38 degrees

The weather has been a lot hotter this spring. It's not even summer yet and in the last week the temperatures climbed to a swealtering 38 degrees. I was worried about the little zucchinis, the strawberries and foremost worried about all these little garden critters. I watered each morning and in the evening, about three watering cans or 30l total each time. 60 litres a day dripped onto the stems of our plants. The water level in my water tank is going down although there is rain forecast for the whole of next week, so we should not worry about it overly much.

Our aim was to provide a nice moist environment for the newly formed organic earth in our Perth sands. I had a bit of a peep last week and it is looking fine, lots of worms, slaters and healthy looking moisture. The tomatoes are thriving. First fruit has set; Roma tomatoes already show their lovely elongated shape. Everywhere new plants are coming up from the composted organic materials, more tomatoes, pumpkins and plenty of unidentified species.

At the gardening workshop they talked about organic materials being at least 10 percent in our soils, I think we have got a lot more. Just the top 30cm have been upgraded and I think we have something closer to 30percent plus organics in the soil.

The coriander is not doing overly well, probably too hot or simply not the right time of the year. Also the basil has difficulties, may be same problems. The second lot of seeds is just germinating and small round leaves have appeared. There is hope.

The potatoes are out. Desire potatoes, the red ones, came up first, the white ones have not penetrated the soil yet. The straw has been very helpful in keeping the moisture in the ground. It was suggested that the straw itself would suck up too much moisture away from the plants, but I think the result is just fine. the top part dried out quickly and there is still enough straw cover to keep the moisture in.

The worms in my worm farm had difficulties coping with the hot weather as well. I covered the top layer with recycled paperbags used previously for bakers flour. But this did not allow for enough circulation of air and evaporation of moisture to cool the worms down. By the first hot evening they were up on the rims of the worm farm in droves, trying to crawl out. By that time the interior was really hot. Taking the paper bags away, stocking up on shredded newspaper and watering them with cool rainwater twice made a difference. I adapted my practice, took the dense paper bags off, inserted more shredded newspaper and yesterday even put a moist blanket on the top to create a microclimate inspired by the Coolgardie Safe. I need hessian to replace my blanket, as it contained plastic materials. But the principle has worked well ysterday and the worms have been fine last night.

It also looks like we will get a shredder this Sunday to salvage as much from the plant materials out the front as possible. Also the next lot of compost is ready, Jules did a great job in putting it all together, complemented by sheep poo. The ute is back and on Monday I bought a great Westmix brickies wheelbarrow to assist in future carting of stuff.

And on the way back in a gardening shop, while buying some much too expensive little rock melons and zucchini plants I met a lovely lady, fellow gardener with a big heart. She lives close by, has invited me to visit her and promised some capsicum and other seedlings.

The universe provides!

We might go to the Big Splash http://www.sustainablewa.net.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=3&Itemid=10 today, an open space event run near City Farm with a focus on how a sustainable Perth would look 10 years! I think we need to be there. But I rather dig than talk!