Category 17

In The Garden: July – October

map of aussie

July: Beetroot, lettuce, mustard greens, onions, peas, radish.

August: Artichoke, asparagus (crowns), beetroot, cabbage (summer varieties), capsicum (undercover), chilli (undercover), eggplant, kohlrabi, leeks, lettuce, parsnips, peas, potatoes, radish, rocket, spring onions, strawberry (runners), sunflower, thyme, tomato (undercover), melons (undercover).

September: Artichoke, asparagus (plant cloves), basil (undercover), beans (after frost), beetroot, broccoli (summer variety), capsicum (undercover), carrot, celeriac, celery, chicory, chives, chilli, coriander, cucumber (undercover), dill, eggplant (undercover), endive, fennel, horseradish (crowns), Jerusalem artichoke (plant tubers), kohlrabi, leeks, lettuce, mustard greens, parsnips, peas, potatoes, pumpkin, zucchini (undercover), radish, rhubarb (crowns), melons (undercover), silverbeet, spring onions, strawberry (runners), sunflower, corn (after frost), tomato (undercover), turnip.

October: Artichoke, asparagus (crowns), basil (undercover), beans (bush and runner), beetroot, broccoli (summer varieties), cabbage (summer varieties), capsicum, carrot, celeriac, celery, chicory, chilli, chives, coriander, cucumber, dill, eggplant, endive, fennel, horseradish (crowns), Jerusalem artichoke (tubers), kohlrabi, leeks, mustard greens, parsley, potatoes, pumpkin, radish, rocket, melons, silverbeet, spring onions, sunflower, corn (sweet), tomato, turnip.

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Kids’ Patch

Our Kids’ Patch winner for issue 17 is Alexander from Rutherglen, aged 2 years. Congratulations! You’ve won a copy of Grow Do It, the CD from the Formidable Edible Sound System.

Next issue we are giving away a set of six permaculture stickers by the talented permaculture illustrator Brenna Quinlan.

To be in the running, parents can email a photo of their child through to editorial@pipmagazine.com.au along with your child’s name, age and suburb/ town.

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Rehydrating Landscapes: Keeping Water In Your Soil

rehydrating

As Australians face a warming climate, it is increasingly important that we consider water management that works with nature to keep moisture in the land we steward. This is equally necessary for large rural properties, smaller gardens and urban backyards. Rehydrating landscapes involves mimicking natural processes to increase the water-holding capacity of the soil, storing the water under and in the land, not on top of it.

Rehydrating landscapes relies on small and slow solutions, and therefore the benefits start small and build over time. Benefits include reduced erosion and salinity and increased soil health and productivity. But they also increase your property’s resilience to fire, drought and some aspects of flooding; and are a key part of any permaculture disaster risk management plan.

Build Organic Matter

The best and simplest way to rehydrate landscapes is to build organic matter – or humus – in the soil. Lush, healthy soil with a rich structure and diverse soil life enables water to infiltrate deeply into hard, dry or clay soils. It also creates an environment that retains water because of the capacity of humus, the soil’s organic component, to store it. There are a number of ways to build soil humus:

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The Art Of Steeking

water-bottle

Steeking may not only revolutionise the way you knit, but it also offers a great way to upcycle or reconstruct knitted garments, tailor them to your needs, and save them from landfill or eternal damnation in your darning pile.

What does ‘steek’ mean exactly? If you’re a knitter, you may have seen the word ‘steek’ used in patterns. The technique of steeking garments is not commonly practised in Australia. So it’s not surprising if Australian knitters feel a little bamboozled about its actual meaning.

Steeking is a very old tradition. It is believed to be the original way of putting knitted garments together; and it is still practised around the world, from Estonia to the Shetland Islands and many other places with a strong knitting culture.

What Is Steeking?

In modern knitting, steeking is the act of cutting a piece of knitting and then sewing it back together. Garments are knitted in the round – one tube for the body and two for the sleeves. Because there are no purl rows when you knit in the round, it is a fast and easy technique to create a garment. It also enables the knitter to create an

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How To Eat An Earth-Friendly Diet

earth-friendly-diet

Does what we eat affect the health of the planet? With agriculture producing an estimated 15 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, you could say it makes a significant difference to the planet’s health.

While we are told that eating less meat or eating a plant-based diet is the most earth-friendly way to go, it’s worth looking more deeply into this advice; and rather than just considering whether we eat meat or plants, consider how each of these foods are farmed.

It’s well documented that regenerative agriculture can not only reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but actually sequester carbon dioxide – by pulling carbon from the air and storing it in the ground. By eating food that is farmed using regenerative practices, you will be helping to build soil fertility and grow healthier and more nutrient-dense plants and animals; which will create a healthier you and a healthier planet.

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Keeping Warm This Winter: Your Wood Heater Guide

wood-heater

Heating your house, heating water and cooking are major users of energy in your home. Using wood to create some or all of this energy use can be one of the simplest ways to increase your household self-sufficiency. It’s efficiency as a renewable energy resource is value-added if you are using wood that is sustainably grown and harvested, or collected as waste and salvaged wood. This value particularly applies when the wood heater is properly maintained and is used correctly (burning dry, seasoned wood).

Wood burners can be cheap to run even if you have to buy firewood; and they work during power cuts – increasing your household’s resilience. Wood burners can fulfil many purposes including heating, cooking, heating water, drying your clothes, raising your sourdough bread before its baked and providing ash and charcoal for your garden. They are an efficient way to clear up fallen sticks and branches around your property. Learning to understand and safely use fire is a great skill to pass on to our children and brings us closer to our ancestors. Not least to mention is the wonderful atmosphere of having a ‘bush TV’ flickering in our loungerooms.

Decide On Your Needs

There are two types of wood burners: radiant heat and convective heat. Radiant heat wood burners heat up a solid mass and radiate the heat outwards. This is great for large rooms with high ceilings and rooms where the

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Mara Ripani

mara

Mara Ripani is living the dream. Not just the fantasy of anyone who is bored with the daily grind of city living, but her own dream – to live her life cooking, growing, sharing and connecting over food.

Mara and her husband Ralf, an environmental engineer, live on 15 acres outside of Daylesford in Blampied with their daughters, 15 year old Ahlia and Artemisia, eight. Their farm is known as Orto, which is the Italian word for vegetable garden. Orto is where Mara’s days are spent cooking, growing, preserving, teaching workshops, hosting volunteer farm stay and bed and breakfast guests, and much more.

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