I’ve been on holiday for the past week – camping in Bright in North East Victoria. We had a lovely time playing in the Ovens River, doing short walks around Mount Buffalo, swimming in Lake Catani and exploring nearby towns and villages. We went to most of the towns locally, except Harrietville that is, which was under the threat of a bushfire in the Alpine National Park for most of last week. Harrietville isn’t far from Bright but the direction of the wind meant that whilst Bright was never under threat Harrietville was (as was Hotham Heights and for a shorter period Falls Creek). The warnings have been downgraded now but the fire could flare up again depending on weather conditions. A week is a long time to be constantly monitoring the weather, checking the sprinkler system, praying for rain, or to spend evacuated living with friends of relatives constantly wondering what you’ll go back to. So to the people of Harrietville (and indeed Boho and Tallangatta East where there are Watch and Act warnings now) I am thinking of you and I hope this summer leaves you unscathed.
We arrived back from our holiday on Saturday night and in the early hours of Sunday morning we had our first rain of 2013, a paltry 1.3mm. Juxtapose this against the 300 plus mm they have experienced in parts of Southern Queensland/Northern NSW in the last day of two (with resultant flooding and destructive winds) and you kind of get an idea of the extremes of Australian summer weather.
Despite the lack of rainfall the sprinkler system held up reasonably well and the garden looked good – all except the tomatoes which looked pretty sad really – a kink in the hose meant the water didn’t reach quite as far as I thought it would and the tomatoes were very dry indeed. There has been some die back but I think they will recover to continue feeding the resident rat population grrrr…….
Naturally I came back to some oversized zucchinis and cucumbers, but also to the first of my Bonica eggplants.
I have to say I can not recommend Bonica highly enough. It grows well and produces lots of good sized eggplants. What more could you want really? I have two plants and I picked one lovely big fruit from each upon my return.
Also in the basket were the first of my Mini Mama capsicums from a plant I overwintered in the pot it was grown in.
I’m still harvesting red salad onions, which is nice;
I whinged about how slow my onions were all winter but now I’m loving them. Pretty, delicious and so far unattractive to rodents – pretty darn good really. Speaking of rodents, I’m boring myself whining about rat damage but you’ll note the lack of tomatoes in this post. Enough said but I will post seperately on my various methods for keeping them at bay later this week or next.
Fortunately the rats don’t seem interested in anything green and my mint, basil and rocket continue to provide lots of flavour to meals. Yay for herbs is what I say.
You may have noticed the basket also contains cucumbers. I need to go and make pickles but before I do I will check out what else is being harvested this week over at Daphne’s Dandelions – its always interesting.
How are you fixed for sprinkler bans etc when there is so little rain or is there a network linking you to other parts of the country.
The fires have been horrendous haven’t they. Once when staying in France a barn self combusted and the noise of burning could be heard quite a way away. That sound magnified must be terrifying.
Melbourne’s water supply isn’t in too bad a shape – due in part to a couple of wet winters and in part to the state government spending heaps on a desal plant (which has yet to be used) so they lifted water restrictions in December. I suspect the repreive will be short lived and although we have a water tank it runs dry with this little rain so i have to admit that I have used quite a lot while i am allowed to.
What a lovely harvest. I tried starting some red onions this winter but they haven’t done very well.
I find they are incredibly slow to get going and I spend much of the year wondering why I bother but I do enjoy them when they do finally mature.
When I read about the extreme weather Australia has been experiencing lately I see that living in the UK does after all have some attractions! Mind you, our weather has been extreme by our standards – the amount of rainfall we have had in the last 12 months is exceptional. And to think, last Spring we had hosepipe bans in force by March, along with dire warnings of drought. How wrong can a weather forecaster be?
Your eggplants look like perfect specimens. I don’t think I will be repeating my experiment with Eggplants. The ones I grew last year were OK, but our attitude to them generally is rather lukewarm. We don’t actively dislike them, but there are so many other nicer things to grow that I don’t think I’ll use up any of my precious pace with Eggplants.
I find that eggplant can be both one of the most delicious veg to eat and one of the most disgusting depending on the cooking method. I really enjoy them cooked well I have to say. We are finally getting our first real January rain today – It only just made it but at least we got some. The garden will breathe a sigh of relief I think.
We’ve been hearing about the extreme high temperatures in Australia, and the fires of course – seems like the weather is getting crazy all over the world.
Your harvest is lovely to see – as always.
We do seem (particularly Queensland and floods) to be having a lot more extreme weather events than we used to. Our summer has been pretty good this year – the occasional really hot day but always one offs not a few of them strung together which is a lot easier to deal with.
The extremes you all have been experiencing lately are quite mind-boggling. Glad to hear your garden is in good shape through it all! I might have to try the Bonica eggplant…I’ve only grown eggplant once (last year) and it was a total bust…
They do well here, these plants I started in July so they’ve taken a fair old while to produce but they do get there in the end.
Love your eggplants! I haven’t started my eggplants under the lights yet. Maybe this week. I want to have white eggplants again, but am not devoted to my purple ones. Maybe I’ll try Bonica.
Sorry the rats are eating your tomatoes. That sucks.
I havend’t grown white cucumbers before. How does the flavour compare?
can you put stockings over the fruit on the tomato to stop the rats getting to them?
Thats not a bad idea – I shall give it a try. I suspect they might just eat through them but its worth a try.
Sounds like you had a lovely holiday and have come home to a good harvest. Am I the only person who can’t grow abundant zucchinis?! I had trouble with mice in the tomatoes last year. When I looked around under the plants I realised they had tunnelled under them. It might be worth having a bit of a dig around under them and seeing if you can find if they have created tunnels under and then perhaps target some bait in there.
I couldn’t see any evidence of tunnels – what did they look like? Tunnels I guess? As for the zucchini – it might be beginners luck – I haven’t grown it for years but felt like having some this year. I grew a variety called ‘Black Zucchini’ and it has done well for me. i get the occasional one which rots rather than developing but most seem to mature nicely.
Beautiful harvest baskets. I so miss my cukes. At least I still have pickles.
Which is exacly what I’m turning a good proportion of mine into.
What a great harvest! Mine are much the same minus the eggplant. Yours look lovely.
Bright is beautiful! Damn those fires. As you would no doubt know, the Aberfeldy fire is STILL going. Hopefully it will abate soon.
Thank goodness for your bread and butter cucumber recipe! I’ve made three batches now (delicious!) and still the cukes keep coming.
My eggplants have flowers. That’s it! No fruit yet but they will come (eventually), I’ve no doubt.
My veggies have been very spoiled over the last month or so as I’ve been on leave and watered whenever I felt necessary. I’m back at work from today so they will have to fend for themselves, a lot of the time. I’m hoping for rain!!
We’re getting rain at the moment – the first for the month. Hope it gets down your way the puts that fire out – its been burning a ridiculously long time. I noticed that Mt Hotham is under threat again too – not good, not good at all. Good old cukes – its been a good year for them despite the lack of water.
Love the countyside around Bright & Mt Beauty the rivers are lots of fun for kids on tubes in summer,my favorite time being Autumn so pretty!
Beautiful eggplants and what a lovely surprise on your return home.I have 3 Bonica plants, very healthy and starting to produce flowers and 2 Little finger plants which are producing well already along with my pepper plants ………all due to your good advice, the most important being getting the seedlings planted early!!
What no tomatoes !! B………rats !!(luckythe eggplants were spared) they do seem to hang around chook pens for the left over grain , do you have neighbors with chooks that back onto your home? My only advice takes a bit of attention but the kids would love it, a little jack russell terrier………..they hunt out and kill rats for fun !! Maybe I might have to bring my little fellow down for a visit and see what he can do !!
We’ve been camping in Bright a few times but always in summer – I haven’t been there in Autumn for years – lovely idea though – perhaps this year… I do like the terrier idea although I did think that a dog might bring its own troubles to the veggie garden.
BAH!!! those rats….. as if we don’t have enough natural disasters to contend with. If its any consolation I lost 4 jumbo size tomatoes over the weekend- how a rat could remove something equivalent of its own body weight and not leave a trace is beyond me. Have you had any success with any of the previously suggested control methods? We have trapped 2 or 3 baby rats using traps in the worm farm- but the adults are to smart for that.
The short answer is no – the rather longer one will be an upcoming blog post. I did have some bait (poison) eaten but it clearly didn’t get them all as things are still disappearing – just at a slightly slower rate. They’ve stopped eating the bait though. Frustrating isn’t it?