The Garden of Woz...

[Whwoz]

Started harvesting the garlic today, 8 lots dug so far. Noticed that one variety, Vekan, is side shooting.

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Have this growing in two spots, one definitely wetter than the other and plants not doing as well even though they went in two or three weeks earlier. May lift these and leave the larger plants, or some of them to see what they wind up like

[Whwoz]

Garlic harvest continues, with the following harvested so far

Italian Red,

Iris, Monaro Purple, Traf White Turban, White Crookneck

French Ruski, Music, Susan Delafield. Have lifted the one that I was considering trying for TGS with as well as main patch.

Bulgaria 49, Dolovosky, French Messidrome

Mild 180-4

Vietnamese Red

Dunganski
Marbled Blush

Pyong Vang

Mariposa de la Tierra
Rojo de Castro
Violette D'Agen

Printanor
Wilde Silver

More still to be dug over the next few days, will be lifting all as not really happy due to the rain that we had at end of November. The season has affected some varieties more than others, with one Turban, Master jack, not being worth the effort of harvesting.

[svalli]

Have you lifted any of those Vekan? I have seen pictures, where there is a one leaf growing from tip of each clove in the head, but never such that there are side shoots with multiple leaves growing like that.

[Whwoz]

Harvested the rest of the garlic today, even though some of the later varieties could have been left in the ground for another three or four weeks. With the extra sweet potatoes and okra that I have I need the ground space.

[Whwoz]

@svalli , I took a few photos of the Vekan as I harvested them , mainly for the one with the most shoots. This one I had 5 scapes present, but only one bulb with no obvious division other than what one would expect. I have wrapped some tape around the stem of this one so that I can keep track of it as it matures.

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[Whwoz]

Picked the first of the Youngberries today, kept a few for dinner, with 10 kg/22 lb going to a mate. Probably 3 or 4 times that left to pick. Plants have definitely been affected by all the rain that we have had, virtually no drainage where they are.

Dug over some ground and planted 24 Styrian hulless or pepita pumpkin seeds, along with 40 odd Sunbird sunflower seeds, the latter will serve dual purpose, feed bees while flowering, then the seed heads will go to the folks/older brother for parrot food.

[Whwoz]

Not a lot happening here in Woz land over last couple of weeks due to a migraine that doesn't want to go away. Light one trigger, so eyes checked, all good there, MRI scan of brain booked in for a couple of weeks away. Mainly been trying to do stuff indoors when I feel like doing something, have managed to get 4 kg apricots made into jam and last of 26kg is in bottles in preserving unit now, 37 bottles will be good, no cherries for home preserving likely this year and a wait and see on plum (should be some home grown ones), peaches and nectarines.

Speaking of nectarines, there are some self down seedlings in the garden, no doubt survived the composting process. Need to get these moved and will hopefully be able to do so if migraine settles down and stays away.

Suprise in the garden tonight, 12 of those Styrian hulless pumpkin seeds mentioned above have decided to come through, given up on them prior.

[bower]

My dear Whwoz, I hope you get some prompt relief! Migraine is a terrible thing.
Sometimes it can be allergy related. My DIL was able to identify several things that were triggers for her, and by removing from her diet, she now has them rarely. In the case of cheese, this is something she always enjoyed and was not easily identified as a cause, but after giving it up for a period of time she was really violently ill when my SIL fed her something with cheese in it by accident. It isn't a dairy allergy, as milk and even sour cream don't cause a reaction - it's specific to cheese. And it seems like the allergy developed really gradually but has now become fully severe. So it could be that something in your daily diet that you don't recognize as an allergen is actually causing this severe reaction.
Magnesium deficiency is another factor identified in a few studies. But IDK if it is easy to overcome just by tweaking your diet.
I sincerely hope that your scan doesn't show any other cause!! And check out the allergy theory instead, by omitting this or that for a day and noting any helpful change!

[Whwoz]

Thanks for kind words and thoughts @Bower . Those comments about cheese are interesting and you have me thinking about what I eat, considering that I am already gluten and dairy free plus restricted amounts of a range of other foods. Lots of things to think about still to try and work out triggers, Doubt if I will ever get the initial trigger and hopefully will loose the light sensitivity soon.

[bower]

Fingers crossed, whwoz, that you find something you can omit for the relief.
It is awful to be allergic to foods, you have my sympathy for the restricted diet. I hope any new restriction is not too onerous.

Nuts are a primary source of magnesium, but they are also a big allergen for some. I recall making muffins with eggs, nuts, cinnamon and apple when I was trying to fight migraine by increasing magnesium, but did not experience the relief I hoped for, or not entirely.
Black currants ultimately relieved my migraine issues, but that is because it was hormonal in nature. Still I suppose it wouldn't hurt, if you have some to try. Really hope you find relief.

[Whwoz]

Fingers crossed, whwoz, that you find something you can omit for the relief.,..........
Black currants ultimately relieved my migraine issues, but that is because it was hormonal in nature. Still I suppose it wouldn't hurt, if you have some to try. Really hope you find relief.

Thanks again for the information Bower. Nuts are something that I routinely avoid, do not like them apart from Macadamias. Have not heard about Black currants, not readily available here as fruit but readily available as juice.

[Whwoz]

After a wetter than ever 2022, by only 0.75 mm/0.03 inches, than 2012, our previous wettest here at the garden of Woz, we have had virtually no rain since December 22 and as has ground set hard. So lawn mower out first to cut down all the growth on beds to be dug, then soaker hoses spraying up to wet the beds and the first one has dug up nicely with rotary hoe. Grabbed bottles of sweet potato slips off kitchen windowsill and two pots of same variety, Beauregard, off deck and 35 slips in ground and watered. Get infill mesh will be set up as trellis for these. Rest of bed will be planted with a row of bush beans, about 2.8 m/9.5 feet of each of the bush varieties, Creso, Purple Teepee,. Fin de Bagnol, Mendoza and Bountiful Butter.
Not my preferred plant height, my back is complaining just thinking about the picking.

Three more rows to chop up, more sweet potatoes to go in , plus Capsicium/Bell peppers and tomatoes that have not yet made the ground.

A good day, especially since no more migraines, preventer tablet may have helped, but had to go off that as 5 tablets in, had to come home to sleep off the tablets.

[GoDawgs]

After a wetter than ever 2022, by only 0.75 mm/0.03 inches, than 2012, our previous wettest here at the garden of Woz, we have had virtually no rain since December 22 and as has ground set hard.

I'm always curious as to the effect of solar cycles on weather. There is often a big correlation. So I looked up solar cycles again as we are in Solar Cycle 25 and found this interesting chart. Note 2012 vs 2022.

https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/products/sola ... rogression

Planting sweet potatoes! Have you ever tried one on a small trellis, like at the end of a bed? And yes, I agree about picking beans!

[Whwoz]

Managed to get the beans in today, 5 X 27 to 30 seeds per lot, going from north to south, Fin de Bagnol (green), Bountiful Butter (butter yellow), Mendoza (flat green), Purple Teepee (purple) and Creso (green). Hopefully a good mix.

Yes @GoDawgs , planting sweet potatoes late, like everything else. I always plant Beauregard on a trellis, to many rats around for me otherwise to get any. Not sure about the ones left to plant, they are from a project where one of the aims is for bushy plants. I haven't planted at the end of a row as with rows running north - south I would be blocking light if planted at north end and south end of bed is relatively shallow, with only 200mm/8 inches of loose soil. Will be interesting to see variation across plants along length of row from north (600mm/2 feet) of loose soil to south. Probably only 4 or5 plants in loose soil greater than 400 mm/16 inches deep.

[Whwoz]

The weather has been a bit interesting over the past few weeks 2022 wound up our wettest year in the 18 years we have been on our current block, albeit only by 0.75mm/0.03 inch. Final tally was achieved on the 22nd December when 15 mm fell, bringing our total to 1252.75mm/49.3 inches. Since then we went about 3 weeks with no rain and days upto 38C/100F or thereabouts. Typical of our soil, it then locked up with the dry spell and I had to water to plant above mentioned beans and sweet potatoes. Two days after planting the Sweets, we had another 100F day and some of them are showing sunburn as a result. Of the beans, the Mendoza have been a total flop and have been replanted with Avalanche, the rest have come up well.

Three days ago we had a good thunderstorm come through and dump 36mm/1.44 inches in less than an hour and we had another 5 mm/0.2 yesterday. The Zucchinis are doing really well, with the rain blowing a couple up if I miss picking them for a day, had a couple around 1.3 to 1.4 kg, roughly 3lb, so have made heaps of Zucchini fritters for the freezer.

Black jack Zucchini.jpg

Black Jack is the main one available here as seedlings.

The local lizards, Eastern Water Skinks are maintaining there population nicely, which we all enjoy. This little one, about 1/2 grown has made it home in the gumboots by the front door

Eastern Water Skink.jpg

Yesterday evening I picked our first two large tomatoes, one an EM Champion was grubbed so got trimmed up with what was left showing a lot of promise taste wise considering it was not fully ripe. The other one picked was from a plant of Aussie Drop A1, given to me by member @a sunny day. This is a cross made by Petrina Nuske-Small (I believe) between Purple Russian and a Project Dwarf. @a sunny day passed on two different seedlings from lines that she has grown, both Dwarf. What plants I have grown from seed that I received from Petrina are full Indeterminate, very productive purple bombs that I need to grow more of, size is similar to this one.

Aussie Drop A1.jpg

Aussie Drop A1-1.jpg

Aussie Drop A1-2.jpg

The watermelon plants that struggled for a long time are now going gangbusters and have runners around 5 ft long. Both Sugarbaby and Stars and Moon have very small fruit on them.

[Whwoz]

Picked some 42 days and Sirja's Love (Red) today, ca couple of nice cherries. A couple of real nice cherries.

Plum season is also upon us here at the Garden of Woz. The first two have ripened, one a green skin, the other a purple.

Plums.jpg

the green skin is a total unknown, not to bad on the chew, nearly as good as Jefferson and it makes a ripper jam, the 1.7kg pictured made 9.5 x 250g bottles, will be keeping for jam alone if not eating as well.

The purple I think is one called Early Orleans, not exactly sure, a couple of weeks later than what I was expecting it to be, no doubt due to cool weather. Will probably just stew up and bottle, but may try a small batch of sauce with them

Green Gaga and Sugar are both less than a week away from needing to be picked, but may hang on a bit longer as only forecast to be 20 to 25C/68 to 77 for next 10 days.

[PlainJane]

Plums are great, and so much easier to grow than peaches or nectarines.

[Whwoz]

Picked a few more 42 days, Sirja's Love (Red) and Chang Li tomatoes as well as some more Zucchini. Lots of little watermelons coming on the plants which have grown superbly considering that they were nearly dead a month ago. Might have 3 pepita squash up after nearly two months from sowing. First cucumbers nearly ready to pick.

[a sunny day]

The weather has been a bit interesting over the past few weeks 2022 wound up our wettest year in the 18 years we have been on our current block, albeit only by 0.75mm/0.03 inch. Final tally was achieved on the 22nd December when 15 mm fell, bringing our total to 1252.75mm/49.3 inches. Since then we went about 3 weeks with no rain and days upto 38C/100F or thereabouts. Typical of our soil, it then locked up with the dry spell and I had to water to plant above mentioned beans and sweet potatoes. Two days after planting the Sweets, we had another 100F day and some of them are showing sunburn as a result. Of the beans, the Mendoza have been a total flop and have been replanted with Avalanche, the rest have come up well.

Three days ago we had a good thunderstorm come through and dump 36mm/1.44 inches in less than an hour and we had another 5 mm/0.2 yesterday. The Zucchinis are doing really well, with the rain blowing a couple up if I miss picking them for a day, had a couple around 1.3 to 1.4 kg, roughly 3lb, so have made heaps of Zucchini fritters for the freezer.
Black jack Zucchini.jpg
Black Jack is the main one available here as seedlings.

The local lizards, Eastern Water Skinks are maintaining there population nicely, which we all enjoy. This little one, about 1/2 grown has made it home in the gumboots by the front door

Eastern Water Skink.jpg

Yesterday evening I picked our first two large tomatoes, one an EM Champion was grubbed so got trimmed up with what was left showing a lot of promise taste wise considering it was not fully ripe. The other one picked was from a plant of Aussie Drop A1, given to me by member @a sunny day. This is a cross made by Petrina Nuske-Small (I believe) between Purple Russian and a Project Dwarf. @a sunny day passed on two different seedlings from lines that she has grown, both Dwarf. What plants I have grown from seed that I received from Petrina are full Indeterminate, very productive purple bombs that I need to grow more of, size is similar to this one.

Aussie Drop A1.jpg
Aussie Drop A1-1.jpg
Aussie Drop A1-2.jpg

The watermelon plants that struggled for a long time are now going gangbusters and have runners around 5 ft long. Both Sugarbaby and Stars and Moon have very small fruit on them.

They look great Woz!!!

[Whwoz]

you will have to forgive me folks for not getting more photos nd comments up. Have been dealing with 80kg of Green gage plums and around 60 Kg of Sugar plums so have been a bit hectic lately. Have missed most of the D'Agen plums and a lot of the Ackane apples have also fallen to the ground before I could pick them. Have a tree load of Cox's orange Pippin apples and another of Macintosh Early ready to pick. The Snow apples are also probably close. At least I can put them in cold storage and they will hold.

On another note, the bee hives on the place were raided by the owner yesterday, 12 frames yielded about 20 liters of honey. We have a sample at home and it is delicious.