Blogspot - Interia Dezain

Continuing the series of posts on Garden Allies , this post will be looking at ground bees, a not so well known group of insects that are important crop pollinators.  What prompted me to write this post was the observation of  a number of mini volcano shaped earth mounds on the lawn this Spring. Ground Bee Nest - Yet to identify the inhabitant   We set up a video over one of the holes hoping to catch a view of the comings and goings of the inhabitants and discovered a very small bee at work.  My son Archie put together this short film of the bee, cheers Arch. What Are Ground Bees? Ground-nesting bees are largely solitary bees i.e, do not live in colonies like honey bees, and include species of digger bees (family Anthoporidae), sweat bees (family Halictidae), and mining bees (family Andrenidae). Solitary bees are especially important as pollinators as many feral social bees are in danger due to dwindling numbers and parasites. Generally females excavate a nest i...

Growing my own mulch has long been a goal of mine. We use a lot of mulch in the nursery and garden and at the moment we have no problem sourcing straw but if/when the day comes that the farmers start using their own straw to improve their soil (which is becoming a more common practice), We'll be needing to step up our mulch growing efforts. Currently, we grow enough mulch to sustain the perennial beds and around 10 % of the annual beds but rely on imported straw for mulching the other 90% of annual vegetable and nursery beds. During this post we'll look at what makes a good mulch, a range of plants that we use for mulch and some possibilities for growing mulch for broad scale use. Mulch Growing in the Garden  What makes a good mulch plant ?   My ideal mulch plant grows fast, is drought tolerant, competes minimally with crop plants, does not contain seed that easily spreads, is easy to handle and cut, i.e,  not thorny/prickly or tough and fibrous, and can biodegrade relati...

Definitions of Annual, Biennial, Perennial, and Ephemeral Annuals Annuals are plants that go through their entire life cycle in one growing season. Hardy annuals are plants that go through their entire life cycle in one season and that can be sown outside in the open garden in spring where it is to flower, for example, Centaurea cyanus – cornflower. Centaurea cyanus - Cornflower Half-hardy annuals are plants that die if exposed to the cold, so they can’t go into the garden until after the last frost and should be sown indoors in spring. They’ll keep going until killed by the first autumn frost. For example, Tagetes erecta - African Marigold. Tagetes erecta - African Marigold Biennials Biennial are plants whose life cycle spans two years, so they flower and produce seeds in their second year. An example of a biennial is Armoracia rusticana - Horseradish.     Armoracia rusticana - Horseradish. Perennials  Perennials are plants that live for more than two years. Woody pere...

For 2015, we are delighted to be offering an educational experience with a difference. Last year, we conducted a study at our residential garden to gauge how productive a biological polyculture could be (read more here ). We wish to expand upon this further by creating a team of 4 keen and enthusiastic people to participate in further research. We are focusing on the same topic - Productive polycultures, with an emphasis on market garden development (i.e. bringing good quality food to the market). What are we doing ? From March 20th - September 30th 2015 we'll be establishing a market garden consisting of annual herb and vegetable polycultures on a piece of abandoned agricultural land just outside our town. The garden will be a developed on a 350m2 area within a larger establishing forest garden (1800m2). We are aiming to produce food from this garden for local markets and buyer groups. We plan to record all aspects of the project including how long it takes to develop, maintain...