Gardening – Immersion gardening

I had set up my first test garden – a raised bed at the bottom of the garden, close to the fence so that when summer did arrive the cucumbers and zucchini could climb easily.

Working on the principle that the best place to store water is in the soil, I had been working on increasing the holding properties of the sticky grey clay.

Inside the raised bed, in preparation for transplanting leeks, I started with a layer of cardboard, covered with a good layer of compost, then added layers of straw, seaweed, some well- rotted horse manure and a top layer of compost.

They say gardening is best learned by immersion, and so it was to be. At first I welcomed the rain, then it began falling in buckets and what I hadn’t noticed was that the overflow pipe from the neighbour’s water tank ended right at the boundary of our section. The neighbour’s house is an old ex-bach, built when councils had no real concern about water run-off from one section to another. A river of water rushed out of that pipe, raced across the clay and within 20 minutes the raised garden was sitting in a lake with the leeks now mixed with straw, horse poop compost and seaweed, while the river continued onto the next property.

The council advised that the overflow pipe was legal and an inherited problem on the peninsula from the era of bach builds! Then, I guess, he went back to his desk to deal with some really important problem.

Preventing external water from entering our section now became the challenge. We began by using a thick piece of timber to build a 500cm wide raised garden bed running the length of the boundary, deflecting the water off our land.

Should any tank overflow manage to get under the timber, we covered the clay with a layer of topsoil and two truckloads of bark and tree chippings. Not only does such a thick layer of mulch slow and soak up large volumes of water, it should reduce evaporation in the summer.
Tomato time

The tomato (Lycoperscion esculentum) is native to the Andes mountains in South America.  Considered to be poisonous before the 1700s, today nutrient rich tomatoes rank at the top of the summer garden list. Tomatoes need full sun and a long warm growing season. They can easily be grown in containers – you just need to remember that they are heavy feeders that require plenty of compost and a great calcium source to prevent blossom end rot.

Tomatoes also need nitrogen, phosphorous and potassium in large amounts. Use nettle, comfrey and seaweed liquid manure once a week and mulch plants well. Mulch keeps moisture in the soil and helps prevent disease. Use straw, shredded leaves or dried grass clippings that will also suppress weeds that take light, water, nutrient and space from the crop.

Minette Tonoli of Meadowsweet Herbs & Flowers in Whangaparaoa grows over 40 varieties of mostly heirloom or heritage tomatoes. Her top five picks are: Tommy Toe (heirloom) – healthy and vigorous with an excellent yield of tasty fruit; Jaune Flamme (heirloom) – ample producer of fruity sweet-tart orange tomatoes; Indigo Rose (open pollinated) – an eye-catching dark purple tomato, nearly all black, with good rich taste; Green Grape (heirloom) – bite-sized green tomato with a sweet zingy taste; Purple Russian (heirloom) – delicious elongated plum shaped dark red to purple fruit, excellent fresh or preserved.

Note: Heirloom tomatoes allow you to collect seeds. If you buy a hybrid variety you will not be able to collect seeds.