Indigenous Gardening. Inheemse Tuinmaak

A dispute has existed for a while now between me/my family and our one set of neighbours. Okay, maybe the word "dispute" is a bit of an exaggeration... they/their guests have irritated us with inconsiderate parking for a few years running. I might also add that it hasn't been one family, but almost the full range of families occupying the said house over the period of irritation.

Our swamp cypress is squarely to blame for the escalation of un-neighbourly feelings. You see, even though virtually our whole neighbourhood moans about the leaves the tree so abundantly throws in autumn/winter, almost all of the very same neighbours love the shade it casts. Our next-door neighbours, and their guests, have taken it upon themselves to park in the tree's shade... on our grass... or even into our garden! You could just imagine the mother's horrified expression when she saw this trend unfolding.

That is the background to this blog post. Over the years we've had various ideas to dissuade our kindly neighbours from abusing our shady grass (including partially submerged spikes), but I finally settled on one idea this past month. I decided to create an indigenous(-ish) bed stretching all the way from the num num bed, under the cypress, to the curb. Not only would this send a very clear message to the perpetrators, but also be a sight more pleasing to the eye than sad-looking kikuyu struggling in too much shade.

The poor momster took it upon herself to remove the grass and dig in the compost. It was needed though, because the soil in that part of our yard hasn't really been composted in years. I had a vision of multiple levels, rocks, grasses and some flowery indigenous shrubs.

Let me show you the process:

The before picture/Die "voor" foto

Here are the after pictures... it didn't turn out too shabby, if I say so myself:

It turns out that the gaura I decided to plant in my indigenous bed is indigenous... just not in South Africa, but rather in North America. Oh well, what is a few thousand miles between friends?

Baby Sun Rose creeper (Aptenia cordifolia) and Guara/Rankende Rooi Brakvygie en Gaura

The Christ plant is a nice focal point in my new bed with it's thorny branches and striking blood-red flowers. It is also more indigenous than the gaura, although still off by a mile or two. It's native habitat is apparently Madagascar...

Christ Plant (Euphorbia milii)/Christusdoring

At least three elements in my "indigenous" garden are Very indigenous, that being the stones sourced from Oudtshoorn, num nums which were already thriving adjacent to the new extension and the two baby sun rose creepers I planted in the foreground. My bed might not be as indigenous as I planned it originally, but at least it is water-wise. Going the water-wise route is always a good idea in our mostly dry country, even in a relatively rainy area like the Garden Route. Here is what the bed looks like from the other direction:

Three creeping num nums (Carissa family)/Drie rankende noem-noeme

Which indigenous plants have you planted recently? #ProudlySouthAfrican (ish)

Warm Season Garden Planning. Warm Weer Tuin Beplanning

Welcome to my second instalment of fruit and veg garden planning. The last time I blogged about garden planning it was the beginning of our southern autumn and I was very hopeful and excited about the possibilities of my cold season garden. This time around I'm blogging midway through the spring, so therefore this post is about planning for warm planting season.

The success of my winter garden was a mixed bag of welcome delights and bitter disappointments. I can quite happily state though, that the failures in my winter garden was less to do with inadequate planning and more to do with being over-enthusiastic. Yes, once again I made some mistakes in my garden, but I will post on this in future. This post is about informing you on my plans for my three main fruit and veg beds, and the subsequent exertion put into getting ready for the summer season.

Backyard veg patch worked over and ready for compost/Agterplaas groentetuin is omgespit en gereed vir kompos

Calculating how much space you have

This season I spent the least amount of time on this step. You see; I have a mild case of OCD so I spent hours upon hours of measuring, re-measuring, calculating and re-calculating the size of all my beds in March of this year. This time around I just pulled up my Excel spreadsheet... and Bob's your uncle! I will admit that it took some minor fiddling here and there as my calculations were a bit off last time. As I am ever the perfectionist, this minor error had to be fixed. Just Had to!

The total size of my three main beds is 12.84m² of which 7.72m² is usable for fruit and veg production. This is due to certain areas being in the deep shade during certain periods of the day, or simply by perennials taking up the space. I know my space is severely limited, but one has to work with what one has, hey?

Deciding on which veggies or varieties to grow

Which summer fruit and veggies do we like to eat most?

• Apples
• Baby marrows
• Beans
• Butternut
• Cucumbers
• Grapes
• Peppers
• Sweet Potatoes
• Tomatoes

If I go according to that list, my planning measures up in the following way: 

I already have a Granny Smith apple in my fruit bed. It's been in my garden about a year and a half and still going strong, but won't bear fruit for a while yet. I already bought my baby marrow (courgette/zucchini) seed at our local Agri store, but won't do butternuts again as they take up too much space. I also already have my dry beans, ready to be sowed. They're leftovers from last year's planting season. I don't have enough space for either cucumbers or grapes, so will still have to source those from our fantastic local fresh produce store, but the peppers were left in my garden. I treat them as perennials since they die back almost completely in the cold season, but always come back into their own late September. I saved three of the sweet potatoes I harvested from the garden in April to make new slips with. Currently the slips are beautiful, and forming roots in a little plastic tub filled with rain water. Tomatoes? I purchased twelve Moneymaker seedlings and cherry tomato plants from local nurseries. 

Sweet potato slips/Patatranke

Which fruit and vegetables worked in my garden last spring/summer?

• Beans
• Pepinos
• Cocktail Tomatoes (our bigger tomatoes were mostly a dismal failure)
• Nasturtium leaves
• Parsley
• Radish
• Sweet Potatoes

Which plants or vegetables benefit most from each other?

Companion planting is a subject every organic backyard farmer must familiarise him/herself with. This is due to the fact that bugs and pests love fresh veggies just as much as we do, especially in a humid climate like the Garden Route's. I won't spray any (non-organic) pesticides, so the fruit and veggies are even more of a temptation to the little critters. The best way to solve, or at least minimise, this problem is to inter-plant fruit and veggies with beneficial herbs and plants and also plant trap crops like nasturtiums. The former assist and provide nutrition to the fruit and vegetables and the latter draw the pests away from our treasured produce. The idea behind companion planting is to create a small and balanced eco-system in your garden, thereby not providing fodder for bugs by planting a ton of the same plant or species. The best South African advice on companion planting is to be found on Livingseeds' website and another good table can be found here.

Which plants are most suited to my soil type and amount of shade?

This is a question that can only be answered with a great degree of certainty after the third or fourth growing season. Yes, as a gardener you will probably know what kind of soil you're blessed (or cursed with), and therefore which fruit and veggies are best suited to your property, but even this knowledge might be misleading. My blessing is the fact that my parents frequently composted in years gone by. My curse is that our natural soil is rich in clay, but luckily the same parentals sorted most of this out by extensively applying lime. I have never actually done a pH test on my soil so I can't say without doubt whether I have acid or loamy soil, but my bet is on good garden soil (somewhere between the two), as it is rich and black in colour (minus the small bits of clay left in some spots underground).

Drawing up a garden plan

I once again used the fantastic GrowVeg Garden Planner tool to assist in this task. This time around I decided to purchase a year-long membership. This enables me to not only draw up multiple garden plans without deleting and re-doing them one by one, but the tool also remember what I planted in a specific space before. This will help me with the next season's planning and planting, as the tool will give me crop rotation warnings etc. Brilliant hey! 

I've decided to share my Backyard Veg Patch plan with my avid blog readers again, if only to show you how the tool assists in the whole process... and how I've improved in utilising it haha. One thing I realised is that you can select the variety as well as the plant type. Practice makes perfect. Without further ado - here is my plan:

Backyard veg patch plan/Agterplaas tuin plan (copyright www.growveg.com)

At least I can say with all honesty that this phase of my planning took a fraction of the time this season. Thank you GrowVeg!

Preparing the soil

As I like to believe I learn from my mistakes, I decided to delay my summer season planting with a month or so this time year. My region experience most rainfall in Oct/Nov and Mar/Apr, although we do get rain most months of the year. Last year the combination of granny's impatience and my eagerness led us to sow and plant most of our warm season crops late August already. Mistake! Not only did some seeds drown in the heavy October rains, but the tomatoes and beans were more susceptible to blight, as the plants which did make it had to struggle through the whole wet season.

This time I only started to prepare my beds early October, and plan to plant my beans, courgettes, sweet potatoes and tomatoes late October. I can almost hear some readers gasp in horror. Surely one cannot sow tomatoes as late as that?! No dear readers, I've also learned from my second mistake - plant seedlings wherever possible and stay away from seeds. I learned this lesson by comparing my tomato production (dismal) to my best friend's 100m away in the same neighbourhood (bountiful). Yes, sometimes one can learn by observation of others.

As stated in my previous post, the MOST IMPORTANT TASK IN GARDEN PLANNING is soil preparation. I'm using upper-case again to emphasise just how important this step is. The two golden rules I've stayed with this year is composting and fertilising.

Unsatisfactory compost mixed with organic manure/Middelmatige kompos gemeng met organiese hoendermis

At the risk of becoming repetitive, the rule of thumb with composting is to add around 2 bags of good, organic compost to every square meter (roughly the equivalent of 2 inches of compost as a top layer). As I wasn't a hundred percent happy with the quality of the compost I purchased for most of my garden (it didn't have the healthy slight farm stink to it and was also too fine for my liking), I decided to add roughly one part pure organic chicken manure to two parts (unsatisfactory) compost. Problem solved. Unfortunately the organic chicken farm where I usually purchase my manure ran out. After briefly wondering how a chicken farm runs out of chicken poo I decided to stock up at the other organic chicken farm in the vicinity. Tip to future buyers from said farm: ask for chicken compost, as the cashier doesn't know it by any other name... and I mean any other. Luckily I also bought four big bags of great, organic compost for my backyard veg patch elsewhere, so those didn't need added manure.

The good stuff - Grow Green Organics compost/Swart goud - Grow Green Organics kompos

A rule of thumb with fertilising is to add about 150g composted chicken manure to every square meter - around fruit trees especially. 50g equals about a handful. A good organic option is either Bounce Back (around R60.00 for a 5kg bag). A cheaper option is Rescue, which is also pelletised chicken manure, but comes in a less snazzy bag. I opted for the latter and bought 4kg for only R40.00 (a 17% saving) at Norgarivier Nusery on the Old Airport Road.

I did most of the composting about a week ago, and did the fruit tree fertilising a few days ago. Now I just have to wait the required two weeks after composting to get in my selected vegetables for the summer season. What did I choose to plant this time around?

1. Contender bush beans (seed): as they produce quicker than pole beans and don't cast shade on other plants in my very limited gardening space.
2. Caserta courgettes/baby marrows (seed): as they require a fraction of the space gobbled up by butternuts or other pumpkin varieties
3. Cucamelons (seed): as they are simply too adorable to resist
4. Sweet potatoes (slips): after the success of last year I would be crazy not to plant it again!
5. Cherry tomatoes (seedling): as they grow and produce quickly and are more hardy to diseases than big tomatoes.
6. Normal sized Moneymaker tomatoes (seedling): the name convinced me ;-)

And that is my summer season garden planning story... in detail... maybe too much detail

(... but who cares...)

Foreign Friday. Volksvreemde Vrydag

Tamarillo/Tree Tomato (Solanum betaceum)

The first thing I noticed when I bought my tree tomato in May 2013 was the pungent smell. Okay, to be honest; this is the real story... I desperately needed the bathroom after a visit to my favourite nursery. Luckily I had the cute little tamarillo (synonym for "tree tomato") to show for it, but I was worrying that the trip back to town would be just too long! Then suddenly the car was filled with an overwhelming ammonia scent. Oh please no! I thought for a split second that I had a minor case of the number ones in my trousers! Haha no; I didn't wet myself, but my brother had rubbed up against the tamarillo leave, which released the faintly revolting smell. That is the memory I will always associate with tree tomatoes.

Jun 2013 - The infant tamarillo/Baba boomtamatie

The little tamarillo tree did well all through our cold but temperate winter, although it grew more in leave size than height, but then...

Photo only used to indicate the tamarillo's height

... the tree shot up and reached for the sky! I could literally almost see it growing overnight during the spring of 2013 and summer of 2013/2014. It goes without saying - I was well chuffed!

And would you know it - within the space of one short year this happened:

Apr 2014 - Flowers and little tamarillo fruit/Blomme en klein boomtamatie vruggies

Here I am, middle spring 2014, and picking tree tomatoes like it's going out of fashion. I am over the moon with the growth rate and quantity of fruit produced by this great South American plant! Not even a year and a half on and I've already picked 1kg of fruit, with lots still ripening on the tree. Yay!!! 

Fat and juicy tamarillos/Smullekker boomtamaties

The only problems I've had with my tree tomato are water and wind. Yes, the elements don't always play along in a garden. The berg wind tried to destroy my tree a few times, maar 'n boer maak 'n plan, so I planted a thick dowel stick in next to it and tied the tree to it in two places. I used stockings and rubber to tie the tree with, so as not to chafe the soft stem. The water problem was partially due to the elements but mostly due to my infrequent watering. Note to self - when the tamarillo leaves turn yellowish it means the tree is too dry! Luckily a tree tomato is a very forgiving plant and snaps right back into tip top shape once properly fed and watered. 

Which plant or tree has really impressed in your garden these past few months? #SouthAfricanUrbanGardener

Botanical Name: SOLANUM BETACEUM

Common Name: Tree Tomato, Tamarillo

Volksnaam: Boomtamatie

Native to: Andes region in Peru, Ecuador, Bolivia, Colombia and Chile

Date planted/sowed: Late May 2013

Ease to grow: Extremely easy, fruits abundantly

Costs: R20.00 for the tree and about R20.00 for compost as well as R20.00 for manure

Notes: Plant in a spot where the tree is protected from strong winds as it is a top-heavy and fragile plant. Water well every second day in summer and regularly in winter during dry spells.

Soul Food: Crust-less Bacon and Leek Quiche. Sielskos: Korslose Prei en Spek Souttert

Food is one of my biggest passions... as I think was made clear in my previous post on soul food. Now, with the country being obsessed with the Banting-based Tim Noakes diet, it seems that everyone feels guilty about eating. Yes, I have also tried to cut back on carbs, but I think food is to be celebrated, not regretted. Heck, if you celebrate food by overloading on fat and protein, that's great too.

Bacon & Leek Quiche/Prei & Spek Souttert*

Who ever thought something with as fancy a name as "quiche" could be so simple to make? I follow the principle of throwing ingredients together until it kind of resembles what I'm trying to make, with a recipe as a starting off point. Do you also find it easier to remember made-up recipes than book recipes? I certainly do!

I'm taking liberties in posting this recipe on my blog, as pretty much everything was store-bought. Since I don't live on a farm it's pretty much impossible to make my own cheese and such, but one main ingredient came straight from my backyard vegetable patch. You guessed it; leeks!

Leeks being sautéed in butter/Preie word gesautée in botter

Quiche Recipe (serves 6):

500g chopped leeks/gekapte preie
500g sliced bacon/repies spek
200g cheddar cheese/kaas
8 eggs/eiers
150ml slightly whipped cream/liggeklopte room
2 tbsp butter/botter
1 tsp thyme/tiemie
salt and ground pepper to taste/sout en peper na smaak

Pre-heat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius
Sauté leeks in the butter
Add bacon to leeks and lightly fry
Mix the cheese, eggs and cream together and whip lightly
Add all the ingredients to a large glass pan
Bake for approximately 35mins

The recipe is easily adaptable. Simply add more bacon for a meatier taste or more cheese and leeks (instead of the bacon) for a vegetarian twist. 

Have you ever tried to make a quiche?

*As this quiche is crust-less, it is Tim Noakes friendly

Spring Has Sprung. Dis Heerlike Lente

I do not want to dedicate this post to anything particularly enlightening, other than to say... SPRING HAS SPRUNG :-) Dis heerlike lente, die winter's verby.... and with spring a multitude of flowers are in bloom. Most of the colour in my garden comes from the indigenous clivias I blogged about way back in October 2013. 

I'm not going to ramble on and on about how delightful the flowers in my garden are. No, let the photos rather speak for themselves in this case:

Orange and red clivias/Oranje en rooi clivias

Sole clivia hiding in the ferns/Clivia wat wegkruipertjie speel in die varings

Yesterday Today and Tomorrow and a Bird of Paradise/Strelitzia

Clivia lane/Laning gevestigde clivias

Bright red clivia seeking sun/Bloedrooi clivia steek kop uit

White Arum lily behind multi-coloured nasturtiums/Aaronskelk agter die kappertjie bos

Sadly I don't know which type of orchid this is... my Ma noem dit sommer 'n Armmasorgidee

Lavender flowers and yellow clivia/Laventelblomme en geel clivia in die agtergrond

Favourite Corner - Spring 2014. Gunsteling Hoekie - Lente 2014

I can't believe it's been a year since I last did a "favourite corner" post. How time flies, hey. This time my post will be more focused on a favourite shrub than an actual favourite corner, but the shrub is in a corner, so what the hell...

Japanese Quince/Blomkweper

Chaenomeles japonica is normally grown as an ornamental plant due to its beautiful orange-red to bright-red flowers. They also produce small quinces. Yes, they are perfectly edible. James Wong filled my head with mini-quinces and rumptopf about a year ago now. The rumptopf is still outstanding, as the mini-quinces are still very much outstanding too. 

I must be honest; I have no idea how long this little shrub will take to fruit. I just hope it's not seven years or an equally ridiculous amount of time. Even worse - I hope it's not a "Speciosa" flowering hybrid which doesn't produce fruit. The horror! That's the thing with most South African nurseries: the plants are not properly named and the naming might sometimes even be a bit dodgy. Oh well, let's just hope for the best.

Botanical name: CHAENOMELES JAPONICA

Common name: Japanese Quince/Flowering Quince

Volksnaam: Blomkweper

Native to: Japan

Date planted/sowed: June 2013

Ease to grow: Extremely easy to grow

Costs: The shrub was a gift but costs around R85.00, plus compost of around R10.00/bag

Notes: Grows well in shady spots, but doesn't flower or produce fruit as well

Apple Tree Pruning. Appelboom Snoei

Let me start off by saying I know know little about caring for fruit trees and even less about pruning them. Less than nothing actually... and the information I gleaned from extensive google searches were so convoluted and confusing I nearly gave up! I still had my Granny Smith apple tree crying out for attention though. It was reaching for the sky really. So what to do? Off I went to my local (and favourite) nursery and enquired there. This is what I learned*:

6 Aug 2014: Pre-pruned Granny Smith/Granny Smith alvorens dit gesnoei is

My tree was seemingly healthy and had lots of first year growth, but had to be topped quite urgently. Late winter is apparently the best time to prune apple trees, so there was no time like the present. Apple trees are normally not allowed to grow too tall, otherwise it would require either a very tall ladder or a very agile toddler to get to the highest, juiciest apples (I'm not in favour of child labour, but obviously my little tree will only support the weight of a toddler :-P ). I read somewhere to cut the tree's top off as high as one's arm can comfortably reach. Noted. Also, that one is supposed to make the cut diagonally so that water would run off the cut, thereby preventing rot. I was furthermore told that I could smear the cuts with honey to seal it, just to make double-sure no rot would occur. Noted. Another good tip is to cut off the main branch(es)/leaders a wee bit above an outside-facing bud. This is to encourage branches to grow outwards from the trunk.

Granny Smith showing two leaders/Granny Smith met twee hoofstamme

My Granny Smith tree also possessed two leaders. In apple-tree-talk the main stem of a tree is called a leader. I thought this would be a major problem, as one strong leader was always preferable, maar 'n boer maak 'n plan. The same friendly nursery owner told me to take a 30cm plank and make circular notches on both ends of the plank for the two leaders to fit in. Then push the plank down in between the two leaders to where it can comfortably go without damaging the stems or tree. Next, tie the plank to the two leaders with stockings. Noted. He also told me to top the leaders about 40cm above where this plank was tied. I topped them a bit higher. I didn't want a midget tree.

All this effort would encourage the two leaders to grow away from each other, and discourage them and their smaller branches to rub against and damage one another. Sounds like a fine idea to me!

Solving the two-leader problem/Oplossing vir 'n gesplete boomstam

I guess the proof in This pudding will lie in the kind of branch growth my tree has later this spring. Let's hope I did the right thing and that I didn't top my tree too high. Damn, who ever knew gardening could be so stressful?!

* I was given detailed advice on pruning and caring for my apple tree, but as I'm an Aries and therefore very   
   stubborn I might've improvised slightly.

Backyard Harvest. Agterplaas Oes

Yes, I'm still here. The computer might've given in and the winter garden might be coming along very slowly, but I'm still here. Still interested in getting my hands in the dirt, growing some useful fruit and veggies and some random ones, and subsequently blogging about it. The massive delay in this post wasn't intentional, but sometimes technology really gets in the way rather than assisting, don't you think?

Since I'm a bit out of practice I will let the photos do most of the talking. Let me get on with it...

Cape gooseberries/appelliefies, strawberry/aarbei, pepino/boomspanspek, Sugar Ann peas/ertjies

How does that cute chocolate advert go? "I've got joy in my life..." Yes, joy, joy and more joy... my Cape gooseberry bush is producing enough for a daily snack and then some. I've even made a summery fruit salad by adding it to chopped pineapple, paw paw (papaya) and pepino. Yes, the tropical pepino bush is unbelievably producing smack-bang in the middle of winter. What did I say? Joy!

Strawberries are only starting to flower now, so I've eaten the odd one straight from the plants. I've harvested quite a few cute Sugar Ann Snap peas though. We prefer them fresh in a mixed green salad. If you have any ideas what else to do with them, let me know.

Sugar Ann Snap peas/ertjies and Little Gem lettuce/blaarslaai

After last year's disastrous attempt at growing lettuce, this year couldn't make me prouder. Just look at the scrumptious lettuce leaves in the photo above. I grew them in the proper season and in a well-composted container this time though. That might be the reason for my success this year. Maybe not "might" - more a definite. The peas are so deliciously crunchy and sweet, I will definitely plant them again next autumn. I think I will dedicate much more of the backyard veg patch to them though. The harvest wasn't nearly enough for the family. Practice makes perfect, hey?

Cape gooseberries/Appelliefies

Oh boy, I harvested 300g of Cape gooseberries (also known as Inca berries) in one go. From one bush! It was a proud moment. Silly, but proud. Did I mention this was a volunteer bush that just shot up in my backyard veg patch? The same one I gushed about in my June post on the autumn garden.

Broad beans/Boerbone

Although my broad beans aren't really ready yet, there were about ten of them waiting to be harvested. No, the wee offering in my hands isn't the sum of it, but I just had to take a photo. I've never really done anything with broad beans, so I went out on a limb and sautéed them in butter with leeks. It went quite nicely with our "boerekos" chicken, potatoes, carrots and peas. What do you guys do with broad beans? I need some ideas here, but I'm not too keen on tossing them with mint leaves as I've read online. In my house mint is something that belongs in a refreshing cooldrink like lemonade.

I promise to pop in again soon. Why don't you tell me what you've been up to in your winter garden in the meantime?

Winter Soup. Wintersop

Since the winter solstice is just a few days behind us here in the southern hemisphere I thought a post on soup would be appropriate. A colleague and I always joke about the link between overcast/rainy weather and soup. Yes, the fare in my household is quite predictable. Soup would be a safe bet on a rainy winter's day. It is not the rule, but nevertheless a common occurrence. 

One of my favourite soups (both to eat and to make) is what I call Sweet Potato and Chicken Soup, or simply Winter Soup. It is hearty, delicious and packed with anti-oxidants. The last few sweet potatoes from my haul in April went into preparing the latest batch. Yes, the sweet potatoes I harvested between the conifers and fruit trees.

Let me share the recipe with you. It serves 6-8 people, depending on the size of the pot ;-)
 

Veggies, chopped up and ready to go into the pot/Groente, opgesny en gereed om pot toe te gaan

Winter Soup Recipe:

4x medium sweet potatoes/medium patats
4x pieces of chicken/hoender
1x large onion/groot ui
3x medium turnips/medium rape
6x leeks/preie
3x parsnips/parsnepe
8x carrots/wortels
bunch of parsley/bondeltjie pietersielie
chicken spice, salt and pepper/hoenderspeserye, sout en peper

Sauté onions and leeks lightly
Brown chicken and spices together
Add water to cover chicken and onion mix and bring to the boil
Roughly chop all vegetables and add to pot
Fill the pot with water and bring to boil
Turn heat down to simmer for 2-3 hours
Add parsley 15mins before serving

The recipe isn't an exact science, but your tastebuds should guide you. If the soup tastes bitter, add another sweet potato etc.

Winter Soup - ready to be served with fresh bread/Wintersop - gereed om met vars brood geniet te word

Which soup warms your heart in winter-time?

Looking back on my Autumn Garden. Terugblik op my Herfstuin

It's now the fourth day of winter here in the southern hemisphere. The weather only changed dramatically today, unleashing cold and wet conditions over the Garden Route. Therefore, I thought it an opportune time to look back on the goings on of my backyard veg patch in the last month of autumn.

The Witkiem broad beans sowed middle April are going strong; reaching for the sky they are. The Carentan leeks look beautiful. I'm very chuffed with them. The Sugar Ann Snap Peas are also doing well, but a little bit less so than the broad beans. I'm worried that they're still so small and straggly, but the granny assures me this is normal. It's "bush" peas after all. Let me show you what I mean:

Carentan leeks left and Witkiem broadbeans to the right/Preie links en boerbone regs

Sugar Ann snap peas in the bottom left hand corner/Erte links onder

Something that's not doing as well is the kale. I sowed the Black Palm kale just a day later than the peas and broad beans, and yet they are barely 5cm tall. I don't know if it's due to the general scarcity of sun in their neck of the woods in the cooler season or something else. Maybe snails? I'm hoping against hope that the kale is just a slower grower than the broad beans or peas. Some of the latter are situated in parts of the veg patch just as plagued by shadows as the kale. Oh well, at this moment I can just hold thumbs I guess. Does anyone have any idea what I could do to aid the kale's growth? Or is this quite normal for cold-season kale growth?

A teeny tiny kale plant/Eina-klein boerkool plantjie

The tamarillo is doing splendidly, as per usual. The bergwind once again tried it's best to destroy the tree tomato, but it's still standing. Askew, but still alive. The angle with which the tree is growing is actually aiding fruit development, or so I read. This is because the tamarillo makes side branches when at an angle, and these side branches also produce fruit. My tree is full of big, beautiful tree tomatoes. I'm thinking a Foreign Friday entry would be appropriate once I actually harvest some of them. Just look how gorgeous they are:

Tamarillo fruit/Tree tomatoes/Boomtamaties

Another vegetable which didn't do particularly well this time around were radishes. This was a bit surprising as I've found radishes to be so easy before. Well, not anymore! This time almost all of them had long, leggy red roots instead of orbs of peppery goodness. I didn't sow them that long after I worked chicken manure into the garden, so I think the soil might have been too fertile, or the manure still too strong. That, or it was simply not sunny enough. I did manage to harvest one meagre hand full though. It went straight into my Sweet Potato Winter Soup. I will share the recipe at a later stage.

A handful of radishes/Handjievol radyse

Some inroads were made into solving the shade problem. Well, maybe solve is a bit of an exaggeration. I chopped down another cordyline in order for the morning sun to touch my garden a few minutes more. I tried to saw through the tree trunk, but it was not to be. In the end I had to chop it down. I felt like a veritable Huntsman as the wood chips went flying and the axe went deeper into the tree. It took ages, but I conquered! 

Halfway there with the cordyline

Doing it the green way... sweat and aching muscles followed

A while ago I also sowed coriander and Little Gem lettuce in my biggest container. The lettuces don't look as promising as I would want, but the coriander is going strength to strength. We don't really eat coriander leaves, or what the Americans call cilantro, in my home. The taste is way too "volksvreemd" for us, but I sowed it for the seeds. It gives such a great taste to meat and our national favourites; droëwors and biltong (pickled dried meat similar to beef jerky).

Coriander popping its head out/Koljander plantjies pop orals uit

My Cape gooseberry bushes fill me with joy at the moment. I haven't had any success in the year I've had it. Admittedly the wind destroyed my first bush. Just as it recovered, the sun scorched it almost to nothingness. I subsequently moved the container, and it looks happier now. Happier and producing a husked berry here and there. The real success is the volunteer Cape gooseberry which turned into a giant, almost untameable, bush in the backyard veg patch. I've tried to minimise its encroachment into my vegetable area without removing the bush. So glad I didn't take it out; it is Covered in berries! I have dreams of making Appelliefie Konfyt (Cape gooseberry jam), or just munching on the little golden beauties. Can't wait! 

Little Cape gooseberries galore/Appelliefies in oorvloed