Late April days

It is mid autumn here and as many years before us the weather has been divine for this time of the year.. Typical sunny days and cooler nights.
I'm waiting for the winter veggies to grow and that will be some time away.

Bees are still enjoying whatever flowers they can find in the sunshine. In this case it is an African blue basil plant. It is great having this plant around as we can get fresh basil all year round.

The spinach is starting to come on.

As is the silver beet.

Our beautiful chickens continue to provide us with fresh eggs. Some very nice pasta was made yesterday. I was not quick enough to take a picture of it before it was turned into the most scrumptious pasta bake. The baby pumpkins are from another self sown plant that was very late producing so it got pulled out.

And here are the girls on another one of their free range forays. You can also see here another one of the self sown pumpkins. The kind posters at Ozgrow have identified it as a Jarradahle.

Fresh plantings

I planted out some new stuff today. Here's hoping there is a lot of good eating coming up in the next few months.
Not everything was planted but I made a good start.
Cauliflower, broccoli and brussels sprouts that has been started from seed were transplanted into the main bed. I've only tried growing these ones from seed once before and i was not successful so here is hoping they work out. I have had a lot of success with seedlings purchased from the store.

Here are some of the brassicas. Tiny as they are.

Snow peas and silverbeet that were planted about 2 weeks ago.

I also planted some spinach and leek seed today. 

And the egg layers ate lots of goodies again today.

How do i get to the other side of the fence?

Todays stuff

I promise this will be the absolute last picture freshly harvested of tomatoes for this season. I finally got a chance to pull the last two plants out late this afternoon. There are no more.

Surprisingly I still have a few more smallish cucumbers around. Every other year they would barely last till late February. I knew this and one more were about but I found about three more today. It was yummy to eat.

Of course there was a mini harvest for part of tonights dinner. The bulb is from a spring onion.

One of my 7 pot chilli plants. You may have noticed by now how much I like chillies.

And finally. The bug eaters were let out for their daily scrounge. I know they found lot of yummy things to eat.

Old Friends

Heard from old friends yesterday and they ended up coming around for dinner. It was good to catch up as it has been a couple of years.
My, how some people have grown.

I warned them before they came over that I would be busy all afternoon in the yard as I had a lot to catch up on.
I am now at the pulling plants out stage. Cleaning of all the ripe and green tomatoes. Not sure if I will make green tomato pickles this year. Made it last year and it was a huge success with everyone that got a jar. We are not big eaters of it. I can assure you it is delicious. Just that eight 600ml Fowlers jars can get a bit much.

Pulled about five plants out and harvested a lot more ripe fruit from a few others. I know that when I made my first post I said that most of my tomato harvesting was done but I have once again underestimated.
Lots of peppers coming on that should last a few more weeks and one lonesome dried up corn that I had totally missed. I'm toying with the idea of drying it and trying to make popcorn. It may not be the right variety but what the heck.

Had a bumper cucumber crop this year. Best ever, and there are still more to come. Also still have a few potatoes hiding around the place.

And of course some eggs from my lovely girls. The chooks.

As you can see there will be more tomato salsa making in the next couple of days.

Brandywine alert bottom left hand corner.

After having a great time catching up all afternoon and having a nice dinner, old friends departed with a big bag of home grown produce. I know they will enjoy it.