Friday, July 6, 2012

June 2012 Summary


If I had to summarise the past month in one word it would be... Green. I have never eaten so much green leafy vegetables in all my life. My mum would be proud. I have even been putting lettuce in my peanut butter sandwiches. It seems, now that we are growing our own, even the children have started to develop a taste for the green. Today as a joke I asked my son if he too would like lettuce on his peanut sandwich, to my surprise he sincerely replied yes. Children always full of surprises.


A real highlight of this month was the celery. We have attempted celery a few times before with very poor results, thin, tuff, and stringy. So when I told Melanie I had harvested and put in the fridge our own celery, she screw up her face in disgust. It took giving her a taste sample to finally convince her I had actually pulled it off. The stupid thing is the secret to great celery turned out to be so simple... plant in autumn, not spring. Same goes for the success of the lettuce. I have always associated lettuce with the summer salad, thus assumed summer was the time of year it grew best. Well maybe good from the plant's point of view as it bolts to seed.


-          Grown (g) Purchased (g) Grown %
Avocado                       1440      0%
Beans                          986      0%
Beetroot                       710      0%
Broccoli         360           260     58%
Capsicum                       546      0%
Carrot                       2,490      0%
Celery           410           280     59%
Coriander                       30      0%
Corn                         1,000      0%
Cabbage          25                   100%
Cauliflower                    450      0%
Cucumber                     1,550      0%
Garlic                          65      0%
Herbs Fresh       30                  100%
Kale             225                  100%
Lettuce          375                  100%
Onion                        2,857      0%
Pea                            400      0%
Potato                       3,250      0%
Pumpkin                      3,120      0%
Rocket           145                  100%
Spring Onion                   150      0%
Sweet Potato                 1,380      0%
Spinach           90                  100%
Tomato                       1,157      0%
Zucchini                     1,170      0%
Total          1,885        23,291      7%
Average                                24%


Looking at the harvest tally, we only grew 7% of total weight of the vegetables we consumed. However as I have said before I don’t consider weight a fair measure of ones gardening success. Is potatoe more valuable than lettuce? I don’t think so, and I believe the price you pay at the store indicates this. So despite the lightness of the harvest I am still very pleased with Junes outcome of 24% vegetable self-sufficiency, and only a 5% drop from last month.

Total Time     16 person hours

Allot more time was spent in the garden this month, mainly due to the team effort from my gardening group. I look forward to hopefully seeing the results of this effort in the coming months.

7 comments:

  1. The leafy greens are one of the big myths around I'm afraid. It has been one of my hardest tasks to encourage new growers to grow lettuce now not in Summer when it wilts, flounders and bolts. I love the way it consistently provides all the great nutrients needed through winter. It's nice to change seasonal eating and have root vegetables and slow cooks but then it is so refreshing to be able to have a hit of vibrant fresh green leaf.

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  2. Still a great month Jason. We grow a lot of the "Summer" Greens here in winter and I even have tomatos in too that are just starting to flower.

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  3. I think you've done brilliantly! Isn't it cool how all the winter greens are quite bugfree? In summer, everything gets eaten, especially as we won't spray..

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  4. Good job. I have a small veggie patch, that is usually pretty neglected. Makes me want to make more of it.

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    Replies
    1. Thanks Alicia, and welcome. Sorry to hear your patch is neglected. Try spending just 15 minutes on the garden, you will be amazed how much more time you will end up spending on it.

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  5. Food is Food ...I'll take all my garden can give me...in small bunches or in over flowing abundance..the most wonderful thing to me is you didn't have to buy it..Job well done I think

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    Replies
    1. I am striving to have the garden maintain a steady flow of food, but you are correct anything the garden provides is appreciated, and something to be proud of.

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