Petula's Patch

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Tomato Experiment.

These cuttings are some of the last surviving from a cherry tomato plant that self seeded 8 months ago. Winter has killed most of the rest of the plant now.

They are in a mild seaweed solution. Seaweed encourages root growth.

My hope is that they will develop adventitious roots and be ready to pot up in 4 - 6 weeks. For me, that will be a month out from Spring.

Week 2 of Winter and the last of the tomatoes from the self seeded cherry tomato plants have been picked.

Tonight some stale, left over, home made bread became a bread and butter pudding.

This is my Feijoa bush 1 week out from Winter.

The bush has now finished fruiting after flowering 6 months ago.

The Feijoas are dropping thick and fast at the moment. Some of them ended up in this Feijoa and Apple crumble today.

2 weeks until Winter and I'm loading up my vegie beds with as many seeds as they can handle. Over sowing and over planting in some cases. I want abundance and volume.

I'm gardening with a prepper frame of mind. Food shortages and high prices are coming (thanks Trump). Unplanted seeds left stored in the packet will not grow food.

I'm going particularly heavy with leafy greens (silverbeet and lettuce). I'd like to have enough excess produce to share with my neighbours.

Sir David Attenborough is 100 years old today - May 8th.

THANK YOU David for everything you have done and accomplished for this planet.

However, this means that free time for house tasks and gardening is very limited right now.

The income earning is useful but what I really want to be doing now is prepping my vegetable garden and planning my pantry so I can maximise my food security in the coming months.

Today, April 29th, is International STOP FOOD WASTE DAY.

One of my favourite online seed retailers currently has a notice up saying they are experiencing a 'high order volume alert' and that deliveries will take longer. Some lines of seeds and all of their shallot bulbs have already sold out.

It is now 4 weeks until Winter here. I have ordered from this company for years and I have never seen these kind of seed stock availability issues at this time of year. I am ordering my seed potato stocks from them now so I don't miss out or have to pay higher prices later in the year at planting time.

I suspect I am not the only person who is getting on the front foot about their future food security right now.

The world is currently struggling to get access to Urea due to shipping channels being closed in the Strait of Hormuz. Urea is a synthetically produced, very high nitrogen fertliser used by farmers to grow food crops and increase yields in a conventional farming system.

Global access to Urea is very tight and prices per ton have increased over 100%. Fresh food scarcity will become real and prices will be high if the conflict continues.

But what about the organic food farmers? They are not reliant on Urea to grow crops. Their petroleum related costs will increase like everyone else but the cost of the soil inputs may not.

Does this mean that organically produced food may soon be cheaper or comparable with conventional produce?

I'd love to hear from anyone with better knowledge in this space or just thoughts from other gardeners or people about what you think might happen here.

7 weeks into Autumn and this is what's going on in one of my vegie beds.

These 2 volunteer cherry tomato plants are now 6 months old. They are sharing a bed with mid life cycle cauliflower plants and Winter peas (growing on the green trellis).

The tomato plants are not just the remnants of Summer. They are continuing to flower and set new trusses.

They are also throwing out copious new growth from side shoots off the main stem.

I think this is the first time I have ever had tomatoes, cauliflower and Winter peas all thriving along concurrently in the same bed. Am starting to wonder if I may indeed see ripe tomatoes and cauliflowers side by side in the same dirt!