August 28, 2009 - Posted by blogadmin - 0 Comments
The place I’m WWOOFing at sells organic, heirloom variety seeds. Heirloom seeds are open pollinated, which means that the plants can be left to go to seed, the seeds harvested, and a new crop can be grown from them the next year. Hybrid seeds, which are often the varieties sold by large commercial seed sellers, have seed which won’t grow true to type, meaning you can’t save the seed for new crops. So it’s always best to buy heirloom, open pollinated seeds.
The other day I got to harvest some seven year bean seeds. All the seeds sold here are from plants grown here, left to go to seed, harvested, dried, stored and packaged here.
The picture below is of the bean pods, which have been left to dry on the plant. Once picked I tipped them onto a large sheet of cardboard so I wouldn’t lose any, then stomped on them to break up the pods (the bean seeds are dried beans, so you know how hard they are, stomping on them won’t damage them).
These are some sieves, made for seed collecting, but only neccessary because of the larger quantites they collect here. I rubbed the seeds and broken pods, with a glove on to protect my hand, to break the pods up further and start to separate the seeds from the pods.
Once most of the pods have been separated from the seeds and there are only fine pieces left, I winnowed the seeds. This involves throwing the seeds up into the wind a little from the sieve, and letting the finer particles blow away, leaving only bean seeds. Only neccessary because there were so many – just for your own garden you wouldn’t need to bother.
I then poured the seeds into a bucket, and they’ve been left in a window in the sun to dry out completely. They will then be stored in jars, with the variety and date they were harvested written on the lid and also written on a piece of paper in the jar, until they are needed.
When an order comes in the seeds are weighed, or counted out in the case of large seeds like these beans, put into small plastic sealed bags, then into labelled envelopes for sale.
The seeds here have been selected for a number of reasons – taste, disease and pest tolerance, varieties that grow well in the climate and soil here. An example is “Autumn Majestic” carrots. They grow well in the sandy soil, they tase good, and they also go to seed in one season rather than two, so the seed can be saved here where they have hot summers.
For more on heirloom varieties and seed saving, have a look at these websites -
Digger’s club – heirloom seeds: http://www.diggers.com.au/
Seed Saver’s Network: http://www.seedsavers.net/
August 18, 2009 - Posted by blogadmin - 0 Comments
This region is known for it’s wildflowers. Lucky for me I got here at the right time of year, after a good winter, so I got to see some wildflowers. We drove about an hour inland to Coalseam Conservation Park, it was amazing. The flowers really do carpet the ground.
Today I got to see the inside of a bee hive. My host keeps bees, and it’s getting to be the time of year when they are likely to swarm. There were signs that some bees were going to swarm this morning, so my host needed to check if it was one of her hives.
Before the hive is opened smoke is puffed into the hive using a smoker. This fools the bees into thinking there’s a bush fire, so they gorge themselves on honey to get ready to evacuate, and so with full tummys they can’t move much.
My host uses two tools, an American hive tool to prise the supers apart, and an Australian hive tool to lift the frames out of the supers, just because each one is better for the job.
It’s bizarre when the hive is taken apart and the bees fly around you a bit. You can also hear them ‘sing’. Bee hives are like nothing I’ve ever seen. My hosts say its a bit hard to name them all.
We were looking for the queen, and any signs new queens. Bee hives (the boxes are called ‘supers’, have frames slotted into them, these ones had ten). The frames have plastic foundations embedded into them, which are then painted with wax. These consist of the cells that the bees use. The cells can hold brood (young bee grubs), pollen, honey (capped), nectar (honey before it becomes honey so it isn’t capped yet) and cells for new queens (these stand out – the caps are much higher).
In one of the hives we found quite a few cells that were being prepared for new queens. We also found the queen, you can see her in the picture below, just to the right of the centre. The queen is much larger and doesn’t have stripes.
I’ve also found out honey is bee spit. They swallow the nectar to take up the moisture, and also add in something to make the honey keep. Once it’s ready they cap the cell.
August 13, 2009 - Posted by blogadmin - 0 Comments
My next destination is Geraldton, a 7 hour bus trip North of Perth. I’ve chosen to go by land from Ballarat to get here – bus to Adelaide, train to Perth, then a bus to Geraldton – three days travel. I’m so glad I chose to go this way, I’ve been able to see far more of the country, including the Nullarbor, than if I had flown. Also, and probably more importantly, I’ve reduced my carbon emissions hugely by choosing to take buses and a train rather than travelling by air. It was cheaper than flying too.
Geraldton is a large coastal town, a port that provides access for the wheat and canola ‘industry’ to the south of here, and for the mining industry. The property here was established in 1988 and is 3 hectares. There is a sheltered zone one veggie garden, where seeds are saved for selling. There is an orchard and a shadehouse for raising seedlings. They keep bees here, as well as chickens, geese and ducks. There are also emus, I think these just hang around!
Today was my first day here. This morning we packaged up seeds for a couple of orders. My host saves seed here for sale, she’s the only person in WA who sells non hybrid corn seed. The system is very organised. The seeds are kept in jars, ordered by plant Family. We used a spreadsheet to find how much of each seed to package, and how long they are viable for recording on the packet.
Winter is the growing season here, they only get rain for 3 or 4 months of the year. Summer is too harsh for growing veggies – it gets to over 40 C in the shade, and they also get 20 or 30 knot E and NE winds here – strong drying winds straight from the interior.
In fact the place is surrounded by layers of windbreaks. Far more than I have seen anywhere else.
The water here is sourced from rainwater – there is a lot of tank storage here, numerous large tanks. They also use town water, there isn’t enough rain for the scale of growing they do here. The town water is sourced from an underground lake to the South of Geraldton.
August 5, 2009 - Posted by blogadmin - 0 Comments
This past month I’ve been preparing for my mid course assessment for the “All Seasons Permaculture Design Course” I’m doing this year in Ballarat. I’ve been staying in a number of places in Melbourne and Ballarat.
One place I have stayed at is in Invermay. A new veggie patch was created here in early Spring last year, in an area that was grass and weeds.
The veggie patch isn’t producing a lot yet, however there is enough growing that we are eating broccoli, beetroot, Chinese greens, chives, potatoes that were harvested a few months ago and some herbs such as parsley and thyme. Enough to comprise a significant portion of the veggies eaten each day. I have also been harvesting rhubarb.
As it’s the middle of Winter here the soil is very moist, perfect for pulling out weeds easily. One thing I have done is weed one of the beds, so I could plant broad beans. These will produce a yield in Spring, generally a lean time of year when there isn’t a lot to be harvested in the garden.
In Summer, when the soil is bone dry, it can be almost impossible to pull weeds out, as the soil sets like rock around the roots. The annual weeds aren’t a problem, they can be chipped off the surface in Spring before the garden beds are planted out. However this is a good opportunity to remove grass, and perennial weeds which are starting to spread. (Another solution if you are weeding in Summer is to thoroughly soak the area you want to weed first.)
Below is a picture of all the varieties of weeds I pulled out. Some I can identify, others I can’t. I enjoy weeding, it’s a good chance to get to know the different types of root systems plants can have.
The weeds I’ve observed that can’t be pulled out easily, if at all, in Summer are those with fibrous roots – roots that divide into a large number of fine or fleshy roots immediately on leaving the crown. An example is in the picture below, these came out really easily, in Summer they’re impossible.
A common weed around here is sorrel. It has a rhizomatous root system – it has underground stems that send out shoots and roots periodically along their length. This is another one that was easy to pull out in Winter, impossible in Summer.
I’ve also started reading “Edible Forest Gardens” by Dave Jacke, about ‘Ecological Design and Practice for Temperate Climate Permaculture’.
