Create Atmosphere in the Garden

REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney and Across Australia on the Community Radio Network. www.realworldgardener.com
The complete CRN edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition.
NEW SEGMENT:Compost Capers:Real World Gardener is starting another new segment called compost Capers. Cameron Little from Sustainability Systems, will be joining me in the studio to talk about worm farming. Today’s segment is an introduction to worms.

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Vegetable Heroes;Cauliflower , Brassica oleracea,
 In Arid zones, plant direct into the garden from April until June, in cool temperate and temperate zones, February was the recommended time to sow seeds but you can sow seedlings until the end of May. If your district is sub-tropical, you might be able to squeeze in seed sowing if you do it straight after the show, otherwise, transplant seedlings until the end of June also. There is one exception, a variety called Caulifower All Year Round-Hybrid. This variety is available from your local nursery shows excellent vigour to reach maturity very early at 15 weeks. It has a large size, tight curd, and excellent taste.
 Soil and Site for Cauliflower--       All cauliflowers need a neutral or slightly alkaline soil to do well. If the soil is too acidic, the plants won’t be able to access the trace elements they need, and may develop whiptail.  On the other hand, soils which are too limey or chalky can lead to stunted and discoloured cauliflower. 
If you’re at all unsure, whip out that pH test kit and give it a workout. If you need to add lime to the soil because it’s too acidic, leave at least four weeks between liming and manuring.  As with all brassicas, avoid using a plot on which a brassica crop was grown within the past two years.  Cauliflowers will definitely suffer if they are grown on the same plot for two or more years in a row.    Winter cauliflowers are much more tolerant of soil conditions, and will grow on most types of soil, as long as there is no water-logging.  Because they grow slowly over a longer period of time, and have to face winter conditions, the one thing you want to avoid is lush, rapid and therefore vulnerable growth. If plenty of organic ferts have been dug in, there is no need for additional fertilizers, prior to planting out winter cauliflowers. They need a sheltered site, with some protection from winds.  They do better in sun rather than in the shade.-       A cauliflower is ready for cutting when the upper surface of the curd is fully exposed and the inner leaves no longer cover it.  As usual in your  veggie garden, cauliflowers are ready at the same time.  If the weather is warm and you leave the cauliflowers in the ground once they have matured, the heads expand and they become discoloured and less appealing. To avoid this lift some early, they will be quite edible. 
 Here’s a tip to not have to eat cauliflower everyday for a month, gather up the leaves and tie them together over the curd so that they cover it, using garden twine, an elastic band or raffia.  It will also protect the winter ones from the frost.
Design Elements:what is atmosphere in the garden? Is it the right collection of plants or just putting the garden bench in the right place? Why don't some gardens have atmosphere? It's a bit of a mystery that garden designer Lesley Simpson and I try to solve.

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Plant of the week: Heliotropeum arborescens, Cherry Pie:
Did you know that butterfly gardening is a popular hobby today? Your first step should be to find out which butterflies are in your area. You can do this by spending some time outdoors with your field guide to see which species are around. For example if you live around Adelaide go to  www.butterflygardening.net.au/
If you want to encourage butterflies to your garden you need to plant shrubbery with flowers that these insects enjoy, like in plant of the week.

Leaf colour varies from dark green with deep veins to the golden colour of H. arborescens “Aureum.” The flowers are terminal clusters (or cymes) of salverform or funnelform  in mauve blue deep purple, white and pale purple,

Large slightly domed heads of purplish flowers almost smother the deeply veined, deep green foliage are vanilla scented that’s more noticeable in the evening .

Some say it smells like baby talc.

You have to bend down and smell them during the heat of the day.
The flowers are very attractive to butterflies.
There are many cultivars, Cherry pie has a pale purple, Plum Pie, has a deeper purple with darker leaves, and Lord Roberts, the flowers aren’t as big as Plum Pie, but also has the darker leaves. There’s also a white flowering cherry pie, and one with golden-yellow leaves as well.
Fragrant vanilla scented flowers that send out waves of fragrance.
This is a frost tender shrub which flowers all year round in mild climates and has a spreading habit. Height : 80cm x 85cm.
Heliotropes prefer a position in the sun to partial shade and a well drained fertile soil.
It won’t do much good in sandy impoverished soil, so if that’s what you’ve got, beef it up with homemade compost.
Otherwise, grow it in a tub.
Tip prune the plants often to keep them bush, prune spent flowers as well and cut back foliage to retain bushiness.
I find that an occasional branch dies back for whatever reason, but the rest keeps on going.
 Protect from hot and cold winds and keep well mulched and watered in hot weather. Needs protection from frost.

What is Permaculture and Where to Put That Sculpture?

REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney and Across Australia on the Community Radio Network. www.realworldgardener.com
The complete CRN edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition.

NEW SEGMENT:The Good Earth:The Good Earth segment with Penny Pyett will feature about once a month. Penny Pyett is the director of the Sydney Institute of Permaculture www.permaculturesydneyinstitute.org.  to find a group near your, http://permacultureaustralia.org.au or just put in permaculture groups  into your search engine . Listen here to the introduction.

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Vegetable Heroes: Mustard Lettuce/Greens, -  Brassica juncea. 
The flowers of Mustard Lettuce are very attractive to beneficial insects. And Mustard Greens tolerate light frost.
In all districts you can sow Mustard Lettuce seeds in spring and autumn. 
Mustard is grown like lettuce. Although it’s more heat tolerant than lettuce, long hot summer days will force the plant to bolt (go to seed) so it’s better to sow it in Autumn in warmer districts.
One of the mustard plant facts is that it loves cold. I have some popping up around my garden at the moment, not too many to make them a nuisance but enough for me to not have to save the seeds.         The variety I have is Red Giant. 
Red Giant has deep purplish-red, large, Savoy leaves with white mid-ribs. I would say about 25 to 30cm long and about half as wide.
The thick leaves have a medium spicy flavour and are excellent for adding to sandwiches with ham or other meats. 
 Supposedly all Red mustard varieties prefer cool climates for growing with full sun and rich soil with temperatures below 20⁰ C. but I’ve found that they can tolerate heat a lot more than they’re supposed to.  I’d recommend them for all temperate climates as well.
Frost is tolerable, but freezing temperatures will kill crops.
TIP: Where to get the seed? If you’re wondering where to get the seed varieties like Red Giant, or Ruby Streak and Golden streaks that have finely serrated leaves, you can easily get them from online suppliers, www.greenharvest.com.au-            www.cornucopiaseeds.com.au
Available in herb section of garden centres and nurseries.
Keep up the water to your plants during dry periods. 
Leaves get tough and have a strong flavour during hot, dry weather.
You Mustard lettuce should be ready in around 4-5 weeks.
I’ve gotta say, my Mustard lettuce pretty much looks after itself. I’ve always got a couple coming up in the veggie bed, and this year, only a couple of others in other spots in the garden.
Mustard lettuce leaves can be eaten raw, or cooked. For salads pick the leaves when they’re still small and tender. 
Either pick individual leaves just as you would any cut and come again lettuce, or the entire plant.            If you want to collect Mustard seeds, do this when the plants begin to yellow. You want to leave them on the plants as long as possible, but before the pods burst open and spill their seeds. That’s why last year I had hundreds of the little seedlings all over my veggie bed.
By the way, beneficial insects like lacewings and Predatory wasps like the yellow flowers of mustard plants.

Design Elements: Gardens shouldn’t be just a pretty place or a collection of plants, because it’s not a museum for plants, but a living thing. Demonstrate your personal design style and artistic interest with a garden sculpture. Use it as a complement to your plantings and landscape design or you can even use a specific piece of garden art as a focal point as you design your landscape. Listen here to the podcast with garden designer Lesley Simpson.

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Plant of the Week:Grevillea "Cherry Pie."  We all know the garden is a living thing but few gardeners don’t want a host of other living things that make up our garden ecosystem. The bugs, the lizards, the butterflies and bees, sometimes a mammal or two, and the birds.
If you want to encourage small birds to your garden you need to plant shrubbery with small flowers that these birds enjoy, like in plant of the week.
For more information go to http://www.austraflora.com/newreleases.html

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Artistic Garden from the Ground Up and Ethereal Pandoreas

REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm, 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney and Across Australia on the Community Radio Network. www.realworldgardener.com
The complete CRN edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/2RRR
Design Elements: Art in the garden series is to inspire you to add finishing touches or maybe change your view of the garden. You may not have considered the ground as a canvass for art in the garden before, Listen to Lesley Simpson garden designer here.

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Vegetable Hoeroes:Onions.  Or Allium cepa from the Alliaceae family that contain Garlic, Leeks Shallots and Chives. You won’t cry with these onions because today I’m going to focus on the “odourless” Onions that will grow in all parts of Australia. I should specify that these seeds are of the  brown mid-season Odourless Onion readily available from garden centres from one of two major seed suppliers.,. There is a Red Odourless globe onion that is a long day variety, only suitable for cooler districts.
 In temperate and arid climates you can sow the seeds of Odourless Onions from mid-Autumn to early Winter. The same goes for sub-tropical areas.
In cool temperate zones, sow the seeds late Autumn to winter.They love sunny well drained beds, especially when the bulbs mature in summer.
 If you’re observing crop rotation, and you were growing tomatoes in that bed, always lime your soil  a week or two before planting onions.
 Avoid applying manures and blood and bone to the beds in which you're about to grow your onions because they prefer alkaline soil. You can use spent mushroom compost instead of cow manure.      Onion seeds can be sown into seed raising mix into punnets. Or if you want to sow them directly into the garden, make it easy for yourself, mix the seed with some river sand-say one packet of seed to one cup of sand and sow it that way. Bit like sowing carrots!
 They can be transplanted to garden beds when the seedlings are around 8 cms tall.     
TIP:When planting out onion seedlings, instead of planting them sticking straight up, lay them down in a trench and move the soil back over their roots. In about 10 days they're standing up and growing along strongly.
In about 6 months the onions should be ready-tops will start to yellow and go dry. Pull them up whole-leaves and all, and then leave in a dry place for 3 weeks to cure. Should last a year if stored in a cool and dry place. After that they'll porbably start sprouting.

Plant of the Week: Pandorea Jasminoides "Lady Di", or White Bower of Beauty has white trumpet flowers with a yellow throat, are a striking feature of this hardy climbing native plant. It’s perfect for training along pergolas and around archways and has shiny dark green attractive leaves. This is a hardy plant in most areas and soils, accepting of mild frosts, so that’s down to -3⁰C,  through to tropical zones.

Evergreen in frost-free areas; perennial if roots are protected during heavy freezes, when it will die back to the ground. 
The Bower of beauty is a vigorous climber that likes part shade but accepts full sun as well. This popular and well known variety is native to NSW and Queensland but is often seen growing all over Australia. It can be easily trained over fences and trellises forming a dense screen.
  Why grow one at all? Bird attracting- Suitable for hedge- - Fast growing
So attractive, I had a birds nest in it for the last two years.
Flowers mainly in Spring and Summer, then you get the long seed pods filled with winged seeds that germinate easily given the right conditions.

I’ve given away quite a few plants that have been grown from seed.

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Art in Garden Design and Bandicoots that Toot!

REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney and Across Australia on the Community Radio Network. www.realworldgardener.com
The complete CRN edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition.
Wildlife in Focus:Long Nosed Bandicoots. The reason that bandicoots dig holes in your lawn, is not because it’s being destructive, but because you’ve got grubs in your lawn and he’s getting rid of them for you. Think of the bandicoot as your pest controller. Yes, temporarily, you’ll have holes in your lawn, but you can fill them in with a bit of top dressing and the lawn will recover. Hear all about them with Kurtis Lindsay.

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Vegetable Heroes: The answer to the question which vegetable has more vitamin C than an orange? Broccoli, Brassica oleracea var Italica .
  Broccoli heads are actually groups of buds that are almost ready to flower; each group of buds is called a floret.     Broccoli can be sown now in all but the hottest and coldest of climates, but does need a cool winter to get to maturity. Temperate and cool climates suit Broccoli best with a temperature range of 15⁰C to 25⁰C.  The ideal time for cool temperate districts has just past, but maybe you can squeeze a few seedlings in a see how you go. However  Autumn is ideal for arid, temperate and sub tropical districts.
Sow the seeds 1.5 cm deep directly into the garden or in punnets.
Broccoli is not too choosy about the site it grows in but prefers to be in full sun, but will tolerate partial shade with no problems. Although, growing in too much shade will reduce the size of the Broccoli head.
The ideal soil is reasonably heavy (not pure clay) which is rich in nutrients and has been well-dug.  A light soil can be improved by the addition of compost.
 Adding blood and bone to sandy or a heavier soil which is not too rich in nutrients will also help.
Pick broccoli heads when they are still compact, and before the buds loosen, open into flowers, or turn yellow. It will be about 70-90 days or 2 ½ -3 months, when your Broccoli will be ready if you plant it now.
Design Elements: Since the beginning of civilization, cultures have incorporated art into their outdoor environment for spiritual or religious reasons.
Today’s gardeners are no different, using fine art and funny stuff in the home landscape — think stone carvings, birdbaths, bottletrees, gazing globes and painted metal sculpture. What else? Hear Lesley Simpson garden designer discuss walls in Art in Garden Design series.

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Plant of the Week:Banksia spinulosa "Cherry Candles." Low growing sub-shrub to 50 cmm height. Phosphorous sensitive native, but nectar feeding bird attractant. Tall spikes of cherry red or ruby pollen presenters appear from late summer until winter.

Frost tolerance:  Medium , down to -3⁰C. Will die in heavy frost. So grow it under taller shrubs to protect it from those types of frost.

For more information visit the breeders site  - http://www.austraflora.com/fullwidth.php?id=15

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Bushland Gardens and Red Banskias

REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm, 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney and Across Australia on the Community Radio Network. www.realworldgardener.com
The complete CRN edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/
Design Elements:So you live near the bush, or your garden is all bush. How do you connect the house and the garden so that they’re not two separate entities. Do you see the best part of the garden from your house? Well you can’t move the house around, but maybe you can do something about the garden.

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Vegetable Heroes:     Leeks, known scientifically as Allium ampeloprasum var. Porrum, are related to garlic, onions, shallots, and scallions.
Sow the seeds of Leeks from Spring until the end of Autumn in cool temperate climates, and late summer and autumn in warm and tropical zones,  and in arid districts, seeds must be sown in February/early March and then you can transplant them in April and May. 
I sowed some seed a several weeks ago and have already transplanted them into the veggie bed because they were a couple of inches-about 20cm high and were the thickness of a pencil.
Using some kind of dibble tool or the end of a rake handle to make a hole that's just deep enough to leave only the top inch of the seedling exposed. Set the leek seedling into the hole and fill it loosely with soil. Space seedlings a handspan apart.
So that the lower portion of the leeks are nice and white, you need to blanch them with either soil or mulch.         When they’re 4 weeks old in the veggie bed, use a thick mulch of sugar cane or similar. In another 4 weeks or when they reach about 10” that’s 24cm, do the same again, or you can use shredded newspaper.      
To be honest you can do all this, but if you don’t the leeks are just as tasty.
Make sure the plants get at least an inch of water a week; otherwise the stems will toughen.
Begin harvesting leeks as soon as they're big enough to use.
They usually take 16-18 weeks--4 ½ months.
Online seed suppliers_-      www.edenseeds.com.au and www.diggers.com.auwww.heritageseeds.com.au
www.greenharvest.com.au
www.cornucopiaseeds.com.au
Plant of the Week:Banksia Coccinea or Scarlet Banksia grows to about 5m. this is a spectacular W.A Banksia that most people in the eastern states would love to grow. It’s always featured in books about Australian plants. The flower spikes themselves aren’t big, but they’re just so spectacular looking that everyone wants one for their garden.
The leaves are leathery ovate and toothed margins, light green above and greyish white below.
The flowers are small and tubular grey with bright scarlet straight protruding styles tipped with gold and arranged in vertical rows. On a terminal short cyclindrical spike of about 6cm long set in rosette of leaves. This Banksia flowers in winter.
It naturally grows in sandy or marshy areas on the south coast of W.A. However, in the book on Australian Native Plants by Wriggley and Fagg, the author notes that this plant is difficult to establish in the eastern states except in Millicient in S.A. where it’s thriving in acid sandy soils over limestone. So if you’re area has underlying limestone, it’s well worth a try.
It has been grown with some success on the sandy soils of the Mornington Peninsula, southeast of Melbourne, as well as in Adelaide.

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Magpie Larks and Bed Bugs

REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney and Across Australia on the Community Radio Network. www.realworldgardener.com
The complete CRN edition of RWG is available on www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition.
Wildlife in Focus:This bird has a bit of an identity crisis? It’s neither a magpie nor a lark, so what is it? Find out in by listening to Kurtis Lindsay talk about the Magpie Lark, Pee-Wee, Mud Lark or Murray Magpie!

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Vegetable Heroes:Coriander flowers belong in the Umbelliferae family. The name coriander is derived from the Greek word koris, meaning bedbug, since the unripe seeds and leaves when crushed supposedly have a smell suggestive of a crushed bedbug.
Always grow coriander from seed, sown in the exact spot you want it to grow as it absolutely HATES being transplanted.
Transplanting coriander stresses it so that it goes straight to seed and then it dies. And you never get any leaves at all!
Coriander gets a has a big taproot as it grows so growing it in a pot won’t work either, it’ll go straight to seed as well.
In Temperate and cool temperate climates, in sub-tropical districts, you got until May, and in arid zones, you’ll probably best to wait until August to sow Coriander.
Sow about 1 cm deep, cover the seeds and keep them moist.
Sow it in rows, scatter it amongst your other veggies, you can use it as a shade plant for your lettuce. It’s a good idea to leave in a few plants that have gone to flower because the Coriander flowers are an important food source for beneficial insects, especially little parasitic wasps and predatory flies.
To attract many beneficial insects you want lots and lots of coriander flowers why not sprinkle some coriander and parsley seeds through your other vegetables under your fruit trees and in any other place you can fit them.
Design Elements:I have a friend who is renovating her house and her garden. We stood in her ruined front yard and when I suggested that she put a focal point in front of the lounge room, say a standard maple so that she would have a nice plant to look at, out of the ornate Federation windows. She was rather nonplussed. It had never occurred to her, yet to plants-people, gardeners, plant addicts, call us what you will, this is essential to the soul . Listen here to Lesley Simpson garden designer set you on the right path in fixing  a garden in ruin.

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Plant of the Week:    Fraxinus excelsior 'Aurea'
Yes it’s deciduous, and grafted too. The understock is Fraxinus oxycarpa or Desert Ash-hardy and reliable.
Great autumn colour and distinctive yellow bark on young branches provides year round interest.
The Golden Ash is an old favourite, suitable as a shade or specimen tree., it grows 7 x 7 metres so would suit most gardens around Australia.
The shape of the tree is broadly conical to rounded. Eventually develops into a medium sized, spreading, multi-branched tree.
The leaves are pinnate-think of Grevillea leaves like Grevillea Robyn Gordon.
Leaf colour is a pale lemon  in spring, becoming very pale green in summer, turning to brilliant gold in autumn.
You don’t plant this tree for the tiny and insignificant greenish-yellow flowers in spring. Totally hidden by the leaves.
Bark:Young branches yellow with distinctive black winter buds. Becoming yellow-grey with age.
Tolerances:Best in moist, deep soil in cooler areas but tolerates both wet and relatively dry conditions. Performs well on alkaline soils. Reasonable tolerance to heat and low levels of dought.

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Broad Beans on Red Alert

REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm Sat. 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney and Across Australia on the Community Radio Network. www.realworldgardener.com
The complete CRN edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ Click on 2RRR
Design Elements is continuing the series on connecting home to garden and today Lesley simpson, garden designer and Marianne (host)are tackling design ideas for those gardens with mature trees and nothing much else.

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Vegetable Heroes:Vicia faba or BROAD BEANS Fabaceae Family.
Broad beans grown into a large, upright, bushy plant up to about 1 metre. They tend to be bushy, with square, hollow stems and without beany tendrils.  They can be tall or dwarf growth habits and can produce long or short pods.
Like all beans, they fix atmospheric nitrogen and so, are also useful as a green manure.
Best of all, they are hardy, easy to grow. Plant them in early Autumn in warm temperate climates, and autumn and winter for milder temperate to cooler zones in Australia.
Broad beans prefer a sunny well-drained position in the garden.
Broad beans can be grown in soils with high salinity, as well as in clay soil, so they’re pretty adaptable.
Sow the seeds 5-10cm deep and your broad beans will start sprouting in about 2 weeks after sowing, but will be slower the later you sow towards winter.
Soaking seeds overnight in diluted liquid seaweed can speed this up….germination.
Water seeds well as soon as you’ve put them into the ground and, then, don’t water them…MOST IMPORTANT   until after germination, to prevent the seeds from rotting. Ok, YOU CAN’T DO MUCH ABOUT IT IF IT RAINS. 
Broad beans will need to be staked or supported to stop the plant collapsing under the weight of the mature beans.
If your district experiences a bit of frost, flowers formed during frosty weather are probably not going to set pods. Once spring arrives, pinch out the tips of the plants to encourage pod set.
Try to limit water stress as this will also affect pod set. That means don’t let them dry out!
In  3-5 months, depending on how cold the weather is, the beans will be ready.
Pick the pods when the seeds are looking about the right size but not hard. If left too long on the plant, beans are likely to be dry and less tasty.
Dig in the roots and leaves after harvest to add nitrogen to the soil.
Plant of the Week: Callistemon "Red Alert,"
Callistemon viminalis Red Alert™ is a compact Callistemon with  deep red new growth. It is a native alternative to exotic Photinia.

It has longer periods of red new growth than Photinia - bright red foliage for 2 months in autumn and 2 months in spring, and lighter new growth foliage in other months.

Red Alert™ grows 2-2.4m high x 1.5-2m wide unpruned and 50cm-2m high x 40cm-1.5m wide when pruned.
Position-Requires full sun to part shade and works in most soil types. Tough and drought tolerant. More drought tough and frost tolerant compared to exotic Photinia.
Water well until established -usualy 2 season are required for establishment of most plants.
Prune after red new growth in autumn and spring.

It is more drought tough, very frost tolerant, and has longer periods of red new growth compared to Photinia. 

Expect it to have a maximum height of 2-2.4 metres after 6 to 8 years, which is significantly

To keep Red Alert looking like a tightly pruned hedge it is suggested to prune it each 10-16months. Red Alert is a much better low hedge than Photinia.
Callistemons are generally less prone to drought stress, particularly when firstplanted. It works better in windy situations than Photinia as well.

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