August 30, 2012 – 6:00 am
The ‘Gundaroo Tiller’ is an Australian adaptation the traditional European broadfork, and an essential tool for our small market garden. It may look like just a big clunky fork-thing, but it is actually a finely tuned instrument of permaculture soil conditioning goodness. Truly.
Famously, when Allan Yeomans‘ saw his first Gundaroo Tiller, he called it ‘A Keyline plow for gardeners’. For us, it’s an essential part of creating aerated soil structure on compacted pasture without inverting the soil…
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August 25, 2012 – 6:00 am
In just over a month we’ll be hosting an Intro to Organic Market Gardening course smack-bang in the middle of the Milkwood market garden. This will be 2 hands-on days of crop planning, garden design and as much planting, growing and harvesting knowledge as we can squeeze in.
This course is designed for people interested in the idea of running either a large-scale kitchen garden or small-scale market garden using deep organic techniques, and who want to figure out how to start their patch from scratch, just like we did at Milkwood Farm. If you’re keen and able, you can book in here…
August 22, 2012 – 6:00 am
Anyone wanting to grow a wall of summer (literally) should try scarlet runner beans. Just thinking about them makes me smile.
They are incredibly enthusiastic climbers and grow up, up, up, blooming bright red flowers ever which way. Then they bear heavily, with bean pods you can eat whole when young (green bean pods with bright red beans inside!), or leave them and collect the beautiful back and red speckled beans later.
We’ve been growing scarlet runners ever since we moved to Milkwood, and I suspect some of my adoration is due to the fact that they were courteous enough to not turn up their toes and die in those first 3 years of drought-filled summer, like many other ‘easy to grow’ vegetables we tried. Read More »
August 20, 2012 – 6:00 am
This spring we’re extending the market garden, and that means more rabbit-proof fencing, and more ‘breaking ground’. In permaculture, we try not to break (both literally and figuratively) ground wherever possible, but one exception to that rule is when cultivating annual vegetables en-masse.
Before we started this market garden, I thought that maybe we could just lay compost and mulch on top of the pasture, plant veggies and it would all work out, the pasture magically changing into rich humus. It worked for my domestic-scale no-dig beds with brassicas and beans, after all? Read More »
August 18, 2012 – 6:00 am
Next round of Milkwood Market Garden internship apps close August 30th! Please help us spread the word! Or jump straight to it and >> apply here <<
August 13, 2012 – 6:00 am
If you are a pak-choi seedling and you live at our farm, you face certain challenges in life. Even before you get planted in the garden and battle the delights of our climate, things are risky. Especially in early spring, when Mumma rats are hungry, and there is little lush greenery about.
As a luscious small green thing, coddled by time indoors and not dormant like everything else on the farm, our seedlings flap their axial leaves like beacons to hungry rodents, who, if they get a chance, will do what rodents do best: eat things.
The solution is a seedling rat-proof-house, re-purposed from steel shelving. It saves our spring seedlings from the jaws of rodents, and subsequently also prevents us swearing more than is proper. Read More »
As spring slowly creeps towards us, things are stirring in the market garden… time to introduce our new Market Gardener, and plant field peas!
Enter Michael Hewins, who, after joining us as a very experienced wwoofer for some months last season at Milkwood Farm, has returned to take on the organic market garden as an integrated enterprise. Read More »
In mid September we’ll be running an Intro to Market Gardening course which will be two days of hands-on skills in our very own market garden! This course is designed for folks with a little gardening experience, who want to skill up on how to grow a serious amount of vegetables.
At Milkwood Farm, we went from a patch of bare ground to two tonnes of organic produce in a season, and you can too!
This course would suit anyone who has a bit of growing knowledge, but who dreams of producing enough organic veggies to feed a number of families either in a community context or a small market garden enterprise. Read More »
Anyone with compost worms knows how valuable the worm juice from their wormfarm can be as part of veggie growing. The trick is remembering to add it, and having a good method of applying it.
Last year Nick devised a way to passively add worm juice into our kitchen garden irrigation supply, via a rather clever little DIY setup. Read More »
In early September we’ll be running a 3-day Market Garden Masterclass at the fabulous Allsun Farm in Gundaroo, which will be taught by Joyce Wilkie and Mike Plane, two long-time organic market gardeners (and our mentors for the Milkwood market garden).
This 3-day class is a chance for folks with good backyard (or larger scale) vegetable growing experience to learn the ins and outs of setting up a thriving organic market garden as an enterprise – whether that be a family enterprise, a community enterprise, or whatever else your situation needs. Read More »
