One of the highlights of spring has been watching the diversity of life in and around the garden multiply. Without trying, I’ve seen a baby quoll and a couple of bandicoots in the past week as well as the usual pademelons (not inside the fence, thankfully!). There are bees, hoverflies, spiders and bugs and flying insects I’m yet to identify. The Wild Pollinator Count, a week-long event which began today, might help me fill in some gaps.

But a range of caterpillars as well as aphids have also arrived (probably joining other pests that I haven’t noticed yet). I remember worrying about all the diamondback moths fluttering around the netting a few weeks ago and wondered why they were bothering. Now tiny caterpillars are munching on almost all brassicas – even those under netting. (In hindsight I think we should have ensured leaves weren’t touching the netting.) Aphids and another type of caterpillar have joined slugs in the lettuce. They’re not in huge numbers thankfully, or at least, not yet. But I understand why farmers and busy gardeners reach for pesticides! An upside of our slow start to the season is that with less produce we can afford to summon all of our patience and follow the first principle of permaculture: observe and interact. We’ve complemented that with the unpleasant, guilt-inducing “squash pests you see” principle while we wait, full of hope, for more efficient predators to arrive.

Spring also means that minimum and maximum temperatures are yo-yo-ing up and down. We’ve been wondering if this is also slowing our seedlings. So Alex bought a roll of black builders plastic (which apparently doesn’t leech nasty chemicals) to warm the garden bed and planted spring onions and lettuce in the holes. Another bed is entirely covered with horticultural fleece and a third is uncovered. I don’t like the idea of using lots of plastic but hopefully with some care these can last for many years and help plants to grow outside earlier. We’ll watch and wait to see what this latest experiment reveals.

Aside from this, we kept sowing, propagating and transplanting. Happily there are more seedlings to transplant now that we have improved the seed-raising mix. We’ve been enjoying eating the first peas (since there was not enough to sell) and sowed more. We also ate our first home-grown onion. Our first tomatoes and blueberries have appeared. Apparently we should have picked off the flowers this first year so the plant becomes stronger but it’s too late now so all we can do is look forward to eating blueberries!