This week we kept building garden beds and sowing seeds but we also started working on our border. Borrowing from permaculture principles (and traditional farming) we plan to create a hedgerow-style border around the garden that will perform a wide range of functions. The idea is to fill the area inside and outside the fence with fruit trees, herbs and traditional perennials, and various native plants (flowering, edible, local to the region). The border will then provide a home for “beneficial insects” (that eat the insects that eat our plants). Its flowers will attract bees to pollinate our vegetables. It will provide herbs and fruit. It will encourage native insects and birds. And it will look considerably more attractive than our blue wire fence.

The border had been pushed down the to-list as we rushed to get started with growing vegetables before summer finished. But last week fruit trees went on sale at a local nursery so this week we began planting. So far we have a cherry tree, two apple trees, two pear trees, two blueberry trees and a passionfruit. They’re still alive so that’s a good sign. In coming weeks we will plant some established natives that we also bought on sale. The herb and native seeds I’ve been planting will eventually fill the spaces but at the current pace of growth this will be a long-running project  – some are barely 2mm tall!

Even without our biodiversity-enhancing hedgerow, it’s been amazing to watch the expanding variety of insects that visit our garden. Sometimes – like for bees – it’s been wonderful. (Although bumble bees aren’t native to Tasmania, they’re still cute flying fluff balls that are pollinating our vegetables.) Sometimes, it’s been “interesting” to notice a new type of insect and wonder whether it will eat our plants or some other insect that is eating our plants. I will hopefully get better at classifying these into friend or foe. Other times it’s been a bit sad, like when I noticed that a new type of caterpillar had appeared en masse underneath our insect row covers to eat our newly planted broccoli seedlings. Maybe the row covers kept them safe from predators? In any case, they are far fewer in number now.

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By the end of the week we had reached our 16th bed. We had a lot of broccoli and cauliflower bursting to get into the ground so we skipped the tarp/green manure phase and planted directly into the compost. Hopefully the cover from the compost and the plants will defeat the grass underneath. It was also an opportunity to test out Alex’s latest creation – a tool to pop the plants out of the seed trays (they are available commercially but aren’t cheap). Let’s just say that I’m waiting for the second prototype. It looked promising though!

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On Thursday night I went along to the Tasmanian Fire Service volunteer information night. The system relies on volunteers and given the terrible fires on the mainland this year and the awful fire in our area last year, I felt compelled to help. After listening to what was required in terms of training and time commitments as well as the type of incidents firefighters attend (e.g. car accidents), I chickened out completely. I can only say that I have even more admiration and gratitude for the people who do this – and their families that support them. But I do wonder whether this is really a sustainable system if the bushfire season is going to become longer and more intense.

On a happier note, the sheer abundance of food meant we had the fun challenge of thinking of ways to cook with it. Meal of the week was probably chard and tofu wontons (I truly think that Alex would agree). But the most photogenic was the zucchini fritters, which were also quite tasty. I’m behind on my other food storage plans, that include turning an overgrown zucchini in the fridge into zucchini bread and rocket into pesto, trying out Mum’s old vacola jars on our plums and making more batches of pickled radish and radish leaves. Some late nights await!