Rain Rain is it Gone Away?

In a community garden you really notice variety and what works in any given year.This one is just off the highway in Victoria.

For the past two weeks I have had to light a fire at least five times. It’s been too cold in the house. That doesn’t usually happen in June!

And what it feels like in my house, the poor tomato plants are feeling in spades outside! Argh. My cucumber plants look more like shriveled yellow sprouts, the basil is turning black and the tomatoes? Bursting their cloche frames I’m afraid to remove.

This past weekend has seen the first warm days in… well, days, the lettuce is loving it, I’ve had my first feeding of snow peas and the berries? Well! Let me tell you in one word….dripping. I’ve never seen them so loaded with fruit.

I guess with gardening and farming you get what the weather and circumstance provide. Some years the berries and fruit are bad, others the broad beans and tomatoes prolific.

The Key I guess is planting variety and harvesting and preserving whatever is plentiful in any given year. Monoculture farmers must have a hard time of it. That’s why they need pesticides and fertilizers and artificially made seed. They rely solely on that one crop and need to do everything possible to make it profitable.

Diverse farming sustains itself, creating fertilizer, capitalizing on climate conditions and providing the farm and consumers with a steady, delicious supply of food whatever conditions climate change throws at us. Thank goodness, for the past two years climate change has thrown wet, cold springs our way.

For this year, my blueberry harvest will be impressive as will my broad beans. But the biggest harvest will be potatoes, I planted them everywhere in the yard over the years. And in between beans, and tomatoes and peas and blueberries I see their persistent furry leaves.

At least they like the rain!