BRIGHT SPOTS IN A GREY DAY

 

Newspaper pot seedlings in a row with an ornamental duck

Seedlings in newspaper pots

Giant mustard seedling in a newspaper pot

Flowers on an ornamental duck and newspaper pots

Close up of circles on community garden plot planting plan

Mustard, asparagus and cabbage seedlings in front of books

Cabbage seedlings in newspaper pots

Carrots and beetroot in planting plan for community garden plot, Flemington, Australia

Cauliflower in the nature strip guerrilla garden

Cauliflower in the nature strip at night

Seeds and planting design for community garden plot, Flemington, Australia

5 colour silverbeet seedling

Flowers picked from the garden and the watercolour planting plan for a community garden plot, Flemington, Australia

 

I woke up Saturday morning at 6am sneezing. Dylan had been sick as a dog all week and had passed on the batton just in time for the weekend. But it didn’t hit me too badly, at first I was a bit sad to miss the Elwood Permablitz, but when I heard there would be an RMIT film crew there I was secretly relieved. I find being interviewed quite traumatic.

I spent my weekend just generally lazing around in the sun when he crept out from the clouds and doing a planting plan for my mum’s community garden plot at the Farnham Street Park. I’m excited to have a place to experiment with chickpeas, soya beans and peanuts! I spent Sunday afternoon in our sharehouse “loft” that I took over this winter as my greenhouse. Can you tell I was bored? I planted out a whole stack of dried beans into newspaper pots for my mum’s garden and some super hot chilli seeds. I have experimented with putting seedlings in milk cartons and toilet rolls in the past, but the newspaper pots are by far the best thing I’ve used to minimise transplant stress. They break down really well and are just so cute.

Now I’m off to make dinner, our nature strip cauliflower has gotten enormous and Dylan thinks someone will take it if we leave it too long. Chickpea and cauliflower curry I think, with coconut rice! Mmmm…

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VEG OUT UNDER LUNA PARK

 

As part of our PDC course we visited the community garden Veg Out in St Kilda. It has quite a lovely history, it began as an abandoned bowling green, the building had been taken over by a group of artists who after a while felt sorry for the weed infested green and began nurturing it and then it sprawled and rambled out into one of the prettiest, creative community gardens I have seen. It was so loved by the community that the council couldn’t kick them out and now have grown to cherish it too. Dinosaurs made of trash metal stalk under the shadow of Luna Park and, there is a garden bed shaped as a ship complete with a mini sail, each plot has a letter box so when there are water restrictions everyone knows when they are allowed to water. It was a very inspiring place, every child at heart couldn’t help but melt.

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SILHOUETTES OF QUINCE

Native flowers by the Merri Creek, Brunswick, Australia

Edible weeks along the Merri Creek, Brunswick, Australia

Silverbeet in the Ceres Market Garden on the Merri Creek, Coburg, Australia

Leeks in the Ceres Market Garden on the Merri Creek, Coburg, Australia

Beetroot in the Ceres Market Garden on the Merri Creek, Coburg, Australia

Rows of vegetables in the Ceres Market Garden on the Merri Creek, Coburg, Australia

Rubbish in the Merri Creek, Coburg, Australia

Permablitz Analysis, Coburg, Australia

Quince tree silhouette, Coburg, Australia

Quince fruit, Coburg, Australia

Permablitz site visit, Coburg, Australia

We went for a walk along the Merri Creek as part of our PDC. It’s amazing that Ceres has its market garden along the bank and hasn’t had every last stalk plucked under the cover of darkness. A few things have vanished, but their policy of if you come and help harvest you can keep half what you pick has encouraged a community to build up there.

 

We visited the site which will be the subject of our final design exercise, it’s all rather exciting really.

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