Orcys Brisbane 1/4 acre

orcy2010 · **Joined:** Wed Nov 10, 2010 8:40 pm **Posts:** 25

well, heres the start of the whole mess

Bed 1 - Mini Roma, asparagus, spring onions, rhubarb, horseraddish, elephant garlic.
This bed will become the perenial bed once the romas and onions come out

Bed 2 - Leek, zucchini, squash, corn, Bay tree (temporary)

Saturdays harvest. I've had about 5 or 6kg of mini romas from 4 plants, and theres plenty to go as long as the weather stays warm and not too wet.

Bed 3 - Eggplant, purple kings, new zucchini and squash.

Bed 4 - no photo. lettuce, carrots, chilli, chives, rosemary.

The girls

Aquaponics - hoping for leafy greens from this. Currently cycling.

Pumpkin and backyard - Aussie butter pumpkin, 50sqm green manure (yard holds water, so aplied 1x dingo digger with rotary hoe, 200kg base sugarcane mulch, 1m3 river sand, 6 bags cow manure, 30kg gypsum). another 6-10 fruittrees to go in here after the soil is a little nicer next spring.

banana and pawpaw

Blueberries, herbs and another pawpaw(need a home, may be temporary)

Back past the aquaponics and pond

seamonkey · **Posted:** Mon Nov 15, 2010 5:21 pm

Great setup Orcy. Have you had any asparagus yet? I put one in the backyard but looks a little lonely. Really did it to experiment as never tried it before. :dunno:

I have a blueberry also but have it in a pot.Yours looks nice and healthy(mine is a bit spindley) I got about 5berries last year but think this year will be a better crop. :joy:

The girls look happy and have a nice house . How many do you have?
It all looks nice and green :thunbs:

orcy2010 · **Joined:** Wed Nov 10, 2010 8:40 pm **Posts:** 25

Asparagus was put in as seedlings in Feb, or March, i think. i'd never seen it as seedlings before, only as corms. So far this is its second huge flush of growth, and i've resisted taking any spears yet. I think maybe after summer, when it gets cut back again, i'll start taking spears.

its strange actually, it seems to grow all year up here, and has only a very short dormant season, so i'm not sure whether I should cut it back more often or not.

blueberries are jsut starting to take off. took a lot of sulphur to get the soil acidy enough, and its still prolly a little high for them.

Only two chooks. we dont eat that many eggs, so i've resisted getting more. I'd love to raise some birds for meat, but being suburbia, were not allowed roosters, so its pretty expensive if you cant breed your own.

Burnsy · **Posted:** Mon Nov 15, 2010 10:45 pm

Lots going on there Orcy, reminds me of my place :cheers:

Tell us more about that concrete AP pond, it looks awesome or is there a thread on it over at the AP forum?

Simo · **Posted:** Mon Nov 15, 2010 11:07 pm

Wow, that is is great looking set up, makes me wish I live some where a little more tropical

orcy2010 · **Joined:** Wed Nov 10, 2010 8:40 pm **Posts:** 25

thanks guys. aquaponics is covered over at http://backyardaquaponics.com/forum/vie ... =18&t=7129

chillidude · **Posted:** Tue Nov 16, 2010 11:24 am

Welcome here too Orcy - great looking setup - very nice.

Big_Dave · **Posted:** Tue Nov 16, 2010 12:04 pm

Great looking setup Orcy, would of thought Brisbane would be a little too south for some of those tropical trees your growing there.

orcy2010 · **Joined:** Wed Nov 10, 2010 8:40 pm **Posts:** 25

Nah, Brisbane is still classed as humid east coast. Where I am we almost never get a frost (i'm told maybe 1 frost every 10 years). Hot, wet summers, and not enough chill hours in winter for cherries or any of the true stonefuits. Tomatoes grow in winter, as do strawberries. Almost nothing except mould and mildew grows in summer. You can probably see the trouble i'm having with zucchini and squash.

Not warm enough for coconuts though

orcy2010 · **Joined:** Wed Nov 10, 2010 8:40 pm **Posts:** 25

well, with some good weather, I had some fairly significant growth to the end of november. Then I went away for 2 weeks, and things went crazy. These are November 29 photos, i'll upload some more recent ones later in the week.

pretty much everything is going well, and the aquaponics is really starting to come into its own. I picked up some lime basil from the local farmers market, and its just about taken over the aquaponics now. oh, and it tastes delicious on bruschetta. a very light citrisy flavour.

Pumpkin is kicking along, though not setting too much fruit. just harvested one of about 8kg because it was just starting to rot on the bottom. need to get some boards under the other 3 or 4 that are there now.

Also trying out 3 new cucumbers this year. giant russian, horned african and sour mexican gherkins. Might chuck in a couple of lebanese if I can find the space.

Does anyone know anthing about snake beans. so far I have had a single bean from 3 plants that are taking up about 6m of trellis 6ft high? am I meant to do something to encourage fruiting?

anyway, enough talking, photos from 2 weeks ago.

Lord Viykor · **Posted:** Tue Dec 14, 2010 7:46 pm

Looking really good Orcy, you got to love our climate.

orcy2010 · **Joined:** Wed Nov 10, 2010 8:40 pm **Posts:** 25

well, its wet as something really, really wet here now. we lost the carpet in the bedroom when a heap of water came over to visit from next door. but at least thats all.

in the garden, we have beans galore. the purple kings are still producing heaps, the snake beans are slowly kicking off, mung beans and soybeans from teh green manure are producing proficically too. Fresh edamame as a side dish for dinner should be good. theres more basil than I can poke a stick at, carrots are coming along nicely, rhubarb is going well. banana and pawpaw have put on about 3 feet of growth, and the pawpaw is flowering. I do have some caterpillar problems, but they seem restricted to the Kale in the aquaponics.

All in all, my garden has finally started to do what its meant to do, produce food, and I couldn't be happier. Looks like vegies for Christmas lunch will be all homegrown except for the spuds. Photos next week when I get back to the work computer.

Burnsy · **Posted:** Sun Dec 19, 2010 11:29 pm

It is nice when the hard work starts to pay off :clap:

Hope we get some rain out of the system that is loitering around at the moment, this dry is ridiculous.

orcy2010 · **Joined:** Wed Nov 10, 2010 8:40 pm **Posts:** 25

well, I promised photos, so here goes

Advocado

Soybeans

Snakebeans

Purple kings

sunflowers

aquaponics beds

Pumpkin

Backyard

Christmas Tree

earthbound · **Posted:** Wed Dec 22, 2010 2:27 pm

Corn's looking good Orky.... :thumb:

Love that minimalist Christmas tree..

Backyard Farming Forum
Bringing food production home