Back From Easter Trip.

We were away on Philip Island for our church's Australia-wide Oceania Convention during the Easter holidays. It was a refreshing time, though there were moments I missed my garden and wondered if the two dogs had destroyed it.

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Fortunately, they did not. And thank God I had discovered the caterpillar eggs under the radish leaves just one day before I left and was able to take measures. Or I would have come back to be heart-broken. The pot of nasturtiums showed great growth after dressing with vermicompost from my worms. And it was peace of mind for me now that they are under the safety of the net. The whole of nasturtiums can be used in salads and I can see why they are easy prey of caterpillars.

The three oriental radish seeds I have sown on 9 April to replace the three uprooted have germinated when I returned on 13 April. Very fast!

My cayenne peppers are fat and long! Wondering if I should harvest them for pickled green chillies.

The tiny calamondin limes are growing steadily. Haha at times they looked like they are going to drop off.

Congratulations to me! The chilli padi seeds have finally germinated and so many are sprouting. They did take a long time to do so, observing only two on 2 April and now about eight on 16 April.

The pot of mint which I have propagated from the original black pot from Kmart has been planted at the vege patch. I have treated it for mildew twice and hope it will do well. So far so good!

One of the two lots of new buk choy seedlings have sprouted when I came back.

Also sown on 9 April to replace the three which were uprooted due to caterpillar attacks. Will thin them once they are bigger.

One of the three existing oriental radishes. Note the little weeds around. Have to do weeding regularly.

Three out of four sweet pea seedlings. As soon as they are big enough, I have to train them around the sunflower stalks behind.

My two wonderful capsicum plants are producing three or four capsicums. Again, great peace of mind with them caged from possible possums' burglary.

The capsicum plant in the pot is not losing the race either, producing three fruits. Somehow the fruits are not as big and do not have a regular shape as those in the vege patch.

Signs of life after the re-potting. Aloe vera seems to grow rather slow in this weather but steadily producing new pups. It has been the mini greenhouse most times to keep it warm.

Vermicompost from my worms works wonder! My curry plant looks very healthy and flourishing after the castings were added.

Same goes for my thyme! Even the stems look thicker.

My divided lemon grass in two pots did not look too good after I potted on last week. Perhaps scorched by the sun while I was away. I have since fed another round of seasol. Not sure of its fate.

The original pot which I bought from Flower Power.

The potted on mint is growing gloriously - potted on successfully! Large leaves and strong. Now I truly believe in Premium potting mixes as Kevin Hendreck mentioned in his book 'Gardening Down-under' - the best gardening book I have ever read so far. It is certainly better to start plants with a good potting mix.

One of the two smaller pots which I have to pot on soon. I have given away the other small pot to my life group mate for her dish.

This is the pot of common mint which I bought from Kmart for $2.50 and since then, I have propagated 5 pots of mints from it. Quite a sense of achievement to me, having failed once from the pot I bought from Ikea when I started out gardening.

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Easter Sunday is not about Easter Bunny or Easter Eggs. It is about Jesus Christ rising from the dead and conquering death so that we are free to connect with God.

Urrrrghhh!

I spend one hour in the garden this morning, not exactly intended to do so but was given a shock when I spotted a caterpillar on my growing oriental radishes! The same pesky green caterpillar with a light yellow stripe along its back! The same one which attacked my buk choy! The same one which attacked my nasturtiums!

Caterpillar eggs and some bugs which look like aphids on the underside of radish leaves .

I pulled up the three buk choys because it seemed that one of the leaves still looked chewed on (with many holes) despite having a cage over the whole pot. Inspecting closer, which any organic gardener must always do, I found many caterpillar eggs attached to the underside of the leaves. An awakening! I was reminded by the bunch of buk choy leaves I cut and fed to the worms in the worm farm sometime last week. Few days after that, I kept seeing caterpillars in the worm farm. I realised that the eggs were still attached to the leaves and they were hatching into caterpillars! Also the bucket of water which I washed the buk choy leaves contained dislodged eggs, which hatched baby caterpillars but they were drowned in the water!

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Recalling all that, I decided it was no point keeping the buk choy as the eggs on the growing leaves would continue to hatch! It is a never-ending cycle since I do not want to use pesticide. Anyway, I have harvested several rounds out of these three buk choys. It is time to sow new seeds. This knowledge helped me! I quickly inspected all the under leaves of the radishes and sure enough, three radish plants had loads of eggs attached. I had no choice but to pull up the radishes or I would have a continual flow of caterpillars. Urrrghhh!!! I noted that the eggs were on the smaller radishes and the larger, healthier, stronger ones are spared. I have sown seeds to replace the pulled up ones.

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Next action was to net the whole area! I was already contemplating that a while ago to deter possums which might dig, but now I am detering the butterflies! I managed to do so quite easily, all thanks to my tall sunflower stems! I also placed the nasturtiums under the netting on the radish patch because they do get attacked by the caterpillars too.

Netting over the radishes with support from the sunflower stems.

The pot of lovely nasturtiums under the net's protection now. The three buk choys were pulled up and made way for new ones, under the netting.

The cage was used on the capsicum plants instead against possums.

In the afternoon while the weather was warm and sunny, I potted the kaffir lime stem cuttings in a mixture of premium + regular potting mix and propagating sand after coating them with rooting hormone powder. If this works, it will be a long wait and I have to keep the potting mix warm and moist all the time. I also sowed more buk choy seeds in the same pot where I have pulled out the existing ones.

2 Hours' Work

My work for 2 hours this morning : Potted the largest pot of common mint which I grew from two cuttings. Potted up the citronella (mosquito plant) Divided up the lemon grass into three pots. Fed seasol to those transplanted. Fed Charlie Carp to curry plant, capsicum plants, lavendar, buk choy, bay, hot chilli. Fertilised the orange and lemon trees. Removed weeds surrounding the lemon and orange trees.

The potted on common mint.

The original two cuttings which I propagated.

Two of the chilli padi seeds given by my shepherd have germinated. Not exactly a good time to germinate seeds at this time of the year due to lack of warmth and sunshine. I do hope they can make it and grow. I was able to harvest more purple king beans today and had them for lunch. Crunchy and sweet and turned green when boiled. The capsicum is my first harvest off the capsicum plant on the vege patch. I have a feeling it is a yellow capsicum as there is no sign of any redness. Four more coming!

I cleared the potato plant from the large pot and wow! Digging the potting mix out gave me a surprise of a few egg sized potatoes. This is also first time growing potatoes and I started out too late in the season. I suppose I can do better the next round but potatoes are really cheap! Perhaps just to grow them for fun!

I am propagating some ivy in a pot.

The two citronella cuttings in potting mix.

The divided lemon grass.

The oriental radishes have been thinned out to just one per lot.

More capsicums from the vege patch.

The onion bulbs. I think daffodil bulbs grow this time too.

Peekaboo!

Writing this to record yesterday's work while little man had his nap. This week has been really chilly and drizzly and the sunshine was intermittent. Day time temperature went as low as 14 deg celsius so I suppose night time temperature could drop even lower. This is my plants' first winter and I am trying to prepare myself as well as them for winter, mainly those that cannot take frost. I am not going to take any risk and lose any of them to the cold. Peekaboo! Cracking my head did some help. I make use of this laundry hamper to house my potted capsicum in the night. Draped a towel over it to cut out the cold and a layer of plastic as waterproofing in case it rains. This capsicum has done so tremendously well despite being uprooted from the vege patch and potted up. It is fruiting now, though later than the two at the vege patch. However, it is actually taller and stronger than the two at the vege patch.

The hamper was just right in size, and deters any possums too. I am contemplating lifting the other two capsicum plants from the vege patch when winter comes. That means they will be in pots. I am thinking of this because capsicums are actually perenial and if I can keep them out from the cold, they can be around for a long time.

My pots of common mint, vietnamese mint and aloe vera are housed in the mini greenhouse at night as they are more sensitive to the cold.

I potted up the kaffir lime shrub with a mixture of premium potting mix, regular potting mix and cow manure. Given it a good soak of seasol.

The tall single stem of the kaffir lime had many leaves on it. I wonder if it is going to grow taller and taller into the sky, so I decided to cut it off and use it to do my experiment and see if I can root it. Anyway, no harm doing it. I just stored the leaves from the stem in the freezer for cooking purpose.

Vietnamese mint does not take the cold and the pot is so heavy to move! So a plastic sheet over them supported by bamboo stems and pegs is fantastic way to keep the cold out.

To reduce transplanting shock, I also used plastic sheet over the kaffir lime for the night.

Finally after more than two weeks, 17 days to be exact, all my four sweet peas emerged.

One Rosemary Cutting has Flowered.

Cold morning. Cosy afternoon. A little drizzle interspersed cloudy and then sunny day. Collected a few drops of rain in buckets ;o. Since the soil was moist and soft in the morning, I did some weeding. The creepy weeds are growing very well at the sides of the vege patch and soon will come near my capsicum and mighty red tomato bush. One of the potted rosemary cuttings has decided to flower instead of growing. Flowering for herbs is not really ideal since it means its energy for growing has been given to flowering. But it is not a bad sight at all.

One dandelion weed growing well in the vege patch. Dandelions are common weeds and their leaves are nutritious for making tea, which can be used to water plants. In fact, shops sell dandelion tea bags for human consumption and dandelion flowers can be used in salads. They have deep tap roots that can draw nutrients from deep in the soil.

My capsicum is growing well, at least with much peace of mind since I am able to protect it from possums. Another on the right of the picture is developing.

One little purple king pod is growing near the ground just close to the very mature pod. I have placed a plastic sheet under it on the ground weighed down by rocks.

The aloe vera is growing two new pups in the centre...one tiny one and a slightly longer one.

The vietnamese mint overtaking the large pot's surface. It is really a sprawling grower. I am ready to harvest some for ladies' fellowship next Monday.

Two of my six lots of oriental radishes. I am now cracking my head on how to protect them from digging possums. Neighbours just told me possums dug their ground and ate their silver beets!

One cluster of chillies from the nellie kelly hot chilli.

Another cluster. So happy to see larger chillies developing before ripening. I have harvested some ripe ones in the past but they were really tiny.