Mulching Your Garden
Gathering mulch from your surrounding areas.
Leaf drop of deciduous trees especially in autumn. Gather these brown leaves, let them dry and use them as free mulch.
Gather leaves with diversity (don’t just gather one type of leaf). This encourages invertebrate diversity which is beneficial for your garden. Also gather sticks and other bits of matter as this all helps.
Mulching is for water retention and allows you to conserve water in your garden which means watering less all in all seasons. Covering the soil with mulch prevents it from drying out and eroding. Especially important for summer!
Mulching is beneficial for invertebrates as it creates more habitat for them to live in within your garden. This can then have a positive impact on your garden as they help with pest control, pollination, food sources and decomposition.
To protect the soil, all visible areas should be protected with an unbroken layer of mulch. This need not be particularly thick, but if it begins to disintegrate, it should be refreshed.
Composting
The general rule of composting is generally a 60:40 ratio of majority dry carbonate and minority green matter. However, to make this easier we do a 50:50 dead/dry:green/moist ratio.
Common Problems:
Too much green material
Too wet
Smelly
Flies present
How to fix this
Add more material e.g. dry leaves, some very small or thin sticks, dry grass etc.
Add recyclable brown paper e.g. egg cartons, brown paper bags, thin cardboard
Break leaves up in compost (they can mat and keep it moist)
In general, break everything in smaller pieces (makes it easier for invertebrates to break it down and accelerates decomposition)
Propagation
You can propagate the plants in your garden by identifying nodes and roots. Break a stem off which has nodes of separate nodules of some plants if they have roots.
Lemongrass has little roots already (break them off from existing plant). This new plant can either be placed in a jar of water or straight into the ground.
Mint can be cut as it has many nodes along there stem where leaves are. These bottom leaves can be cut off and then the stem can be placed in water.
Parsley plants have new shoots due to a rhizome.
Strawberry plants create runners. This will put down roots. Therefore, you can create multiple plants and separate these runners.
Of course, look out for any plants seeding and harvest these and then plant them.
Lizard Homes
Use a planter pot trivet as a base for the habitat
Fill with small stones/ pebbles to create a thermal mass that can heat up in the sun
Fill the trivet with water so that the stones just stick out of the water
Top up with some pieces of wood (layer one on top of the other to build hiding places)
Place in a half-shaded, half-sunny spot close to plants to enable hiding places for the lizard and enough heat (we put ours underneath the trellising tomatoes.
Check regularly if water is needed
Worm Farming
No citrus/onion/garlic/chilli. If it can hurt your taste buds, it's probably not great for the squishy worms either.
No meat/milk/bread/processed foods. Putting it in compost or worm farms will likely lead to pests and mould so it is best to avoid!
Small worm farms can be created in garden bets using old plant pods:
Drill in a few more holes in the pot.
Dig a hole and place the plant pot in it (should lie completely in the ground), fill the surrounding gaps with earth.
If you have a bigger worm farm, you can transplant a handful of compost and worms in the pot.
Add food scraps and dry plant material.
Place a stone/stone plate on top that covers the pot.
Refill with food scraps.
Other Notes
Nasturtiums
- Leaves + flowers are edible.
- You can pickle the green seeds (as they drop a lot) to act as a substitute for capers. This is more accessible and allows you to create straight from your garden!
Native raspberry
Always plant in closed garden beds as their roots spread everywhere and take over the garden (beds allow controlled growing)
Might be the dominant plant after some time in its garden bed
Pineapple sage
Leaves and flowers are edible – the flowers contain sweet nectar that can be sucked out
Planting Tomatoes and Marigolds together
- Marigolds help in repelling certain pests, such as root-knot nematodes
- Root-knot nematodes cause knots in the roots of plants like tomatoes
Garden design
The ground could have been designed better (with mulch instead of hard sand and stone), the mulch would have turned into compost over time which could have been used for the garden beds
Always consider the sun's path and where to place a shed etc. because of the shadows that are cast (in general avoid shade)
