Great! Can't wait to see your pictures.
Wishing you all the best for your new gardening venture.

Please send pictures of the hothouse, too. And all your plants. And of you and your slave. *grins*

Sounds exciting. Just need some good soil, eh?

Happy creating your new garden ray. Looking forward to the photos.

helen

Hi All, Slave Adam here, just waiting for my afternoon beating. As Ray says, the block is really bare, but the soil is much better than first thought. Dark brown and sweet smelling. I 'spose thirty years of cows must have done something right. We're trying a few things. Plain soil, soil with gypsum, no dig beds and various others. Full report as pickies come to hand. I've lost five kilos in four weeks. I've got my teenage hourglass figure back!!!!YEAH RIGHT. Life is easy.NO NOISE. So Good.

Ray and Adam

It sounds pretty exciting to me! But what's the house like? I need to know if it's time to throw a few things in the car and drive over yet?!

PP

Good news about the soil. I thought you were in granite country. Might be some clay around for that kilne.

How wonderful for you both, sounds like some kind of Heaven.
I wish you well while making your Garden of Paradise.
And Good luck on your new venture...Cheers...MM

Hey I think you've got the slave/owner thing round the wrong way? Isn't Ray slaving away creating a beautiful productive garden then moving somewhere else???????
Looking forward to seeing you at the Sustainability Fair,
I'm trying to organise a night out as I'll have a non drinker to drive me home!!!
Sarah :-))

Best of luck with your new start.....are you too a muddie? I have just got back from a 9 week Art residency in Jingdezhen China ..the capital of porcelain....heaven and hell on earth depending on who you are and how you cope with a new culture..I am a Sino phile and just love the palce.I even p-lanted some trees while I was there ..much to my Chinese friends surprise.."why would you do that??

Well, so far, 19 new garden beds in - some dug (hard work) some no dig (love the no dig). Planted out already are:
broccoli
wong bok
kale (2 varieties)
erba stella
potato onions
garlic
Anzac peach
raspberry
youngberry
Two of the beds have a bird seed mix sown just as a green manure crop.
And in pots to strike are cuttings of
grapes (more varieties than you could poke a stick at)
plums
quinces
figs
peaches
pomegranates
(grapes, plums, quinces, pomegranates and most of the figs thanks to Pepino)

Adam's working hard creating his flowering paradise out the front. Me, I just grow veggies.
Loving the climate here - very cold nights but beautiful days for the most part. There's a little town about 30 km east of here called Hillgrove where I might go searching for my country residence (read shack on an acre or two). While waiting for that to materialise though I'm happy as a pig in the proverbial helping Adam get his piece of dirt in growing order.
Ray

And he's really not planting anything, yeah right!!!!!!. The veggies are doing well. We'll start full production when the weather warms up a bit. Minus 8 last night. I was in bed , but the veggies and flowers felt it.
I don't have it all my own way. The only thing I've got in so far are the berries and the peach, oh , and the garlic. Hope it grows this late.

Okay, some piccies at last!

The yard looking west from the back porch.
Note all the garden beds. There were none just weeks before. Right up the back in the top left corner is the compost bin. Just down from it are the remnants of a cotoneaster - horrid thing which had to go! There is now a hothouse next to the compost bin.

This is the south side of the yard taken from the back of the yard. The beds are all no dig - just newspaper/cardboard, edged (wood or cement blocks), filled with straw, manure and soil. The ex-cotoneaster is just out of the picture on the right.

And now the hothouse!

A view from outside.

A view to the inside. The dark stuff on the floor is red cedar mulch over weed mat. I've only lashed it for now as I'll be moving it when I find my own place. The door will be in place tomorrow.

Sown in various beds we have:
Peas - Blue-podded Capuciner (soup), Delta Matilda (snow), Telephone (garden), Oregon Sugar Pod (snow) and Sugar Bon (snap)
parsnips, broadbeans, caulies (Romanesco and Phenomenal Early), carrots (Red-cored Chantenay), kale (Russian Red, Nero di Toscana), chinese cabbage, broccoli (Northern Spring), garlic, rocket, daikon, lettuce (Great Lakes, Winter Triumph, Sucrine), potato onions, asparagus, leeks, erba stella, potatoes (Sebago, Viking, Toolangi Delight, Kipfler, Dutch Cream, Nicola and a purple one whose name escapes me), various green manure crops (soup peas, barley, mixed birdseed, fenugreek etc), youngberry, raspberry and peach.
Next few projects - more beds for tomatoes, caps, chillies, eggplants, strawberries etc etc. Plant out the artichokes currently in pots. Make spots for mandarin, lemon, apple and other fruit trees.
And Spatz, those red currant cuttings are already sprouting!
Ya just gotta love it!

Bravo! Totally impressed and with you all the way on the cotoneaster. What size beds are they and what kind of timber? Best wishes for much success in your great big backyard.

The timber is a mixture of oregon and hardwood of some description, bought from the local tip recycling shop. The oregon won't last but it only has to survive a season. The beds vary in length from just over 1m to a bit over 2m. Total cost so far is around $50 for timber, cement blocks, manure and straw.

the purple taters are Sapphire. And we also have two kinds of parsnips and four kinds of beetroot.
Going well, just had a lovely visit from Patty of adelaide, HRH Pattie I should say.
My carrots came up today, still waiting on the parsnips etc. I've lost 8 kilos and found a new way to feel pain ...it's called a pick and shovel.
I wish all my flowers would come up but they still think it's too cold. Bloody Wimps.
Good growing to all, it's a heady experience.

Another royal tour. She sure gets around. Your beds are now officially blessed.

Oh, please do call me Patrina *waves regally with a flourish* Yes, 'twas indeed lovely!

PP, back in her pokey yard, green with envy.

Looking fantastic guys. How I wish I had all that space.
Those beds are looking really good.
Mantis

Looks great guys. Is there method to the sizes of the boxes you've made, rather than one bed as long as possible? Just curious. I love the little hothouse and even more I love all the varieties you are growing. I don't think our local green grocer has so many.

Well done and your hard work has paid off. (Pepino off to find an easier way to shed a few kilos)

the method we use is called ego and anxiety. works a charm. We started making itty bitty beds, and now we're doing man size. we have to make a few beds for the tommies capsicums and uuuurgh!! eggplants. The size actually depended on the size of wood we could scab at the local recyclers. Very cheap up here, and all kinds of goodies to be found. I found thirty fowler jars for 10 dollars.

Great setup! Great hothouse! Well done!

Glad to hear the red currants are sprouting.
My bushes are already flowering. Madness!

Must dash, another garden bed to set up and fertilize and mulch and..... It's a fantastic spring day out there, nothing can keep me inside. :)

Another no dig done today. This one is just straw on cardboard. When it comes time to plant, I'll just place little islands of soil to plant in.

Ray, is that how people also do the planting in bales of hay? Toss in a bit of soil when they are ready to plant?

PP

I think so PP. It's been described as a way to avoid nematodes if your soils are infested. Cut a hole in a bale, not all the way through, put in some growing medium and plant. The little beggars can't find their way through the bottom of the bale to the yummy roots waiting so tantalizingly above them. Wish I'd known about this when I lived on the Central Coast. It's nematode heaven there. It's an easy way for the back yard gardener to simply side-step the nematode problem.

Hi folks. The no dig stuff really works. I did it once about 5 years ago on the dirt where my greenhouse is now.
I think the process was to:
Lay down thick layer of newspaper (cardboard would do the same)
Spread some animal manure thinly over the paper
Lay down about a six inch thick layer of lucerne straw in biscuits over this.
Put a thick layer of cereal straw over this.
Then like Ray said, make a small well in the straw and fill with potting mix or soil and plant.
I grew 6 tomatoes in this bed and they went beserk.

Thanks for bringing back almost lost memories Ray, (don't take long for things to fall out of the brain these days), I might just try a small bed like this , this year, why the hell not eh.

Cheers Mantis

it seems to work really well. You always get the detractors saying it's not sustainable blah blah, but it seems to work really well. As well as that, the straw keeps the soil lovely and warm. they think it's spring up here.

The Nematodes would be a good name for a group of Harley riders. Motto: Eats roots and sleeps.

Woo Hoo....Munchin' down the highway.

Fantastic photos guys, you've obviously been working hard!
I hope it's not too long till I'm also building new beds.
See you soon
Sarah *who's very sticky from potting LOTS of marmalade*

I'm bringing fruit loaf and a cake Sarah. We have brekky at 7am Sharp, and then you can run my bath.
I can see the head lines now.."strange death of mystery guest."......"He was just so annoying" says distressed perpertrator

Hello Ray & Adam! This is Mrs finbar - I have been asking after you both for ages. Now I've finally seen some pics of the ranch - lovely. I've been reading up on no-dig gardens, that's what I would like if I ever have a garden again. Mr finbar would like one of those cute little Honda tractors with a mountain of horse poo - he has reached new heights of delight, and there is no going back! Much love to you both. I've been painting.

Mrs f x x

Hi Mrs F. Great to hear from you and glad to hear you've taken up brush and easel again. It's been so much fun getting Adam's place in growing order (actually, it's still going on). Today I planted loads of daikon radishes directly in the lawn. An experiment to see if I can convert lawn to garden with almost no effort! I've carefully dug an edge around it so that the only grass to contend with is in a well-defined area.
Anyway, I'm really looking forward to lobbing on your doorstep in 9 or 10 months' time. Must dust off my "Teach Youself Italian" books.

Hi to you Mrs F. great to hear you have found a few niches in Sunny Italia. Molto Bene. Finbar is very proud of your progress. Ray and I are growing up a storm.
All's well in New england, and we've just found out that telstra won't be sold for a while. yay. Armidale really is a beautiful place, Wanna swap?. Is Finbar behaving?. he hasn't killed the gardener yet has he?. very Midsummer murders of him. I've got into making bread. It's fun. I have to buy a pinnie this week, floral I think. I'm getting liver spots, and a craving for sweet sherry. EEEEEK, I'm a C.W.A. member. Anyway Ciao, or as aussies say, CHOW for now. Lotsa Love , Adam x x x

Mr f back again. I hate to interrupt this love-in, but I'm going to take photos of my Cavalo Nero crop and post them. We've had two feeds already - blanched for 3 minutes, then tossed in oil, garlic and a hint of dried chilli; and in my first Ribollita for the season. In other news, my fave are roaring along, with their first flowers appearing; my first spinaci crop is ready to harvest; my carote are up; my piselli have emerged - contrary to Big Foot's (our new name for Carlo the gardener) prediction - and are roaring along; and my barbabietole have started to appear. Torrential rain over the last couple of days, very good for the new bed I've just renovated with 16 Honda-powered barrow loads of horse poo and 4 loads of sand.

We need a Cornucopia Italian-English dictionary now. I had to look up barbabietole - beetroot it would appear. We've just had a false spring, very warm weather luring many fruit trees to blossom. But the cold weather is back today. Apparently this happens, on and off, till late October.

Are they Barbabietollini?. I had them in Roma with a little burro e sale. Yumbo Gumbo.
I bet you're missing Middle Harbour huh?.
All those lovely rocks etc.

They would have been baby ones, Adam. Around here, they add "ini" as a suffix to mean a baby version of something. Just back from a couple of days showing a friend around Florence on their first visit. It's a tough life.

Just like Pepe and Pepino (Little Joe) hehehe

pepino, you aren't part of the double act on Brian and the Juniors in 1972 are you?. they were Pepino and Pepita. He, or should it be you, played Piano Accordion, and she, your sister, sang and played recorder. That's went entertainment meant something.

Sorry Adam. Way before my time, but perhaps we should have a revival of the piano accordian.

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

Agree totally Peter. We ensure when growing barley for green manure that we don't let it go to seed as the nutrients go to the seed and then eaten by the birds. If the farmer is taking the seed then you're not left with much other than fibre. I never thought of it with straw but it makes sense.

The straw does seem to be sprouting quite well, Pete, and I see your point. We just couldn't find spoiled hay, or rather didn't know it existed. We are putting a lot of other nutrients into the soil, and really used the straw for aeration and not for humus or goodness. Merely as an aide to getting the clay to release its goodies.

And I figured you were a little too young to know of these peeps pepino. But the Piano accordion is a special thing. Revered I'd say.