from a friend.  Used this as base nitrogen content (along with prunings from garden, fridge clean out 'product', and five litres of nettle juice) to which I added the various piles of weed from around the yard to equal volume for the carbon.  Layered this, soaking every two layers.  Size of heap is a bit over a metre square at base and a close to four foot high.  It was 55'C in centre in morning and over 60'C at dusk.  Today was the third day, I turned it over.  Covered heap with tarps due wind/heat etc while I'm gone.  Will be at least three days before I get to it again.