GREENS~LEAVES
The newsletter of the Dunedin Veggie Growers Club; issued monthly. Vol: 4.9.September 2011
Meetings are held on the second Monday each month at St Patrick’s Parish Centre, MacAndrew Rd, Sth. Dunedin starting at 7.00pm sharp (we ask you to arrive at 6.45pm to avoid a bottleneck )
Our next meeting is September 12th and the invited speaker is Bart Acres “Building a tasty future: Seed saving, urban organics and resilient food systems in Dunedin”
President: Margaret Scott (489 2030) msscott@xtra.co.nz Treasurer: Lynne McCrone (4781195)
Secretary: Carol Henderson (454 4625) hendersonic@xtra.co.nz
Springing Up!
Yes, the weeds are coming up along with my (late) broad beans, peas and even some carrots I optimistically sowed about 6 or 7 weeks ago. It was an experiment to compare the sunny front garden and the darker back garden....you can guess what happened....yes, the sunny front garden ones came up at least ten days before the ones in the “dark”! It will be interesting to see if there is a big difference further on in the season.
If any of you would like to write a few lines on what you are up to in the garden; successes , failures , problems solved etc. please send it to me by e-mail or write it out and give it to me at the next meeting so I can include it in the newsletter :)
The August meeting went well although we were down to half the committee once Margaret had to go! A big thanks to all who helped out , especially the seat shifters who separated out the extra seats :)
Andrew Trotman did a very good job of informing and entertaining us in regards to Parsnips and was a good sport in agreeing to help Dennis with the Open Forum....they made a good team!
Our invited speaker, Steve McArthur, showed us the difference in colour of the old (grey) and new
(reddish brown) raspberry canes. The old ones are cut off at ground level as are any suckers or small shoots leaving the new canes which are then tied up and the top quarter removed. He recommended the old “Taylor” variety for jam.
Steve also gave us lots of information on (and showed us photographs of) black and red currants , boysenberries and strawberries. Some of the fertilising requirements and pest control methods were commercial ones not suitable for us home gardeners but the overall message seemed to be that regular feeding would give you a better crop :)
Planting…..
Looking at my two main planting guides, one by Jason Ross (of Sutherland nurseries) and the other from The Star, it seems that the only vegetables one shouldn’t plant yet are ; Spring onions, Leeks and Florence fennel. Last chance this month for Garlic, early Potatoes and Jerusalem Artichokes
September 12th Meeting;
This is our seed share/swap meeting so please bring all your extra seeds! There will be envelopes and pens available :)
Veg. of the month talk – Asparagus by Bruce Bernasconi
BrainsTrust/Open Forum – hosted by Margaret and Dennis
Invited speaker – Bart Acres on “Building a tasty future: Seed saving, urban organics and resilient food systems in Dunedin”
Competition – 1 x Leek
Announcements, seed sharing/swapping and Supper
Open Garden
Dennis sadly had no visitors for his open garden due to inclement weather but is still willing to try again in the future!
However Margaret has kindly organised for her doctor, John Bulow, to open his garden for us on Sunday the 18th at 2pm. The address is 23 Osborne Rd and can be reached by driving towards Purakaunui then turning left at Purakaunui school. There is a causeway after this and the first driveway just after the causeway is the one we are aiming for :) This is a large garden so should be well worth the trip. A car pool has been suggested and will meet at the railway station carpark next to the Saturday market site at around 1.30pm.
Moon Planting times…
According to the NZ Gardener magazine the
most prolific for sowing seeds is up until the 8th Sept. then the 9th and 10th are best for applying liquid manure. Carrots are best sown on the 16th and 17th then potatoes from the 23rd until the 25th.
However, the moon calendar in the Organic NZ magazine only recommended sowing seeds up until the 4th and again on the 14th with root crops on the 29th….it’s nice to have a choice ;)
Actually the moon calendar in Organic NZ is very detailed…have a look at it in the magazines in the library!
Hort Talks
I don’t know if all of you know about the gardening talks hosted by the Botanic gardens and held up at the Lovelock Avenue rooms at 12 noon on the first Friday of each month. I went to the last one entitled “Worms at Work-vermiculture unearthed” and wished you all could have been there too :)
Robbie Dick from Cromwell explained how he acquires thousands of tonnes of waste and converts it into high quality soil conditioner which improves the quality, yield and vibrancy of plants.
He uses sludge (dried) from the animal trucks, lawn clippings, leaves, fruit waste from the orchards, pulp from the juicing operation and fruit and vegetable waste from the supermarkets to feed his tiger worms. He has them in 60 metre long windrows ……16 of them covered with black polythene (white on one side to keep the temp. down in summer!) Each row gets “fed” 2 tonnes of food at a time and the only things that survive the worms are the stickers from the apples and the pumpkin seeds! One slide showed an absolute sea of pumpkin plants which came up so he let them grow and got hundreds of pumpkins from them….which he promptly sold back to the supermarket!
The next Hort talk is on “Green Ways to Eradicate Invasive Weeds” 12 noon , 7th October.
Library
Please bring back your library books so that others can have a turn. It seems to be sensible to limit the lending time to one month, or two if you forget! A reminder will be put in the newsletter each month to jog memories.
If anyone is interested in being the “librarian” please let any of the committee know :)
Internet Interests
I quite like keeping an eye on what is happening in gardens in the Northern hemisphere…
http://allotment65.blogspot.com/
http://vegplotting.blogspot.com/
....and even Australia!
http://hillsandplainsseedsavers.blogspot.com/
but we have our local favourites too J
http://www.urbanorganics.org.nz/
Bank Account details…
For those who would like to pay their subs via internet banking the Club bank account number is;
Westpac 030905 0515906 00
Kindred Day
An invitation has been extended to 4 members of the DVGC to attend the next Kindred Day which is being hosted by the Otago Herb Society at Dunedin North Intermediate on Saturday 5th November. A clipboard will be available at our next meeting with more information and a chance to put your name forward if interested :)
The Kindred Group encompasses all of the gardening clubs in the area and meets twice a year when one of the clubs hosts a “Day” either in the Spring or the Autumn.
School Vegetable Garden Grants
The process of getting schools to apply for a $100 grant from the Dunedin Vegetable Growers Club has come to an end with the result that 3 schools will be presented with their cheques in the near future. The schools are ; St Brigid’s, East Taieri and Waitati Primary schools
Mystery garden?
Happy gardening!
Carol Henderson
Newsletter Editor
