Friday, September 9, 2011

First time to the Tenderfoot plot

Friday 9 Sept 2011

Jacob and I took Heidi and our lunch to the plot today. It was sunny and warm, with blue skies and a little wind. Found the Trust easily, parked and were pleased with how close Tenderfoot's plot was to the car park, shed etc, thumbs up to Elaine for picking such an accessible plot.

The office was empty but we spoke with two gardeners who had spent the morning there, Tania and her mum, Win. They were very helpful, showed us where to sign in, the garden shed with whiteboard (lots of information on there about what to plant at the moment and what is available to plant).

First we divided our plot into the six sections (different things planted in each section). We realised that we didn't have the whole length of the plot as we originally thought and later asked Jen the garden manager about it. She said that there were so many requests for land that they had divided the larger plots in half. She apologised and said that if people didn't show up to do their hours, then we would get another half plot.

We decided to plant early season potatoes which should be ready by Christmas (there was a big bucket of seed potatoes there with very precise planting directions. We planted three rows, half the length of section 3. The rows are meant to run up and down the plot, rather than side to side because of irrigation requirements. We did this, setting up stakes and string to ensure they were all straight. Then we covered all of it up again with mulch as per the planting directions (the mulch will keep the weeds down and will protect the plants from late frosts (Jen told us this later).

When we were eating lunch, Jen came over and introduced herself. We talked for a while and she mentioned that because we would harvest these potatoes early, they wouldn't necessarily need the 60cm gap that we had left between the rows. She suggested that we plant garlic in between the rows of potatoes. So, after lunch we (Jacob did it while I fed Heidi!) planted two rows of garlic. You can tell the garlic because they can't have as much mulch on the top of them so there are big mounds of mulch on top of the potatoes and not much on the garlic. At the beginning and end of each row there is a short bamboo stake.

There is still half of section 3 available to plant silverbeet, spinach etc!

We had fun and can't wait to go back. We made sure we signed in and out so Tenderfoot completed the requirement for time in the garden this week :-)

See you soon

2 comments:

  1. Great post guys! Sounds like you had an awesome day - I can't wait to venture out on Tuesday!

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  2. Nice start, I'm looking forward to getting out there in my gummies. I will be round with Amy the following Tuesday.

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