Pura Veda Seeds

My latest discovery and an enrichment to my breakfast choices has been a seed mixture of buckwheat, sunflower kernels, raisins, sesame seeds, millet, pumpkin seeds, linseed, poppy seeds, chia seeds and amaranth. This mixture is called pura veda seeds.  I add it to my musli for breakfast and love its taste. Alsio during the day eat it some joghurt and tinned fruit or steamed apples. I have come across thus stuff by accident through one of their promotion events at Manna Wholefoods in Fremantle about two months ago.

I have actually lost a bit of weight too without changing any of my diet. My naturopath who I visited last Friday said she rarely sees healthy people like me. A few friends of my are hooked too now. Give it a shot. I think you will like it. And the producer of this heavenly stuff don't even pay me to say this.

Winter harvest

Lettuce in pots - 5 August 2011

In our garden there is not much growing at the moment. I must have missed the days to plant winter vegetables, but still am very glad to see my neighbour Paul grow his suedes and beetroots.  There are a few kohlrabi plants and some left over sping onions still gowing from last year, but my pride and joy is the lettuce patch.

The last rain has done the lettuces well. We nearly reached average monthly rainfall for June and July, just a few mm short. One watertank is full and the other one 3/4 full, despite only a very small water collection area on the roof.

The lettuces are thriving, may be due to planting them in pots in the middle of best home made compost. Or the companionship with garlic is working out. I planted garlic in the corners between the pots, plenty of it and it has been growing just as well as the lettuce.

Snails seem to avoid the lettuce alltogether, apart from a few common garden snails (helix aspersa) that were tucked on tighly and came with me into the kitchen when I cut the leaves for dinner.  

It is a delightful pleasure to cut lettuce leaves for family meals. Just enough for a few people. Fresh and home grown it is eaten within 10 minutes of being harvested! We love it! Any leftovers go in the lunch boxes for the next day or into the next compost batch!

Lettuce patch - 25 September 2011

Pruning grape vines

Today I spotted the first growth on my grape vine. It was time for pruning and I worked for about 15 minutes using my best secateur. I know that the plant only grows flowers and bears fruit only on the new shoots therefore I cut everything back that I did not want sprouting in the wrong directions. I want the grapes to ripen along the sunny fence and want to avoid much sticking out into the garden, as one of our coffee tables is close by. 

The picture shows the branch cut off already on the table, looking quite healthy despite some insect bite marks.

I never had any training on how to prune grapes but had very good outcomes last year. In the meantime I also learned that I should cut out the weaker growth from shoots that cross each other.  I will try that in a few days when pruning our two transplanted plum trees where I already spotted some green shoots coming straight out of the trunk of the tree. Probably a sign of stress.

Happy with the outcome of my work, all that needs to be done now is to get rid of the cut-offs. I don't want to put them in the rubbish bin and am thinking of other options. Any ideas?