Innholdsfortegnelse for Issue #13.1 - 2022 i Good Organic Gardening

While putting this issue together, we noticed a theme emerging: water. It’s a particularly Australian obsession that doesn’t hit home until you move to a rural location where you rely on rainfall to keep your tanks and dams topped up. It’s especially true if there are kids in the house. Ever tried to regulate a teenager’s shower time? And every so often your water levels get so dangerously low you buy a truckload of the stuff — whereupon, even before the departing tanker gets to the end of the drive, the heavens open and down it comes. Of all the continents, only Antarctica receives less rainfall than we do. Neither is it shared equally here: Darwin gets around 1700mm a year while Adelaide goes thirsty on less than a third…

Sometimes a garden is about creativity, habitat, climate hardiness, art and soulfulness. It isn’t always just about feeding the masses and aiming at 100 per cent food security. Creating a space that ticks more than one box of garden design is important on so many levels, especially in the current climate. Organic gardening doesn’t always have to be just beans and compost or permaculture and pigs. It can be much more; it can be diverse and as personal as you want it to be. Your garden is your palette to do with as you wish and this one is just that: an aesthetic, organic and sustainable garden for the family who live there as well as for their pets and the local wildlife. WHILE ALL ASPECTS OF DESIGN ARE HER…

The artichoke is a handsome vegetable both in the garden and on the plate. In spring and summer, the leafy clumps produce large, edible flower buds on a stout, thick stem. However, don’t leave artichokes too long before harvesting as they quickly reveal their true identities as purple-flowered thistles. Once the green bud scales start to separate, the flower is maturing and opening. By the time a purple thistle flower emerges from the bud scales you’ve missed the opportunity to eat them. In that case, we may have missed out on a taste sensation but bees and other pollinators can still enjoy this nectar-rich flower. As large and attractive perennial plants with spiky silver-grey leaves, artichokes are often incorporated into gardens rather than relegated to the vegie patch. Growing them…

Rainbow chard, Swiss chard or rainbow silverbeet are all common names for the popular leafy veg with multihued stems that keep their colours even when cooked. It’s a great way to get kids to eat their “greens” because everything’s more fun when it’s rainbow coloured! References to this vibrant veg go back a few centuries and it’s actually native to Sicily, not Switzerland. Beautiful both in the patch and on the plate, chard is now considered an essential heirloom vegetable around the world. The small young leaves can be eaten raw in salads or lightly wilted while the older leaves can be cooked up and used as spinach or kale substitutes in many dishes. BEAUTIFUL BOTH IN THE PATCH AND ON THE PLATE, CHARD IS NOW CONSIDERED AN ESSENTIAL HEIRLOOM…

MUSHROOMS AND DEPRESSION For a new study, data was gathered from more than 24,000 adults across 11 years. Analysis of diet and mental health outcomes revealed that people who ate mushrooms regularly were less likely to have depression. Mushrooms contain ergothioneine, an antioxidant, and research shows that antioxidants have a preventive role in several conditions including schizophrenia, bipolar disorder and depression. Mushrooms are the highest known dietary source of ergothioneine. The ever-popular button mushrooms are also a good source of potassium, which is known to reduce symptoms of depression. Other mushroom species also contain neurotrophic factors that influence nerve growth and hence conditions such as depression. However you slice it, this research suggests that eating mushrooms is a good way to prevent depression and other mental health issues. Source: Journal…

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Not many people set out to cultivate nettles — but if you have an unplanned crop, don’t just discard it as an annoying weed. Nettles are useful plants that tend to grow in good soil but they need to be treated with respect. The slightest brush with a nettle leaves a burning, stinging pain that can often last for many hours and is inflicted on bare skin by the myriad tiny “hairs” on the stem and leaves. Take a very close look at the hairs (use a hand lens) and they prove to be hollow needles designed to inject chemicals, including histamines, into the skin. A prolonged encounter with a nettle patch can lead to a severe and very painful rash that will need treatment with antihistamines. A severe reaction…

The pale-pink climbing rose ‘Souvenir de la Malmaison’ was named after Joséphine Bonaparte’s estate near Paris where the empress grew some 250 varieties of roses. Joséphine also planted Australian trees such as acacia, melaleuca and eucalyptus and kept kangaroos, emus and black swans as well as zebras and llamas, among other exotic animals. Sarah Pinon is something of an exotic transplant herself. She grew up in rural Brittany in northwest France and as a child spent much of her spare time working on her parents’ 80ha farm. She now lives far from France in Dardanup, a small town in Western Australia’s fertile Ferguson Valley, where kangaroos roam freely in the backyard. Sarah celebrates her European childhood by growing the likes of hollyhocks and, of course, the magnificent ‘Souvenir de la…

The most frequently asked question about garlic is when is the best time to plant it — closely followed by when to harvest it. The rule of thumb is you plant on the shortest day of the year and harvest on the longest: respectively, that would be mid-June (the shortest day this year is June 21) and just before Christmas. The planting window is actually much broader. Garlic is a spring-flowering bulb (much like a daffodil) so it can be planted from late autumn through to the shortest day and harvested about six months after planting. With that sorted, it’s worth keeping an eye out for cloves to plant. A lot of garlic sold in Australia for eating comes from overseas — mainly from China but also from Africa, Taiwan,…

A cool-climate edible native to Japan, deliciously hot wasabi grows naturally in mountain streams in the country’s highlands. Its fresh stem — not the root or rhizome as it’s often mistakenly described — is ground to make traditional wasabi paste, served as a pungent condiment with sushi, sashimi and soba noodles. Many consider wasabi a type of horseradish and, even though they belong to the same Brassicaceae family (as does mustard), that’s where the familial resemblance ends. However, the confusion around horseradish is compounded by the fact that many of the commercially available wasabi pastes are actually made from horseradish dyed with green food colouring. MANY OF THE COMMERCIALLY AVAILABLE WASABI PASTES ARE ACTUALLY MADE FROM HORSERADISH DYED WITH GREEN FOOD COLOURING. The taste of freshly ground wasabi stem is…

When we think of bush tucker, we tend to overlook the many native edibles that grow by or in the sea. Most are protected and often local authorities have rules around the harvesting of endemic species. You need to check first before picking anything in the wild. Many bush tucker species look toxic. Without generations of expertise behind you, like that of First Nations foragers, a food-finding mission in nature can risk harm to both yourself and the environment you’re in. You need to identify plants correctly before harvesting and consuming them — or growing them in your garden. It’s always best to buy from a reputable native nursery. Every now and then I have the pleasure to visit Minjerribah, the north island of Stradbroke, to be awed once again…

Herbs are a great addition to any garden. They can be used in cooking, for making teas or as natural remedies. They can be picked fresh as needed or harvested and preserved for use throughout the year. Typically, herbs put on lots of new growth in the warmer seasons and are pruned back to size after flowering to maintain a tidy and compact form. Unfortunately, that’s not the optimum time to harvest herb leaves for drying or freezing, as herbs tend to become somewhat bitter in flavour after flowering. What can we do when the timing of pruning and harvesting processes don’t coincide? LINKING GARDEN PROCESSES In the ecological gardening system of permaculture, one of the ways we save energy, time and resources is by linking processes together. When the…

COOL & TEMPERATE VEGIES • Plant a good range of brassicas including Asian greens. Broccoli, cabbage and kale are particularly easy growers, but cauliflower and Brussels sprouts are well worth the effort. • Put in plenty of peas, including sugar snap and snowpeas, as well as broad beans. Give the peas a structure such as a trellis or tepee to climb. • Look for purple varieties of vegies, not just for colour on the plate but for the anthocyanins indicated by the colour. • Spinach and chard are good crops for winter; or, for something different, why not give warrigal greens a go? • Divide overcrowded perennials such as asparagus and artichoke by digging up and replanting into soil that has been replenishd with aged manure, compost or worm castings.…

While there are many varieties within the botanical genus of Prunus, the sweet cherry — also called the wild cherry — is known as Prunus avium and the sour cultivar is P. cerasus. The English word “cherry” is derived from the Latin cerasum, named after the area in Turkey from where they were first exported to Europe. The indigenous sweet and sour cherries have been grown (and enjoyed) since prehistoric times throughout much of Europe, western Asia and parts of North Africa. NUTRITIONAL VALUE Sweet cherries are a nutritionally dense food rich in anthocyanins, flavonoids such as quercetin and hydroxycinnamates, potassium, fibre, vitamin C, carotenoids and melatonin. Sweet cherry contains about 2.1g of fibre per 100g, a range of bioactive food components such as the anti-inflammatory polyphenols (160–170mg/100g) and antioxidants…

IN SEASON MAY FRUITS Apple, avocado, banana, cumquat, custard apple, dates, feijoa, grapes, kiwifruit, lemon, lime, mandarin, nashi, nuts (chestnuts, hazelnuts, peanuts, walnuts), orange (navel), pear, persimmon, pomegranate, quince, rhubarb VEGIES Asian greens, beetroot, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, carrot, cauliflower, celeriac, celery, daikon, eggplant, eschalot, fennel, garlic, ginger, horseradish, kale, leek, lettuce, mushrooms, okra, olives, onion, spring onion, parsnip, peas, potato, pumpkin, silverbeet, snow peas, spinach, squash, sugar snap peas swede, sweet corn, sweet potato, taro, tomato, turnip, witlof, zucchini IN SEASON JUNE FRUITS Apple, avocado, banana, custard apple, dates, grapefruit, kiwifruit, lemon, lime, mandarin, nashi, nuts (chestnuts, hazelnuts, walnuts), orange (navel), passionfruit, pear, persimmon, pomelo, quince, rhubarb VEGIES Asian greens, beetroot, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, carrot, cauliflower, celeriac, celery, eschalot, fennel, garlic, ginger, horseradish, Jerusalem artichoke, kale, kohlrabi, leek,…

DOWN-UNDER MILLIPEDE LIVES UP TO ITS NAME Until the recent accidental discovery of Eumillipes persephone — an Australian species with up to 1306 legs — no millipede had ever been found with more than 750 legs, so none could be considered a true millipede. The “new” millipede’s generic name comes from the Greek eu- (“true”) and the Latin words mille (“thousand”) and pes (“foot”). Its specific name references the Greek goddess Persephone, queen of the underworld. A team of scientists found four members of the new species in goldfields drill holes in Western Australia as deep as 60m underground. The millipedes have short legs and long, thread-like bodies around 0.95mm wide and 95.7mm long, consisting of as many as 330 segments. Their eyeless heads are cone-shaped with antennae and a…

If you want a long-lived clever plant with an even longer and revered history, the yew — a European woodland tree associated with places of worship — is for you. Yew trees are commonly found in old cemeteries and churchyards in Europe and are also associated with some churchyards in Australia. In Europe, the trees often predate the church, indicating that the land has probably held some sort of religious significance for many centuries. Some of the oldest yew trees known are found in the UK where there are specimens that date back more than 2000 years. (Once a yew tree reaches its 900th birthday, it’s honoured with the title “ancient”.) MODERN VALUE All parts of the yew are poisonous — its generic name Taxus is from the same root…

Former schoolteachers Diana Neggo and Rob Manning may be retirees but they’re always up for an adventure. Before moving to their small farm in Western Australia’s beautiful Ferguson Valley four-and-a-half years ago, the couple sailed halfway round Australia and on to Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand on their sloop The Doctor, named after Fremantle’s famous afternoon sea breeze. With them, as crew, went ship’s cat Motley. Diana cuddles the now 18-year-old tortoiseshell, a rescue cat that came aboard in Cairns and managed to rescue herself more than once. “She fell overboard a few times and swam to the boat, grabbed hold of a rope and managed to get back on board,” recalls Diana, adding: “She’s sailed more miles than most humans around Australia and Southeast Asia.” Aboard The Doctor, they lived…

MAY 2022 Late autumn means it’s still a good time in most regions to get all those lovely health-giving brassicas and root vegetables into the garden JUNE 2022 Winter has officially arrived and, while it’s a quieter time for planting in cooler regions, there’s lots to put in the ground in the warmer zones When the moon is waxing from new moon to full moon, it is increasing light and drawing sap flow upwards. During the waning from full moon back to new moon, light decreases and sap is drawn downwards. This movement of sap flow has an influence on how well new plants will grow. There are four phases, each lasting seven to eight days. Sowing, planting and taking cuttings should not be done in the 12 hours before…

Two types of savory are used in cooking: summer savory (Satureja hortensis) and winter savory (S. montana). In some dishes they are virtually interchangeable, but their botanical differences may determine which you choose to grow. Summer savory, the better known of the two, is an annual, while winter savory, sometimes called mountain savory, is a bushy perennial that some people find more convenient for the herb garden. While the two savories — members of the Lamiaceae family and so related to thyme and rosemary — can be used in much the same ways and have very similar leaves and flowers, hortensis is generally considered to have a sweeter, more delicate flavour than montana, which is slightly stronger and more bitter. Neither is commonly used in Australia. I only discovered them…

We have a Japanese plum in the garden. The first of our fruit trees to blossom, covering itself with white flowers in late winter and early spring, it’s a ‘Satsuma’, one of the best backyard varieties. Nearby are several English plums — ‘Victoria’, ‘President’ and ‘Greengage’ — all still resolutely grey and bare of flowers. In late summer and early autumn, when the fruit ripens, it tastes of roses. Along with peaches, nectarines, apricots, cherries, apples and pears, plums are part of the enormous rose family. Although there’s no hint of rose in this one’s floral perfume, the juicy, red plums somehow channel the family line into an irresistible flavour. They are delicious to eat fresh but also make wonderful jam or bottled fruit. The Japanese plum — actually native…

Like many, I found my pleasure in gardening thwarted by the confines of a small block — until I read an article that brought both hope and inspiration. In Backyard Orchard Culture: A New Approach to Growing Fruit Trees in Limited Spaces, permaculture educator, blogger and Good Organic Gardening contributor Angelo Eliades proceeds from the thrilling premise that a plethora of fruits can be grown on minimal land. During coursework under Bill Mollison and Geoff Lawton, Angelo — founder of the blog Deep Green Permaculture and a pioneer in small-scale intensive gardening and urban agriculture — was faced with the dilemma familiar to many who undertake permaculture training: how to scale food forests down to small urban settings. His research uncovers the groundbreaking work of the Dave Wilson Nursery in…

COOL & TEMPERATE VEGIES • Dig up and divide perennial vegies if you haven’t already done so and plant some new ones. Try something different such as Jerusalem artichoke — great for creamy winter soups. • Continue planting brassicas and peas of all kinds to ensure constant cropping through the cooler months before the cabbage white butterflies get busy. • Winter is an especially good time for leafy greens including lettuce, mustard greens, collard greens (these are actually brassicas), silverbeet and spinach. Corn salad may be one to try if you’ve never grown it before. • Continue planting alliums including onions, spring onions, garlic, leeks, eschalots and chives. • Asparagus can be planted in all areas this month. Purchase the crowns from your nursery as they are likely to be…

98 Breakfast of Champions 99 Poached Spicy Mushrooms 100 Semur Chicken 101 Wattleseed Banana Bread This is an edited extract from Mabu Mabu by Nornie Bero (pictured above), published by Hardie Grant Books (Hardback, RRP $45) and available in stores nationally from 2 Feb 2022. Photography: © Armelle Habib 2022, except pages 20, 22–3 © Hugo Lamb 2022…