Blog September 2018.

It's September at last, and after a cold, wet and windy August, the weather in Melbourne is starting to warm up a bit. Here are a few photos of my garden taken today.

Under the Anzac fruit tree, which is in bloom and promising a good harvest later in the season.

A close up of a flowering head on my Californian Lilac tree. This small tree is covered with buds which are starting to bloom. It attracts loads of bees and hover-flies and has an almost overwhelmingly sweet aroma. A real asset in my garden.

Not many of these are left, but both Camellias have been flowering continuously for several months now.

The Climbing peas have been flowering for a few weeks and are setting pods.

The broad beans are about 900mm tall, and I have pinched out their leading shoots to direct their energies towards pod formation.

These dwarf Broad Beans are nearly as tall as the full size variety. There are 12 plants in this 900mm x 900mm planting space, and they seem to be coping very well with the cramped conditions.

I should have plenty of time to prepare the soil for the next crop in this Ecobed since the current crop is approaching harvest very quickly. I will be sowing Tomatoes in a few days, and they should be ready to replace the Brassicas and Lettuce in not much more than a month.

The Red Iceberg lettuce are looking good, but Lil is not keen on the red leaves, so guess who eats all the red leaves. Needless to say, I will be testing some open green lettuces soon.

The carrots and beetroot were both sown in clusters, and so far they seem to be flourishing. I'm hoping this technique will substantially increase my vegetable growing productivity.

The Garlic is clean and completely free of the usual blackfly attack at this time of the year. They invade alliums like garlic by landing on the plant's leaves and laying their eggs, so this year I protected the plants with loose net covers held in position using the Ecobed's hooking points. So far its working well.

These Silverbeet have been providing delicious juicy leaves and stalks for several weeks now, and are starting to increase their growth rate.

The drip line irrigated beds are ready for a growth spurt in September as the weather warms up..

These English Spinach are ready to supply plenty of delicious outer leaves.

About half the potatoes in this bed have broken out of the soil, and are starting to grow. The catch crop of Radishes and Lettuce are growing strongly and should be ready for harvest before they are overtaken by the potatoes growing in between them.

This variety of Turnip is very mild tasting when added to soups and roasts.