Garden Update - October
Signs of green in the Food Forest - the garden is waking up!
The warmer weather has seen the garden buzzing (pun intended!) with action.
We’ve welcomed some new volunteers into the community garden space over the past month and it’s been great to have new faces and extra hands in the dirt. The garden wouldn’t be a success without the volunteers who drop in to the garden space - some for just a session or two and some for the long haul - but in a micro organisation like CEC it makes all the difference (sidenote: we’d love to welcome you to the garden for a drop in session too!).
It’s been great to continue to work on our Food Forest Project. Now that the base foundations are in with swale and main fruit tree layer we are beginning to add further plantings, mulch and of course keeping up on the weeding and watering while things get established. This past month we planted out some natives for the pollinators and some berries for us. We’ll be continuing to add to this space with a mix of annuals and perennials over the coming months.
The greenhouse is filling up with plenty of seeds and seedlings for the warmer months ahead. We did the first pot up of the tomatoes and they are looking great. This year we have plenty of dwarf tomatoes going in and are excited about taking part in the Canberra Seed Savers Dwarf Tomato project. The DTP is aimed at stewarding local open-pollinated heirloom varieties of the dwarf tomato - an amazing compact & easy to maintain plant with full-size fruit! Come check it out in the garden when we plant out come November or reach out to seed savers for more details of being involved.
Colourful broad bean flowers - the Festive Fava project
In other fun projects we are part of in the garden our Festive Fava beans are beginning to flower. This is a project co-ordinated by Gregg at useful seeds to grow and select for colourful broad bean flowers. It’s a great beginners step into adaptive seed breeding and adds some lovely colour to the spring-green of the garden.
The month ahead will be spent prepping beds for the big November plant out of all the greenhouse seedlings. As well as getting all our systems in working order before next season busyness hit in full swing - checking irrigation lines, turning the compost and feeding the soil.
Want to join us in the Community Garden? Pop in to a drop in session 9.30-11am Thursdays in term time or reach out if you’re keen to volunteer.
Happy gardening!