This Week's Autumn Gardening Tips From Fred (+ FREE SEEDLINGS)

Now is the time to plant some lovely Autumn seedlings in your home vegie garden or planter pots/boxes for Winter and Spring harvest. Leafy greens like Spinach, Kale and Rainbow Chard are nutritious and easy to grow. Leeks, Celery and Snow/Sugar Peas are beaut in Winter soups, casseroles and stir fries.  Herbs such as Thyme, Sage, Rosemary, Italian Parsley and Coriander add flavour to many dishes and can help ward off Winter ills. But have you noticed vegie seedlings and seeds are in short supply now? The stay at home requirement has resulted in a huge (and wonderful!) renewed interest in home grown produce.

Our plans to get planting at Seed Community Garden leading to a May Open Day have been put on hold. So the plants which we grew for the shared beds at Seed need a home. Would you like some? If so please come to the front entrance at Seed (in between the 2 lakes at the end of Montgomery St Sale ) on Easter Saturday morning 11th April around 10 am. The plants listed above will be available for you to take home and plant in your own garden. We've disinfected the pots and practiced good hygiene in their production. Please take no more than 4 per household. We suggest just calling by while you are exercising on your regular Lakeside walk or bike ride. Please bring your own bag and you must observe the standard Coronavirus 1.5m social distance requirement as you do when food shopping. We'll probably do this again in about a month if it works out ok and everyone is respectful of others. 

It's also time to plant legumes: Broad Beans and Peas especially. These are best planted by sowing seed directly into a well limed (dolomite lime is recommended) soil. Because they fix their own Nitrogen, adding standard fertilizer is not necessary although well worked in compost will benefit all plants. Ordering seed on line used to be easy at places like Diggers Seeds https://www.diggers.com.au/shop/ or Eden Seeds:  https://www.edenseeds.com.au/ but it might be that they have some temporary restrictions. Goodman Seeds https://www.goodmanseeds.com.au/shop/vegetable-seeds are a local Gippsland company worth supporting so maybe give them a call. 

Good luck and happy veg gardening!