It’s been a wet few weeks. Forty-two millimetres of rain fell in the four days we were away last week (taking advantage of not needing to ask anyone to water!). While we were away strong winds (gusts of 100km/hr gusts) belted Tasmania, including the north where we were. Amazingly, all of the tarps and fleeces were still covering their respective beds and the seedling trays were still on the shelves. That said, two days later one of our neighbour’s trees  fell across the fence. But with our neighbours’ help (and their bigger, badder chainsaws), the tree became material for compost, stakes for peas and next year’s firewood. Ebbi helped by telling the friendly but curious goats not to use the tree as a bridge to our property.

All the water is posing some challenges: slugs, moss, mud, stagnant puddles. There is still an internal debate about how permacultureish the solution to the pooling should be. Permaculturalists say swales (ditches that run along the contour and hold the water) are the answer but neither of us really understand (yet) how this will cope with all the rain in winter. But we have been rewarded for the rain-related delays in building our greenhouse – this week we decided that we will bite the bullet and move our polytunnel out of the shade next year so that the season gets underway during August. It’s going to the sunniest position, where the greenhouse was to be. Moving the greenhouse a few metres across was much easier when it just involved moving the markers for the four corners.

We did made decent progress on our two-phase windbreak. Under pressure from Alex to stop researching, Christie bought 65 plants to thicken the future windbreak over time. The aim is to provide wind protection, cope with the heavy clay soil, attract insects and feed pollinators, provide habitat to birds, not be too flammable, and be endemic to the Huon Valley or Tasmania…. which is why it was a little slow…. The overall mix will hopefully do these things. The more immediate hessian windbreak is nearly finished. We’ve been doing it in 10m stretches so the hessian is more manageable and because cutting and pulling out the grass around the fence has been a pain in the neck, back and legs! For the wind break itself we’ve punched brass eyelets into the hessian, attached it to the fence with cable ties and then sewn it (yes really) to the fence with jute to take some stress off the eyelets. We’re happy that the first section survived the wild weather but the real test will be during summer.

Meanwhile we continued preparing for the growing season. Seed trays are accumulating in the laundry and tunnel again and the most important seed orders are done. We’re slowly remembering the routines we had developed by the end of last season for efficiently sowing and propagating seeds of various types. The catch-up weeding involved in preparing the beds for the season is proving to be physically straining – it’s amazing how much hand, arm and leg strength can be lost in six months! So we’re capping it at one hour a day and legitimising this by labelling it a transition. There is certainly a case for gym for growers! But all transitions are close to ending – September is nearly upon us, which is when the sowing list multiplies. And next Saturday we will say goodbye to Saturday sleep-ins and restart selling veg at the little shop in Geeveston.