Latest / The Shed Organics Show / #52 - From Farming To Flowers | Shavorn Stones [that_girlinthegarden]

Transcript

#52 - From Farming To Flowers | Shavorn Stones [that_girlinthegarden] · The Shed Organics Show

0:00
Hey everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Shared
0:03
Organics Show. Today's episode we have Siobhan
0:08
from Victoria. She is a bit of a gardener
0:12
herself, coming from a family farming background.
0:16
Now farming in general, as we know, is a incredibly difficult
0:21
job. It's such an important job and I
0:24
think couple of things that we touched on today highlights what
0:28
actual farmers do week in, week out, what it requires to be a
0:33
farmer, to hold it down, not only just for one person as a
0:37
farmer, you know, you think farmer, it's like single.
0:40
This is a farming family, like everyone's involved and all the
0:44
time too. So this is a really nice insight
0:47
into that farming family. But also it was nice to chat
0:51
about Siobhan's gardening journey herself and the things
0:55
that work for her, the things that she likes.
0:58
And I really love her simple approach to it.
1:01
Just get out there, have a go, try things out.
1:06
And you know, we spoke about flowers because she's really
1:11
into her flowers and just trying to really enjoy, soak up the
1:15
experience of gardening and what it can do for you.
1:19
So I really enjoyed this conversation.
1:21
I think it's some something that we, you know, it's hard to put
1:26
into words, but it's something that we overlook or overthink so
1:30
much about. What do we do?
1:33
Do we put this in here? What about that?
1:35
Or how much shade, How much water do I do this?
1:38
Do I do that? Realistically, we just want to
1:41
get down to the absolute basics of just going, hey, let's just
1:44
enjoy gardening, Just plant something, figure out whether
1:47
it's going to work by doing it, not necessarily by thinking
1:51
about it. And it's something that I'm
1:53
guilty of, but I think we all can relate a little bit to that
1:57
as well. So let's jump in to this
1:59
conversation. This is Siobhan who is just a
2:02
girl and her garden. So I live on the NSW Victorian
2:23
Porter near Aubrey and a small one if you're into one you might
2:27
know rather Glen. We are a Four Seasons sort of
2:33
area, so super hot in summer, super cold in winter, have the
2:37
most amazing springs and autumns.
2:40
That in itself is a bit tricky with temperature frosts and all
2:46
that sort of stuff and getting started with the new seasons.
2:51
I've grown up in the area, so I've been here for 30 something
2:55
years. I've been and gone.
2:58
I've lived in SA, I've moved overseas to the UK for a few
3:01
years and then I've come back. In the last six months I have
3:08
moved from one part of town to the other, 10 minutes away.
3:13
Pretty much it's the same. Yeah, I was just.
3:16
Starting to get for. Trash.
3:18
Yeah, exactly. Because I saw that through your
3:20
Instagram. I saw that you just moved.
3:22
You said you basically downsized from a whole bunch of, you know,
3:27
bigger garden beds and spaces down to a smaller one.
3:30
To nothing. I forgot to start again.
3:33
Yeah. Do you like that kind of thing,
3:35
starting again? Because I kind of like the
3:36
creativity of starting again. But also, if you've worked
3:39
really hard on a space, it's hard to say goodbye to it, isn't
3:41
it? Yeah, I loved because it was
3:45
established. I knew where everything was.
3:47
I knew what the sun was doing. I knew what would happen if
3:52
there was a frost and everything was just established and I've
3:55
come to a blank space, which I think is great for that
3:59
creativity side again, where we are super red, hard rocky clay
4:06
soil. So it's really hard to grow in
4:09
the ground. So then you've got to sort of
4:11
try and establish something to build up.
4:13
They've been had termites here in the past, so wood was out.
4:17
So I've wow, completely scrapped wood and that was that's usually
4:21
my go to. Yeah, yeah, because they can
4:23
just be so destructive of. Those wooden.
4:26
Cotton beds. And it's like, yeah, you know,
4:29
used to end up all spend all this time building them, filling
4:32
them up, you know, sorting out all the soil, growing something
4:34
in it, and then the whole thing's falling apart from the
4:36
insides. I've had unfortunately the same
4:40
result like even with not necessarily termites even, but
4:44
just having wood that isn't properly looked after to the
4:49
fact that it just gets eaten from the inside and it just all
4:52
falls out on itself and. Yeah, it's a little bit tricky
4:56
like that. So garden bed wise, I've chosen
4:59
metal recycled tin garden beds. They're still empty.
5:05
I haven't got them ready. That's right, it's.
5:07
Such a big. Thing yeah, it's a work in
5:10
progress and people don't understand.
5:12
Well, everyone gets excited when you come into a new space,
5:16
myself included, and you just go I just can't wait to get
5:20
everything in the ground. I can't.
5:21
It's especially with raised beds, there's a lot of soil that
5:25
needs to be going in this and there's a lot of set up and
5:28
prep. And if it's insanely hot, like I
5:31
mean, yesterday was 37 in Brisbane, which was just insane.
5:35
But you know, you can't go outside and be burrowing stuff
5:38
around in that kind of heat. Is does it get crazy hot?
5:42
I know you mentioned it does get Four Seasons, but does it get
5:44
crazy hot where you are? Yeah, we probably January,
5:48
February is our our hottest month.
5:50
So it's been a bit slow this year.
5:53
We had a frost I think 2 weeks ago.
5:55
So that, yeah, that was weird. That never happens.
5:59
The poor wine makers in the regions vineyards have copped a
6:03
absolute flogging. Yeah.
6:07
So we had a frost and now knots are still down in single digits
6:11
or like low teens. So that's really tricky.
6:15
But then nowadays we've had a few mid 30s, but then I think
6:20
today is like 20 something. So it's a bit of a slow start.
6:24
It's normally pretty consistently in the 30s by now.
6:29
Yeah. So I'm trying to do like the
6:31
lasagna layer method in my garden bed so I can reduce the
6:35
amount of soil, but that means I've got to go pick up sticks
6:38
and now I'm petrified that there's snakes everywhere and I
6:41
don't want to go pick up sticks so.
6:44
Totally understand. Yeah, lots of barriers and then
6:47
I have to try and get my partner to help me because he's not
6:50
scared of snakes, but he's really busy on the farm so.
6:53
Yes. Well, that's, yeah, that's part
6:56
of it, isn't it? And going to that lasagna
6:59
layering, that's kind of that Hugo culture mountain spiral,
7:03
isn't it? Yeah.
7:03
And they're super effective and I guess a lot cheaper and easier
7:10
to fill garden beds. I've noticed because I've done
7:13
that, like my, my beds are like that too.
7:17
I've noticed that in the first season or two, it's not as
7:24
effective. Yeah.
7:26
You get a lot of sinkage, obviously, because like it's all
7:28
kind of compressing down. You get all the water that comes
7:31
through, sinks it all down. So then you're topping up and
7:33
things like this, you get your compost in and blah, blah, blah.
7:37
But it's after sort of, yeah, year 234 onwards, Like you're
7:43
really starting to see the benefits of that, that real, you
7:47
know, feeding from the bottom almost.
7:49
Yeah, those sticks and things. Is that traditionally how you
7:52
filled your garden beds before? No, look, last time, so where
7:57
I've had my garden, last time I was at my parents' house last
8:00
time, my dad just came in with the backhoe and just dumped
8:02
soil. He's like, it's great topsoil.
8:05
Fun fact, it was not topsoil. It was pretty much clay, which
8:09
was an absolute disaster. So that was another I guess hard
8:15
thing to leave is I'd spent so much time and effort like just
8:20
restoring the soil and I'd finally, finally got it to a
8:23
stage where it was actually quite good and I was really
8:29
happy with it. And now I'm like, see ya
8:31
they're. Still there you've.
8:34
Left. They're still there.
8:35
My parents are still there. It was.
8:38
We just had. Well, we've been working on
8:41
getting our own place. And sorry, it had finally just
8:44
come to fruition that we now have our own space.
8:48
Yeah. So they're still sitting there,
8:49
and mom and Dad haven't touched them.
8:52
I'm like OK. That's hard, isn't it?
8:55
Because yeah, especially, you know, when your parents get old,
8:58
like my parents, you know, they kind of don't want to do as much
9:02
outside. They're getting to the point
9:04
where they're like, I just want a little bit of low maintenance
9:07
type vibe. And I'm sort of going, yeah, I
9:10
get it. But like, you've got so much
9:11
opportunity here that you've got such great growing space.
9:14
And I was like, I can well, we're like an hour away from my
9:18
parents, so it's a bit difficult for me to pop over and just
9:20
keep, you know, tending to their gardens.
9:22
But I mean, is that something that you foresee maybe just sort
9:27
of kind of going back in them or?
9:30
Yeah, look, I had my Borassicas. I knew we were moving so I
9:34
planted my Borassicas in there last year.
9:39
I think I got like, I've got a few really good broccolis and
9:42
cauliflower and then mum keeps just letting the chooks out and
9:45
the chooks, they took care of everything.
9:47
So in like in an ideal world I could definitely do that.
9:53
It's more just the watering situation.
9:55
I had just set up a watering system, but in the summer you've
9:59
got a almost be there twice a day just to make sure that it's
10:02
there. And I'm back working.
10:04
We've got the farm. I've got a small, I've got a
10:07
toddler now, so running around after her, that really takes up
10:11
a lot of my time. Oh, absolutely.
10:13
Yeah. So time, time is very poor.
10:18
And that's, I think, yeah, I got, I concentrated on a few
10:22
things that I needed to do here first.
10:25
I got my daily beds, that area all set up.
10:28
I've got them in the ground. I do need to go check them to
10:30
see what they're doing. And then, yeah, the veggie beds,
10:34
they came last. And then hay season hit and I
10:37
was like, OK, this is just not happening this year.
10:40
That's fine. This will be my first year that
10:42
I haven't had a veggie garden over summer in a very long time,
10:47
so I don't quite know how I feel about it.
10:49
I've got seedlings sitting on the BBQ outside waiting to go in
10:53
the ground, but I think I'll just end up taking them to mum
10:55
and Dad's and praying. Yeah, it's that they survive.
11:00
It's one of those things it's like it teaches you so much
11:04
patience. It's like such a long game.
11:07
And especially, as you said, you know, being a mum like you're a
11:10
superstar as it is just to be a mum, let alone work.
11:14
Because I think I'm right in saying that you work in
11:16
healthcare. Yeah, yeah.
11:18
So I'm a sonographer, so I work in a private clinic that's in a
11:23
public hospital. We do on call, which that's also
11:28
like when I'm on call on a weekend, I generally don't don't
11:31
get a lot of stuff done either. Yeah, because you're you're
11:35
needing to just fly out the door maybe like if you need to.
11:38
So even just those two in itself leaves you with minimal time.
11:43
And tell me about the farm. Tell me what that situation's
11:47
like. What is it?
11:47
How how are you operating that? And yeah, what's that?
11:51
So it's probably more of just a traditional commercial beef,
11:58
lamb and grain sort of farm set up family situation.
12:05
So we all pretty much all work, all have jobs plus the farm.
12:10
It's I think in total 1500 acres.
12:17
So it's not like super, super huge compared to a lot of other
12:20
big broad acre, but it's enough. And then if you add in a little
12:24
bit of contracting jobs here and there, it's quite busy.
12:27
So this time of year, we've just finished hay season, we're
12:30
rolling into harvest. Yeah, OK.
12:34
Because it's. Crazy.
12:35
And then Christmas has got to fit in there somewhere, so I
12:37
don't know. Yeah.
12:38
And like this is this is such a, an important thing to highlight
12:42
because what you just said there about the fact that you're it's
12:46
a family thing. You're all running, trying to
12:49
work together to run this 1500 acres, which, you know, I know
12:53
you say it's like not that massive, but it's enormous.
12:57
Yeah. But then you're also working
12:59
other jobs. And I think this is so important
13:01
to highlight like it's, it's you're doing this outside of
13:05
your working hours and then you're going in the evenings, in
13:09
the early mornings, on the weekends to, to get all of this
13:12
done. And it's people don't appreciate
13:15
how much work goes into it. I think that's kind of.
13:18
I don't think they, yeah, don't. I don't know if it's the lack of
13:22
appreciation or the understanding.
13:23
They don't understand the amount of work that he's put in.
13:27
And then sometimes, you know, some views are hard.
13:32
Yeah, some views are really hard.
13:33
And you don't get a lot of return.
13:34
And then our inputs now are nearly double what they used to
13:38
be. But what we're getting back is
13:41
not double, probably getting back either.
13:43
So it just it depends on the year, the season.
13:46
Some are really hard. Some you're like, oh, I've got
13:48
some extra cash this year, like this is great.
13:51
And then other years you're like, OK, we've paid the bills.
13:54
Yeah, the labour of love. Yeah, it is.
13:57
You have to really love it. And I think like I was chatting
14:00
to a brilliant farmer in Queensland recently who does,
14:04
who does regenerative beef, etcetera like this.
14:07
And you know, he was highlighting how difficult it is
14:10
for any farmer to be able to even just, you know, clear your
14:16
expenditure. And as you say, like the inputs
14:19
are going up and up and up. They, the seed that you have to
14:23
go alongside with it, it goes up and up and up.
14:26
And then the prices are just getting ridiculous.
14:29
The supermarkets are taking their, they're adding on their
14:33
cut, they're making more money out of it, but they're not
14:35
paying the farmers anymore. And there's no incentive
14:39
whatsoever to help farmers. Well, from my perspective
14:44
anyway, I'm still obviously somewhat of an outsider, but it
14:48
doesn't seem like they're trying to help you in any way or even
14:52
trying to help you reduce input switch over to something that's
14:56
a little bit more regenerative approach.
14:58
Like there's no help with that because it's a massive switch.
15:02
It's a difficult switch. And yeah, you know, we were
15:06
talking about just how people like you yourself, your family
15:09
is just in this situation where you're kind of stuck, Like
15:12
you're you're in a position where it's you need to feed your
15:16
family, you need to put you pay the bills.
15:19
But then all of these things are crunching and squeezing you from
15:22
the outside where it makes, yeah, more difficult.
15:25
Are you feeling that sort of thing?
15:26
Does that ring true for you from what you understand?
15:30
At the moment we're touch wood having a good season.
15:35
Cattle prices are cattle and sheep prices are pretty, pretty
15:40
amazing at the moment. So we've that has definitely
15:43
been keeping us afloat. We'll see what happens with the
15:46
grain when it comes off hay. Hay is going to be a bit tricky
15:51
to move at the moment, but we'll see what the season brings.
15:54
So we'll just hold on to all of that.
15:56
But yeah, I don't, the government doesn't necessarily
15:59
help a lot of help us a lot with I'm from Victoria, so we've just
16:03
got a new emergency services levy tax.
16:06
So you know, most of our emergency services are
16:09
volunteers and a lot of them are the farmers.
16:12
And so now we've got land tax, emergency services tax on top of
16:20
our rates. It's like.
16:23
And you can't even get the council to grade your roads so.
16:26
Yeah, like where's all this tax going?
16:28
Where's it going? Yeah, I totally understand.
16:31
And like that kind of thing, I just think needs more
16:35
recognition. It's just like, look, guys,
16:38
we're busting ourselves week in, week out to make ends meet.
16:42
And you guys are the most, I think you're the most important
16:47
people in our one of the at least in our system, because no
16:51
one is going to be able to eat if it wasn't you guys though,
16:56
this is yeah, this is just one thing.
16:57
I know that like, you know, there's so much of A rabbit hole
17:00
I can dive down in terms of farming and that that sort of
17:02
thing. But I just wanted to highlight
17:05
that whilst we whilst we were talking about farming, because
17:07
that's really, really important. How much then of your say like
17:13
OK, going back to, to moving to this new place, right, You've
17:17
just set up. I've seen your beautiful daily
17:19
of beds that you've got some coming up, haven't you at the
17:22
moment? Yeah, hopefully.
17:25
I found a few sprouts the other day and I was like, please just
17:27
come up before you get burnt. Yeah, from it being too hot.
17:31
So I've yeah, that's some of the list of things to do today is
17:33
duck out there and have a look at the survivors.
17:36
Yeah, that well, that's, that's The thing is like with this such
17:40
an unpredictable weather, especially in Victoria, they you
17:43
can even get Four Seasons in a day from what I understand.
17:47
How does how does that go with growing flowers?
17:50
Because I know something like flowers is something that you're
17:52
you're quite into, from what I understand.
17:55
And how do you find growing flowers in a climate that's like
17:59
that? Are you sort of going towards
18:00
the ones that are tried true and tested and just more adapted, or
18:05
are you really trying to battle to get some things growing that
18:09
you really love to have? I look, I grow a few things that
18:14
I know I can't kill, like zinnias, happy days.
18:17
They just grow for days and they'll self seed.
18:20
Yeah. And they're just they're fairly
18:22
resilient. So they're sort of like my happy
18:24
flower. I am persisting with the
18:26
dahlias. They, they grow well in our
18:29
climate, but they don't love the frost and you need sort of like
18:34
warm ground for them to come up. And I find if you leave them in
18:38
overwinter, if you've got the soil or down pat, if you can
18:41
leave them in for the year, they come up a lot quicker, a lot
18:46
easier. Whereas when I plant my tubers,
18:48
I find they take a long time to come up.
18:50
And then because I've got to wait so long to put them in the
18:52
ground because of frost and the cold, then sometimes it gets too
18:56
hot and then they they like, burn as they come up out of the
19:04
soil. So the little shoots burn and
19:07
then they don't come up. Yeah.
19:09
So that's something that I think I'm going to have some issues
19:12
with. I know that that sort of thing,
19:16
like if you've got, as you said, leaving them in the ground,
19:20
yeah, you're much more likely to have them climate adapted and
19:24
also coming up at the right time as well.
19:27
Yeah, they come up a bit early. So the I lifted these ones from
19:31
my parents and they'd already started to shoot and come up out
19:34
of the ground. And it was October.
19:35
Oh wow. OK.
19:37
I thought just like, and that's quite a normal time for dailies
19:40
to pop up for some people, but I thought, oh, we've still got
19:43
like our risk of frost is still absolutely huge in October.
19:47
And then if I had have had them at mum and dad's and we had that
19:51
frost in November, they just would have been done.
19:55
Yeah, completely done. Yeah.
19:57
But that's like such a bizarre thing.
19:59
And it feels like the the seasons are sort of shifting,
20:02
like everything seems to be like a bit later and it's throwing
20:07
things for a spin like. Yeah, absolutely.
20:09
Yeah, you're getting things flowering at the wrong times.
20:12
Like we had an insanely hot sort of end of September, October
20:17
here and, and you know, it was unseasonally warm in the end of
20:23
October and then it kind of dropped off again.
20:25
So you had all of these like, for example, I had a lot of my
20:29
winter veg and things bolting and going, wow, this is so hard
20:34
going to flower. And then some of the ones that
20:37
didn't were then OK again once the climate had cooled down.
20:41
And then it was kind of like some were confused, some were
20:44
all over the place, and some flowers came up and then died
20:47
back and then come. It's just you're watching them
20:49
get all confused. Yeah.
20:52
Absolutely. I've had a passion fruit start
20:55
flowering in August, 1 year. And I was like, no, this, this
21:00
is not right. Yeah, It just was an
21:03
unseasonally warm period, like, and then it got cold again.
21:07
And then my passion fruit just came out and started flowering
21:10
and I was like, anyway, that's fine.
21:14
Yeah, exactly. And like we this year, we had
21:19
three of the trees that normally flower at different times all
21:24
flowering together, which was really beautiful.
21:26
Like, for example, the Jacaranda and then the ponciana, the Reds,
21:30
the purples, we had all of them flowering together, which was
21:34
bizarre. And apparently, according to
21:36
some people, like, for example, Jerry Colby Williams lives in
21:39
the similar sort of climate and area to me, he was noticing this
21:43
and said that hasn't happened, but he can't even remember how
21:46
long, which just shows like, it's just all over the place and
21:51
it's so hard to predict. Is there a meaning behind it
21:55
when they all flower at the same time?
21:56
Because my Nan, my grandparents in 95 and my nan talks about if
22:02
there's going to be a drought, I can't remember which gum tree
22:05
it'll come out and flower first or if it's going to be a really
22:08
wet season and this gum tree will come out and flower 1st.
22:12
And that's how she sort of like predicts if it's going to be wet
22:15
or dry. And I think that stems back to
22:17
some like indigenous ideas and knowledge that they've shared.
22:23
And she, yeah, that's something that she's noticed.
22:26
That's brilliant. I had not thought about that,
22:29
but there is recently I'd come up with that kind of well, I've
22:33
been had that thought because I was talking about the Mariah
22:36
Mariah something the the mock orange, can't remember the, the
22:40
proper name, the mock orange flowers that come out as
22:44
extremely pungent, somewhat of a self seeding weed here in
22:50
Queensland. But they apparently flower
22:53
because they flower like crazy and then drop off.
22:57
They flower when it's about to have an absolute ton of rain and
23:01
they flowered and what did we have crazy tons of rain
23:04
afterwards. And this kind, this kind of
23:08
knowledge like you touched on has been passed down.
23:11
It's all about observation over the years going, Oh, yeah, we've
23:14
noticed this pattern, that sort of a sign, a signal, like, for
23:21
example, the jacarandas usually are a nice sign of spring in
23:26
Queensland because it means it's warmed up enough.
23:28
They're all starting to flower. It shows, OK, like we've moved
23:31
into that new season. But yeah, you just, you never
23:36
know. I don't know in this case about
23:37
the fact that they're all flowering together.
23:39
Maybe it was just that unseasonally warm sort of period
23:42
or whatever it may be. But I'm going to hold on to that
23:46
because I want to figure out what that actually is.
23:50
Going back a little bit before you reach this new place, then
23:56
with vegetables, veggie garden. You said this is probably the
23:59
first year that you haven't had one for a long time.
24:01
What? Yeah.
24:03
What do you like to grow? What's your What are your go TOS
24:05
that you have in the garden normally in your veggie patch?
24:10
So I love to grow tomatoes. I don't love eating them, but I
24:14
love growing them. So I I like cherry tomatoes.
24:17
I like all the small ones. The big ones I don't love to
24:20
eat, but I like, I guess it's like that gratification and
24:24
satisfaction when you do. So usually my nan and I have a
24:29
bit of a competition as to who can get the first tomato.
24:31
So it just, it just keeps like her heart still beating and she
24:35
always beats me. And even if I do beat her, I bet
24:37
her ones with cherry tomatoes and she said it didn't count
24:39
because they were cherries. So I always, yeah, tomatoes
24:45
always a staple. And I just, I think I give my
24:48
dad gastritis nearly every year because he just eats fresh
24:51
tomatoes for breakfast, lunch and dinner.
24:53
Yeah, they're probably. I like to grow corn, but I'm
24:58
really bad at it. I just haven't mastered it.
25:03
Yeah. And then, like, winter,
25:05
probably. Like, I love a good broccoli and
25:08
a snow pea. Oh, yeah.
25:10
Yeah, Snow. Peas are just so rewarding
25:12
because you can just go and pull them straight off and they're
25:15
fixing nitrogen into the ground generally so great having that
25:20
legume in there. And then what about, OK, so with
25:24
your broccoli, I had tend to do this or have done it in the
25:29
past. I've been growing broccoli for a
25:31
little bit, but I would fold the leaves over the head to protect
25:37
it a little bit from the sun and the heat.
25:40
And I found that it's doesn't go as like it doesn't change the
25:45
colour of it as drastically. And it also prevents it from
25:49
bolting here in Queensland, which we can tend to have these
25:52
crazy like just warmer winter days which just ruin you
25:55
Broccoli, Same with cauliflower. I tend to do that as well.
25:59
Fold the leaves kind of over, make this little parcel and
26:02
protect it. Have you ever done that?
26:05
Have you ever heard of that? So I do that for.
26:07
Generally my cauliflowers, I find that I get a better formed
26:12
head doing that and one they don't bolt because yeah, we can
26:17
have, I wouldn't say they're warm winters, but we get a lot
26:21
of sunshine. So about 40 minutes down the
26:25
road is Yarrawonga, and that's got more sunny days than the
26:28
Sunny coast. Really.
26:30
Wow. Yeah, so we're.
26:31
Very, whilst it's cool, it's very sunny for us in our
26:36
winters. So I find cauliflowers can be a
26:39
bit tricky if you don't have the soil like bang on to how they
26:43
want it. They're they're just gone, they
26:46
bolt. So I find I have to do that more
26:48
with the cauliflowers. I don't necessarily do it with
26:50
my broccoli. The only issue I really have
26:53
growing broccoli is rats coming and eating all the tops off
26:57
them. But I know the rodents 1.
27:00
'S real difficult. Do you have chickens?
27:02
I do. And they're right next to the
27:04
veggie patch. Yeah, Yeah.
27:06
And they were borrowing under. They were living in the
27:08
BlackBerry. They were borrowing under.
27:12
They absolutely killed my rhubarb.
27:15
And I think I had like 20 something broccoli plants and
27:19
they just, all of them gone. Wow.
27:22
It can be. So destructive.
27:24
It's just like one of those things.
27:26
And then like, you know, we get possums, we get a Bush Turkey
27:29
that just loves to dig up all of my pots.
27:33
Yeah, we've got. Possums here, and this is the
27:35
first time I've really ever had possums.
27:38
We've got the big. Is it the brush tails?
27:43
Yeah, I think that's what they. Yeah.
27:44
Yeah. Yeah, we've.
27:46
Yeah. This place is just, like teeming
27:48
with them. And I was like, oh, great, what
27:51
are they going to do? Yeah, I heard this.
27:53
Really. Interesting thing that if you
27:55
put fairy lights along where their normal kind of path is,
28:00
they get deterred all right. I'm going to have fairy lights
28:03
everywhere because I've woken up in the middle of the night and
28:06
they're just being roaring and I'm like, what the hell?
28:09
Like what is this? He's trying to break into my
28:11
house and turns out it's just a possum.
28:13
It's just parties of possums. Coming in, yeah, I honestly, I
28:16
haven't tried that. I like we have enough street
28:21
light pollution as it is. So I kind of like I'm reluctant
28:26
to be putting in more light, but I haven't tried it.
28:30
And then the other thing for because you guys don't get Bush
28:33
turkeys for you down there. No, no, no.
28:35
Bush goodness me. They're annoying.
28:39
They apparently I saw this on the Weedy garden YouTube
28:44
channel. He tried hanging teddy bears
28:46
around the garden because they were like these.
28:49
But then his poor teddy bears just got so saturated and sad
28:53
looking in the weather. They were just like these, you
28:56
know these soggy rotten looking teddy bears by after a few
29:00
weeks. But again, I don't think that
29:02
works all that often. These things are just the most
29:06
difficult to combat in the garden.
29:08
The rodents, the possums, the ones that you pretty much need
29:13
full exclusion from. Hey guys, really quickly jumping
29:16
in. I just want to remind you, if
29:18
you are not subscribed to this show, that is the number one
29:20
thing that you can do to show me your support.
29:23
So if you're finding value from this conversation and you're
29:26
deeply engaged, I would love you to hit the follow or subscribe
29:29
button. All right, back to the show I've
29:31
seen in. Someone had like a a motion
29:35
detector sprinkler. Oh yeah.
29:39
And I think they've. Primarily we're using it for
29:41
cats, people that have had issues with cats in their
29:43
garden, like Suburban, yeah, there's a like a sensor
29:48
sprinkler that they're using. And I was like, I wonder if I
29:50
could set something like that up for them.
29:53
But one of my other things was like, if the possums are too
29:56
much of an issue, I think it's more going to be like an
29:58
exclusion. I'd have to set up a little
30:01
enclosed net house, which I don't want to do because again,
30:05
extra work, I haven't got my garden bed set up.
30:08
So yeah, so it's all right for now, but.
30:11
Yeah, I totally understand. That's a cool one.
30:14
I'm going to note that one as well because that's not not a
30:17
bad idea. I've set up a couple of like the
30:21
the cameras before, like we've got Ring cameras and things that
30:25
do the motion detection and kind of show you what's what's going
30:28
on. So yeah, so sort.
30:30
Of done some. Recon work as to who's coming
30:33
into the garden after dark. But, you know, I've got the
30:35
ducks and chickens and then I've sort of developed this run
30:39
underneath the fruit trees that they can go through and scratch
30:42
under and fertilize that. But the rest of it is kind of
30:47
enclosed. But then, you know, they're just
30:50
the Bush Turkey flies in or the possum just climbs, you know, on
30:54
the fences and just gets, they're just too clever.
30:57
And it's, I don't want to exactly what you just said,
31:00
don't want to go through the effort of having to put in all
31:03
of this massive exclusion netting and, you know, create
31:06
Fort Knox basically in my garden, which is really tricky.
31:12
Let's go back to flowers again. What other flowers are you
31:14
growing? What sort of what would you like
31:18
to grow if you could, and what what sort of things are you
31:21
looking at trying to put in? I guess like ideally my end goal
31:27
is to just have like my own self-sufficient picking patch so
31:30
I can just nice have my own flowers I can gift them and I
31:35
just think they're all generally just pretty.
31:37
So I'm always willing to try everything.
31:40
This year I grew stock for the first time.
31:44
Oh cool and I. Just thought that was just the
31:46
coolest. I just had these little double
31:47
stock. I got upon it from our local
31:50
nursery. They were great.
31:52
They lasted in a vase. I think I'd gifted them to my
31:54
Nan and I think she had them inside for nearly two weeks and
31:58
I was like, these are great. This is what I like.
32:02
I've tried to in the like house garden that we've got.
32:07
I'm trying to sort of make it a bit more of a like a perennial
32:11
type garden, so something that I don't have to replenish year in
32:17
year out. So I've put in some echinacea
32:24
and rubeckias to see how they're going to go.
32:27
And then I'm just collecting like a random tube stock when I
32:30
go into the, the nursery and just playing with things because
32:37
I've never really had like a house garden to sort of play
32:40
with. So just grabbing random, random
32:43
things that I can and having a look on diggers online and just
32:46
being like, I'll try that, I'll try that.
32:48
So I'm, yeah, really I'll just try anything and if it works, it
32:51
works. If it doesn't, it doesn't.
32:53
I've got some asters out there that I really want to take up,
32:57
take off, but they're just not, not quite doing anything and
33:01
they haven't for a while. So I don't think they'll
33:03
survive. But I I just really like violas
33:07
and pansies. Yeah, it's so pretty.
33:09
It's that cottage. Yeah, kind of.
33:10
They're just instant. Gratification as well, like you
33:12
plant them and then they're just like flowers straight away.
33:15
So I'm really, I'm a big instant gratification type gardener.
33:20
If I don't get a lot of reward very quickly, then I'm like, oh,
33:23
OK, so that's strange that I want to grow daily is because
33:27
they're not instant gratification.
33:29
No, but you do get that. Nice reward, but it's nice to
33:32
have a balance. And I think like I've spoken to
33:34
a few people, like for example, you know, Claire Bickle talk to
33:37
me about added a little bit having having something that's
33:42
growing at all times. So yeah, you're not always like
33:47
it's really difficult and hard to get motivated when you know,
33:50
you do a whole lot of planting, everything looks great and then
33:54
everything looks terrible. So it's kind of this all or
33:56
nothing type approach. So it's nice to have In summer
34:00
you've got some flowering, in spring you've got some
34:02
flowering, winters you've got some.
34:04
It's just like a constant like, oh, this one's coming up now,
34:07
this one's coming up. It's a little bit closer.
34:11
Yeah, I'm also into like self seeding as well.
34:13
So anything that'll just self seed happy days, because that is
34:17
also again, less work. So it can just come up and do
34:20
its thing and spread its seed, go elsewhere for the winter or
34:25
the summer and come back. Yeah, and less money at the.
34:28
Nursery because absolutely. Well, I mean, I literally just
34:32
came back early this morning from a nursery visit and I
34:37
bought way too many plants for what I actually needed.
34:39
Like I went in for a few things and then, you know, I got
34:43
excited. It got the better of me and now
34:45
I'm like got all these plans sitting outside in the garden
34:48
going, I don't even know where I'm going to put this.
34:50
I don't know. Like it's, I've got to try and
34:53
understand each plant. It's important to understand
34:56
where it grows nicely. You know, you're still
35:00
relatively new to where you are. So you've got to understand,
35:03
like you said you knew previously, where the sun's
35:06
coming over, where the wet spots are.
35:10
All of this where is like the really harsh ones against the
35:13
house or against the fence or whatever it may be.
35:17
So you've got to go and learn that.
35:18
And then you've got to try things out and say, OK, well,
35:21
that just absolutely failed in that spot.
35:22
But then it might work here or I can plant something taller here
35:26
to provide some shade and make this area a little bit more
35:29
shady. Is that the process that's going
35:32
on for you now? Yeah, that's sort of the.
35:34
Way that I'm looking at it. So we've got a lot of trees in
35:37
our front garden. It doesn't.
35:42
I love. Things to get morning sun and if
35:44
anything shaded in the afternoon like that would be my
35:46
preference, but that's not what it is here to get more of the
35:51
afternoon sun. So basically I'm just planting
35:54
stuff anywhere and I'm just going to observe if it has to be
35:59
moved, it has to be moved. If it doesn't work, it doesn't
36:01
work and then we'll try again in a different spot.
36:05
And then if that doesn't work, it's just probably not suited
36:07
for this climate. So yeah, it's I, yeah, I'm a bit
36:11
of a slap hazard gardener. I'm just going to go with what
36:15
what works, if it works, and then we'll go from there.
36:19
Trial and error. I think that's a nice simple.
36:21
Way of doing it because you don't want to necessarily
36:23
overcomplicate it or overthink it, yeah.
36:27
It can be. Overwhelming when you really,
36:31
you know, dive into OK, oh gosh, this needs this amount of
36:34
sunlight and it needs this much water and this one needs this
36:37
and that and the other. It's like, do your best, shove
36:40
it in where you think it's going to do best and then observe and
36:44
just kind of and then you can pivot and it's not that big of a
36:47
deal. I get that.
36:49
Yes, there's probably a little bit too well, there is to
36:52
planning and thinking about it prior, not just running in and
36:55
planting things, you know, too close to each other or like
36:58
you're in the wrong spot. But then if you kind of have a
37:02
general understanding and then you just throw it in, I think
37:04
it's going to be a little bit better.
37:06
You're going to that's awesome. So how you learn?
37:08
Yeah, like you. Don't learn from.
37:10
Doing nothing, like I probably could read up a little bit more
37:13
and do a little bit more deep diving into it, but then that
37:17
for me creates a lot of overwhelm and then I overthink.
37:20
And so for me, I'm just better off just to plant it, see what
37:23
happens and if it works. And if it doesn't, I just need
37:26
to move it to somewhere else. So that's fun.
37:28
Yeah, exactly right. And it's a good.
37:30
Attitude to have you. You can't like if you go in and
37:34
you get too much of a good thing, almost like you can do
37:36
too much of too much study or too much whatever.
37:39
And it's like it actually takes you away from the physical act
37:42
of getting out there and planting something yourself.
37:44
And it's like, OK, I've just wasted all this time thinking
37:47
about it when it could have been in the ground the whole time and
37:50
doing fine. Talk to me then about do you
37:56
compost? Are you about to compost and
37:58
things like this at this place? What is that like for you in
38:01
terms of trying to get compost going and bringing that in?
38:05
Or are you buying that sort of thing in?
38:07
I have bought in compost. This year.
38:10
So I don't know how I somehow convinced my little brother to
38:13
take his truck down to Clyde Compost and get me a truckload,
38:18
which is like a four hour drive each way.
38:21
So I don't know how I managed to get him to do that for me.
38:25
And then it was too windy to unload it the day he got it
38:29
home. So it sat in the shed for a few
38:32
days and then it all settled with the moisture and got stuck
38:35
in the back. So I think there was like 20
38:37
something cubic metres of compost in the tipper tray and
38:42
he pretty much was climbing in and shoveling it out.
38:48
He's still talking to me, so it's fine.
38:51
So yeah, I have bought in that input this year.
38:55
It's always scary buying in inputs because you never know
38:59
contamination wise. But I've heard a lot of good
39:02
things and I think the way that they do it is a a great way that
39:07
they do it. And it certainly smelled like
39:09
really good quality compost and there was lots of thermophilic
39:12
reactions happening inside the pile as I'm digging into it.
39:16
But I have composted in the past.
39:19
I need to get something set up here.
39:22
But it's more of a, they've probably got more of a rodent
39:26
issue at this place. So it's trying to find that
39:29
balance of not having rats in your compost totally and it.
39:35
Is it is hard to create enough compost for the space?
39:38
Like it's, you know, generally you need a large amount of space
39:45
for OK, for example, you need like a bigger space than you
39:48
have a garden because the space that you need to create the
39:53
compost and turn it constantly and the speed that you need,
39:57
it's just, it's like you'd be doing turning compost all the
40:00
time or you'd be trying to get compost all the time.
40:03
So I don't think there's a problem with bringing in
40:05
compost, especially if you know you've done the quality control
40:08
type checks, you know you understand and trust the person.
40:12
It gives you that Peace of Mind and saves you back a little bit.
40:16
Yeah, but then. Creating a little bit of extra.
40:19
Compost just by using your green waste to then turn it back into
40:22
free compost helps chip away at that input cost and all of that
40:26
type of thing. Yeah, so we use like a.
40:29
Lot of our like household scraps.
40:31
They all end up with the chickens and the Guineas.
40:35
Sorry, scrap some water. And I've also got a, it's like
40:45
an in ground composting system. I can't remember the brand of
40:47
it, Subaru something. So it's fully enclosed and it
40:54
lives in ground and it's got little holes that all the worms
40:59
can like come and go. So rodents can't get into that.
41:01
So I've got to bring that over here.
41:04
I've got to find a spot for it. I'll probably get a little
41:07
raised sort of garden bed for it specifically and then I can
41:11
plant around. So I like to put the scraps in
41:14
there and then that also creates a little bit of worm castings
41:18
and like they break it down into this really beautiful black
41:22
magic as well. So hopefully get that done.
41:25
But I've looked into maybe like an Aero bin style composting
41:29
just because it is enclosed rodents.
41:34
Excludes the. Rodents.
41:36
I like that in ground idea. It's almost like an in ground
41:39
worm farm that you're kind of creating.
41:41
Absolutely. And it's got 2.
41:42
Sides as well so you can feed one side or if you've built one
41:46
side up then you can sort of start harvesting from that side
41:49
and keep still feeding the other side and they can all the worms
41:52
can move yeah and then like I. Often because like, for example,
41:56
with the worm castings, like a little goes a long way.
41:59
So I might put a little bit in a bucket, blast it with the hose
42:05
and kind of just, you know, swirl it around, get all of the
42:08
bubbles in there. And I'm basically washing off
42:11
all of the microbes and the nutrients into that liquid
42:14
solution. And then that gets broadcast
42:17
over the whole garden. So you're getting those that
42:19
benefit and the inoculation and everything across the whole
42:23
space rather than sprinkling little bits of your worm
42:26
castings everywhere. And yeah, and try to do.
42:29
That so. That's a good way of using
42:31
compost and worm castings as a fertilizing technique without
42:34
having to, you know, go and get a big, thick few inches layer
42:39
across your entire garden. That's a lot of.
42:41
Worm castings. To be fair, yeah, tons of.
42:44
Worm castings, Exactly. So yeah, that's really cool.
42:49
The next thing then is like any other sort of feeding or
42:53
fertilizing that you've found. I've I noticed on your Instagram
42:56
you have Soil Life products. Is that your go to?
43:00
Do you have anything else? I know they're really awesome.
43:03
I'm sorry. Just for full clarity, they have
43:06
gifted me a lot of their products.
43:07
They have bought some, but they have gifted it to me.
43:10
I have actually found that it's really good so.
43:14
Yeah, I'm. Really happy with the results
43:16
that I've been getting from it. That was one of the big Co
43:19
contributing factors I think for getting my garden up and going
43:23
at mum and dad's. I started using the soil life
43:26
over the last summer, my last growing summer, and I found that
43:30
the I always find that my summer soil goes really hydrophobic
43:35
around about. February it.
43:36
Just I think it's just everything's too hot.
43:39
The worms have retreated that I don't want to be anywhere near
43:42
the heat of the soil. And I just find around February
43:46
my soil starts to go really hydrophobic.
43:49
Yeah. And I didn't have that issue
43:51
last summer. And my soil just it like it was
43:55
a better colour, a better composition.
43:57
It held the water a lot better. My vegetables were growing
44:00
really, really great and I've done a lot of work with soil
44:04
life here and I've transferred, transformed some of the garden
44:08
beds and they seem to be kicking along quite well so.
44:11
And I've put some on the lawn. The lawn has bounced back, yeah.
44:16
Honestly, yeah, you're absolutely right.
44:18
These well and other people that make similar products.
44:21
I mean it's just about getting life into the soil.
44:25
Exactly why but also feeding it you.
44:27
Can't just put life in and not feed it.
44:29
And that's what I like about the products, is that you're putting
44:31
the life in, but you've also got something to feed it.
44:35
And whilst you're transforming the soil, there's nothing
44:37
necessarily to feed it until you build up all of that stuff.
44:41
Yeah, that's right, Graham. State actually talks about, he
44:44
says send off your workers with a lunch box.
44:47
So he's like he says. He says.
44:49
You know, put in some food behind the microbes and microbes
44:53
behind and minerals. So you're kind of, you're really
44:55
trying to. Yeah, just basically give them
44:59
something that they can go and feed on, populate and then do
45:03
all of that good work in the soil that helps you build that
45:06
humus, develop that kind of water retention, especially,
45:11
especially in these hot summers. So I'm so pleased that yeah,
45:15
you're getting a lot out of that because that is it's one of the
45:19
steps that a lot of people miss. If you've got a good quality
45:23
compost, you're going to be putting a lot of that life in.
45:25
But it just these liquid fertilizers and things that have
45:30
all of this good stuff in it seem to accelerate supercharged
45:34
because it's kind of more available quicker.
45:38
It's it goes in, can saturate throughout the soil layers.
45:43
It's just seems to be a cool option that a lot of people miss
45:47
out on. Yeah, I mean you can feed the.
45:49
Soil, whatever you want, but if your soil is not doing the right
45:52
thing, so you don't have the microbes to help with the
45:54
transfer of everything, then it's not going to do anything.
45:57
So you can have really crap soil and you can be like, I'm just
46:01
going to put some fertilizer on it, but it's not going to do
46:03
anything if your balance is not there.
46:06
Your plants are not going to uptake it if it's not rightly
46:10
balanced. Yeah, that's right.
46:12
Is that a, is that something that you guys talk about come up
46:18
against in the farming practices that you do?
46:23
We've tried a little bit. My dad's in his 60s, my grandpa
46:27
is in his 95, he's 95. So they're very, very set in
46:31
their way. Our soil, because we're really
46:35
red, hard clay. It's a really tricky one because
46:40
it's not when it dries out, it dries out and we can't do much
46:44
about that. And so then trying to get all of
46:48
the nutrients back into it is quite tricky.
46:50
So our soil subtype is a really tricky one.
46:56
We have spread cow manure over it in some parts and my partner
47:03
and myself on our sort of block of land.
47:06
We have used some bio fertilizer to try and mitigate putting
47:11
synthetic stuff on. But trying to get through to a
47:16
60 something year old who's very set in his ways is quite tricky.
47:21
He has adopted some regenerative sort of practices, changed his
47:26
way. He doesn't RIP up the soil every
47:29
year when he's putting a crop in anymore.
47:32
We'll only sometimes we do have to burn off before we put our
47:36
crops in because our summer weeds are so prevalent that you
47:41
can't actually sow the crops. We've managed to reduce the
47:46
amount of herbicides that are used and trying to consciously
47:52
not use anything that has a residue, because anything that
47:55
has herbicide residue then obviously we can't put back into
47:58
the garden and stuff like that. And trying to educate him around
48:04
all of this stuff and all this knowledge that's come through is
48:08
a challenge, but he's sort of starts.
48:12
Like a bit of a thought. Process and then he sort of will
48:16
think about it a little bit but yeah very said in his ways loves
48:20
his gypsum loves his lime loves his urea so well it's it's one
48:25
of. These things, it's tried true
48:27
and tested for them to produce the same result and then it's.
48:31
He's not the only one there's. So, so, so many and you know, it
48:36
seems to be a common thing that like our farmer farming
48:39
generation seems to be getting older and there's not
48:44
necessarily a huge amount of people coming up underneath.
48:48
I mentioned Graham said earlier his, you know, content is
48:51
insanely helpful for people in that regard.
48:54
I don't know whether he's got onto that or anything, but his
48:58
podcast, especially in nutrition farming, really helps people
49:01
understand, reduce their inputs. Like for example, using folic
49:04
acid to reduce your inputs and things like this or reduce your
49:09
glyphosate, make it more effective, that kind of thing
49:11
for people that are using it. Yeah, it's such a tricky one to
49:16
be able to balance and like, I don't blame people like your dad
49:22
at all. I think it's just like it's the
49:24
nature of the business. It's the nature of how it's
49:26
worked over time. And it does take a while for
49:31
people to realize, okay, this, you know, maybe the way that
49:35
we've been doing it is suboptimal.
49:37
And yeah, and to as we mentioned earlier, there's no incentive to
49:43
be say, hey, look, we'll give you a little bit of subsidy to
49:46
help make the switch or to, to educate you and help you bring
49:50
it yourself into more regenerative practices.
49:52
This is not that help there is there?
49:54
No, no. Yeah.
49:56
So that's. Kind of.
49:59
That's why, I mean, you're a bit stuck in that situation
50:01
sometimes. Yeah, it can be a little bit
50:03
tricky, but you know, no, no harm, no foul necessarily.
50:08
I think it's just a sign of the times.
50:09
It's just more about, yeah, we're, we're now all generally
50:12
becoming slightly more educated. We're trying to inspire more
50:16
people to get into farming because we want farming to be an
50:19
attractive job. Like.
50:23
You know, they don't want to be it got these farmers that are
50:26
working a whole job. They're, you know, bottom line
50:29
is like not, you know, it's hard to to break even.
50:33
It's hard to do the job and it's just like it's not enticing
50:37
young people to be like, hey, you know, let's get into
50:40
farming. Do you see any, do you see that
50:42
at all? Is that sort of reflective of
50:44
what you're seeing or do you think there are young people
50:46
that want to get into farming or is it just the families that
50:49
kind of end up going down the same line?
50:52
I think there's generally. Some kids that are quite
50:54
interested in it, I'm not sure if that generation, if you're
50:59
not brought up on a farm, I don't necessarily think they
51:02
know that. There are certain times a year
51:05
that it's seven days a week and I'm not going to say 24 hours,
51:10
but sometimes it feels like it's 24 hours.
51:13
You're thinking about it nearly. 24 hours like you've.
51:15
Gone. You're up at Daybreak and you're
51:18
home just as the sun's going down.
51:21
So there are certain times of the year that and it seems like
51:24
a lot like I've just mentioned, like we've gone from hay to
51:27
harvest and then we'll have like, you know, one or two
51:30
months break and then it'll go into seeding and then you've got
51:34
everything that comes with that afterwards.
51:36
And then you might have another one or two months break and then
51:39
it's you're back to hay and harvest.
51:41
Yeah, it's this kind of. Cycle.
51:43
Constant, constant, constant. Yeah, yeah, true.
51:47
What what would you say? Like what do you enjoy about it?
51:52
The the let's just say the farming and the gardening
51:56
together. What do you think could be some
51:57
of the factors that would bring people in?
52:00
Like what do you really get out of it?
52:03
I. Really dislike the baby animals.
52:05
I'm pretty simple. I love the baby animals.
52:08
Give me all the calves, all the lambs, let me play with them and
52:13
let them have a great life, and then I'll be naively.
52:17
Ignore what happens in the. That after part, yeah, I love
52:22
the baby animals. I'm all about it.
52:26
And if you want me to drive a tractor, as long as it has air
52:28
conditioning then I'm fine. Wonderful, ladies and gentlemen.
52:50
Thank you again to Siobhan for sharing that and sharing her
52:54
family's journey, not only in the garden but obviously on the
52:57
farm. And if you want to check out any
53:00
of her links, which I encourage you to do so go and support her
53:03
and tell her you enjoyed the episode.
53:05
You will find those in the description below.
53:09
Now this year we've got plenty of exciting guests coming up.
53:13
So if you enjoyed the episode or you want to hear more, remember,
53:17
just hit that follow or subscribe button on whatever
53:20
platform you are on. And if you feel so obliged to, I
53:25
would love any kind of review or comment to just to let me know
53:29
which part you enjoyed, what you might like to see, any guests
53:32
that you'd like to see on the show.
53:34
And that really, really helps me out, helps the show out and will
53:37
help find more people to get them into the garden.
53:40
So thank you again. That's pretty much it.
53:44
Look, I have nothing more to say.
53:45
I think I'm I'm ready for the next one.
53:47
I'm pumped to all these kind of conversations.
53:49
They're just getting me excited to get out in the garden.
53:51
So thank you again for listening, for watching and take
53:54
care. We'll see you again very soon.
53:55
Bye for now.