Strawberry TLC

 Unbaffling the Baffled

Strawberries have had me baffled for a while but over the last year or two I've been focused on unbaffling myself.

It seems to me the more popular a plant is and the more information there is written about such it and then the more misinformation there is.

What I've looked for is consistent and often repeated information and messages.

Fertilizer time

Information like, strawberries like to be well watered and well fed. Along with as much sunshine as possible. They also like a rich well prepared soil with loads of added organic matter.

And also now (mid Winter) is a good time to water, fertilise and mulch your strawberries which I'm doing right now.

I mention Macro nutrients during the video and there is a fairly thorough article on Wikipedia about Plant nutrients if you're interested. 

Experiment time.

 Experiment time.

Whenever I've been reading about how to grow lettuce often you'll see advise stating they should be 'grown quickly' without giving you too much information on how to go about this. 

Therefore I'm going to lightly dig and water in a quarter of a handful of blood and bone fertilizer around my Great Lakes iceberg lettuce every 2nd and 4th Tuesday of the month to see what happens. If that seems to be working and I'm getting good growth, then, when it gets to about half grown in size I'll increase it to half a handful every 2nd and 4th Tuesday of the month. 

Here goes nothing.

What do you think?
Anyone ever tried something similar? 

The photo doesn't do my lettuce very much justice but I can assure you it looks a lot better and healthier than what it looks.

Cheers for now and happy gardening,

Stewart.

Tattie Tyre and more.

Been feeling a bit low these last few days. If anyone has heard of Ulcerative colitis will know why. Apparently I'm one in 61000 Australians that suffer with it.

Anyhow on to more positive things and my potato tyre is doing very well.

I have given them a feed of blood and bone and mulched them and when they get about 200mm aboue the ground I'll slip a second tyre over them and fill it up with compost. So far so well.

I can report that my 'tatties are go' stuck their shoots through the ground and are looking very strong and healthy. I'll post photos when they get a bit bigger.

Also Beetroot I planted on the 11/9/08 sprouted within six days. I don't think I've ever seen them grow that quick. Must be the songs I'm singing them. But then again maybe not.




I've included this photo of my broad beans progress because this is the first time I've grown these little (nearly 1.5mts tall) buggers before and I'm finding it quite exciting.

I've got more to tell but I need to get out into the garden so I'll post again this arvo with more news.

FWIW I drive a taxi in Toowoomba and one of my favorite customers is and old scottish lady and her farwell saying is cheery bye which sounds so cheerful when she says it so I'll try it as well.

So cheery bye

Talk about spoilt!

These are my Cabbage, Lettuce and Turnip that are about half grown and I decided to give them a treat. My Beetroot and Brussels also got the same treat.



First I added a light side dressing of blood and bone at about a hand full per sq/mtr.














































Then a side dressing of compost. I used about a bucket per sq/mtr































And then I covered it all over with my mulched prunings, again about a bucket per sq/mtr.