Birds are often the culprits for excavating new seeds; and small rodents. One system which may work for you is to get some small mesh 'chicken' wire to put over a row of wire hoops pushed well into the ground. Fasten the wire to the hoops. When the plants are up you can either leave the protection there until you're ready to harves - or move the wire across to a new site. (Aside: if you have found a source of trashed supermarket trolleys those baskets make very good protection for young plants and small patches of strawberries ;-) ) For the euc's: ask on the Australia forum. There are many species of Eucalyptus. Bear in mind that if you get more rain than the Blue Mountains your plants are going to grow much faster. For the tomatoes - generous holes with the soil well-mixed with plenty of compost, a stake or other means of support, and the recommended serving of fertiliser, followed by reliable watering. A trickle system would probably work well and ensure that the leaves aren't left damp. For soil-planted plants - you might want to investigate what it would take to install a watering system on an automatic timer. Trickle is probably more economical and effective than sprinklers as such. For plants you're growing on, or house plants - might be worth looking at capillary watering pads. (More forums to look at!) PS unless you have access to vast amounts of material - and mechanical assistance - your compost heaps will never supply all the organic stuff you'll want in your garden. It pays to allocate a chunk of the garden budget for buying in. If you develop the habit of always adding a couple of gallons of compost to the soil whenever you put in a new permanent plant - and a six inch layer when you renew your beds for annuals and bulbs your soil will steadily improve and so will the water-holding capacity. Mix it through rather than burying a layer. In some soils buried compost can become a toxic mess. Clay can be particularly bad this way. Keep the humus in the top six inches. If you're not home often enough to water things week by week - a deep watering and a hefty mulch layer can help plants carry over. Usually established plants will be fine. It's just the new ones that are making roots to escape from the root ball that can seriously suffer. Bare-rooted planting can take a year or so to create a decent root mass. With that in mind you might want to work a patch at a time to give the high intensity care needed to get plants well-established.

Hi Guys Just a note of caution regarding the use of straw in No dig gardens...the quality of soil produced from decomposed organic matter is related to the qhality of the organic matter it is sourced from when plants (say a grain such as oats) reaches maturity it will begin to extract the nutrients in the leaves and stem and transfer these nutrients into the developing seeds If the farmer then comes along and cuts these seeds and sells you the resulting stems then you get poor nutrients and this can cause deficiencies in your soil On the other hand if you are using hay yoju get the seeds as well and as such you get the "wholefood" so to speak...you actually get all the nutrients the plant ever had Sure some "Gardening Gurus" will tell you to..."Never use hay because you get a lot of weed seeds") but if you are mulching over your mulch...as is the no dig method then you just mulch these "weeds" down...or harvest them for breakfast and you get a really good soil building up I would never buy straw because for the same cost (or cheaper) you can get spoiled hay But that is just my opinion on this and I rarely ever buy any mulch at all...preferring to grow my own...its even cheaper...of course there are times (especially when creating a new garden) I would like to get some feedback on the above comments...especially from those who disagree cheers Peter

I am currently harvesting: Mulberries Red Strawberries White strawberries Valencia Oranges Lemons Babaco Lettuce (x 3 varieties) Cress Rocket Carrots Chillis Macadamias (just finishing) Perrenial Leek Perpetual Spinach Silverbeet Asparagus are doing great this year Celery ( dissapointing little plants - first time growing these) Rhubarb Capers (just starting to form buds) Tumeric Heaps of herbs( parsely, thyme, sage, lemongrass, dill, coriander, curry leaf, laksa leaf, chamomile, calendula, lemongrass, mint, oregano, marjoram, chives, garlic chives, rosemary, lavender, aloa vera, bay leaf, comfrey. Seeds in for mustard, fenugreek, cumin, mizuka and more coriander) Sugar snap peas have just been pulled Loquat finished fruiting about a month ago Plants in preperation for fruit are: Fig Black muscat grape White nectarine Garlic (regular and elephant) tomatos Potatoes Pepino chili capsicum eggplant rockmelon (hales) watermelon (small shining light and sugar baby) Pumpkin (jap, delicata, golden nuggett) Lebanese Zuccini Cucumber (lebanese and german pickling) Onions (red and white) Citrus (Kaffir lime, tahitian lime, oranges, cumquat, lemonade all small fruit) All my other trees are still too small to fruit: Three guava varieties Fejoa Carambola Lilly pilli Native tamarind Davidson Plum Black Sapote Apricot Yellow and red papaya Granadilla Passionfruit - yellow panama cherimoya Oh and of course my five chookies! (which aren't really vegetables now are they!) And that's about it! All mixed up and couldn't really say they are all in my "Veggie patch" as the two vegie gardens that I started with seem to have taken over the whole yard - plants stuck in wherever I could find space!

Good news. Just called Dad, and Mom loves the woman helping them. (i need to get her name and number). -The one major hurdle we won from our visit last month. She was in elder care and hospice for 20 year before staring her own business. She dropped Dad off at the pool for his swim, then took Mom for a blood work appointment, then picked up Pop....stopped by the grocery that Mom has not been to for 2 years...then cleaned the house, then their upright freezer went out...so she helped organize and toss old stuff. Helped Mom organize her kitchen fridge/freezer, then my Misfits box arrived, 😂. Oy. Helped to put that away. Then helped Mom with her bath. Brilliant. She starts all new ciients herself, then gradually can introduce an employee for assistance if she cannot meet the need that day. She so understands the eldery hesitancy to have a stranger in the home. I am so relieved. It has been so stressful especially during Covid lockdown. He was driviing and not safe at all. He causes an accident and mom is at home alone with demetia...his license expired and no way will be renewed. (we considered taking the keys to the car)...to force some outside help. I have three older siblings that are 'dough head' about the sitaution. They are all retired and i am the baby 8 years yourger so where are they? jerks, lol.