Garden Share Collective: April

If the garden was a person, it would spend April going through its closets, throwing out its worn-out summer t-shirts and shorts, digging up the wool stash and crocheting a hat, scarf and gloves, and having the occasional bowl of soup for lunch instead of a tomato and cucumber sandwich. Getting ready for winter. 

But it would also be enjoying every last drop of summer. Here in Wellington, it's been surprisingly warm and dry out in the early mornings -- a sharp change from the heavy dew we had most mornings this summer. Winter's definitely coming, but it's not here yet.

Here's my April post for the Garden Share Collective -- a wonderful online community sharing the garden love. 

APRIL HARVEST

Tomatoes. I do try to space the tomato planting so I get a crop over the longest period possible, but I still never manage to avoid the end-of-summer tomato avalanche. This year I experimented with the tomato preserving and made my new absolute favourite toast spread -- tomato and chilli marmalade. It's just an ordinary old jam recipe, with tomatoes and a chilli substituted for the fruit, whole chopped lemon for the pectin component, and a tablespoon of salt added to the sugar.

I will write a post about this miracle of modern tomatoes soon. Meanwhile you can trust me that this is the best thing since sliced bread.

Crab apples. It's nearly jelly time. I keep saying to myself "I'll harvest the crab apples when they're the same colour as the ones on the tree next door." The crab apples next door are always several shades of gorgeous orangey-pinkness richer than mine! They always seem to be basking in golden sunlight, taunting me a bit while mine seem quite shy and reserved in comparison. I must get over myself and pick the damned crab apples!

Coriander. Coriander, or cilantro as it's called in other places, shines in the cooler weather... well maybe shine is too grand a claim. It doesn't go to seed in five minutes in the cooler weather.

This is the photo of the self-sewn coriander in February.

Here it is today -- juicy, cool, and waiting to jump into a bowl of salsa, or a thick spicy root vegetable stew.

The last of the nibbling fruit: There is still plenty of fruit nibbling to be done out on the front path.

The little heritage strawberries just keep on giving. They've been fruiting since before Christmas, and every day there is more in the undergrowth. The red banana passionfruit is also going mad, flowering and setting fruit. If you look closely at the tangle of ivy, jasmine, honeysuckle, and weeds in the bottom photo, you'll see three passionfruit nestled in there. I hope there's enough summer left for them to ripen.
APRIL PLANTING
Salads, onions, spinach. I have to confess that I went to the garden center and bought seedlings at the end of March. We were going away for a week, I hadn't planted any seeds as planned, and I really wanted to get some winter veges going...

So the old wheelbarrow at the back door and the raised bed on the first terrace have got instant growth factor. It was very gratifying getting from overgrown to half-grown in one day. I cover newly planted seedlings with old fridge/freezer baskets. They look ugly, but they keep the neighbourhood cats and the forraging birds away while the plants get a chance to get established.

Sweet peas. Every year at the start of winter, I sprinkle sweet pea seeds around the garden. They seem to thrive in the cool weather, and will have grown to great heights by the time they flower in early spring. I love walking outside into a big sweet pea waft in the first days of spring.

They will be finished flowering by the time it's warm enough to plant the beans and tomatoes out.  

A garden for someone else. Here's what I did on my recent holiday to Invercargill. My sister and her partner have a way bigger garden than I do, but it was just a little bit overgrown and neglected. So I decided to give them a garden makeover. Here's how to turn a weed patch into a kitchen garden in one day...

Stand in Garden Warrior pose, and take a couple of deep breaths.

Start at one side, and pull everything up. Toss the waste, save the spuds.

Voila. It's time to go shopping!

Pick your crop. Buy what's on offer at your local garden centre, as they know what's what when it comes to your local conditions.

Make a path with old bricks, pavers and planks -- just somewhere to stand while you're planting and harvesting.

Add some compost to the soil and mix it in with a rake. It's cheap to buy in bags.

Plant out your seedlings in rows or patches, or whatever you like. Just be gentle with the roots, get them into the soil quickly, tuck them in snugly, and water. They will look sad for a few days, but they will perk up.

APRIL CHORES

Pruning. This April I'm going to get out my gardening books and learn how to prune. More on that next month, when I know what I'm talking about! Right now, pruning is a bit of a mystery to me, but I know I need to get my head around it if I want to continue to enjoy nibbling out there.

Clearing the last of the summer plots. I've made a good start on this in the lower terraces, but up top... it's a total embarassment. Check this out:

I am going to clear this crazy tangle of tomatoes, seeded fennel, lettuces, sorrel, parsley, cucumbers, beans... And plant out radicchio, radishes, and chiogga beets, and fennel bulbs. That's a winning salad combination in late winter, but only if you plant now. 

A little bit of housework. I'll keep on picking up leaves, squishing bugs, hunting snails, pulling weeds and clipping off the dead or diseased bits of plants. These are chores that become second nature after a while. They don't take up much time, but they do make your garden happy.

If you've got any questions, leave a comment and I'll get back to you.

Thanks for reading, and happy gardening everyone!