Three productive black currant bushes—syrup, mead, country wine.

2 x red and 1 x white currant. Some eaten fresh, red currant jelly to dress up cheesecakes etc, others to mead and/or country wine.

1 x cape gooseberry—preserve

Will see how they go, might order more blackcurrant. I do like black currant jam!

All this means no plum, no apricot and no avocado trees. Oh well.

This is an apple on one of the two Hubbardston Nonsuch trees I managed to include in the orchard—one tree went to the neighbor across from me. Looks deelish, eh?

Notice the trunk is black? I paint the trunks to about 45cm high with bituminous paint to stop fucking rabbits eating the bark and ring barking the tree. I do this until the trunk is thicker and the bark hard and dry and of no interest to the fucking  rabbits.

See also, top left, the tree bag I had taken the tree out of? Most trees were put into bags, a few into big pots. I am keeping the pots, useful for keeping young trees in and moving them under cover before fall/winter frosts hit.

I have two quince trees—Pineapple and Smyrna. One is planted, one is not yet. They will be planted close (≈45cm) together so root competition keeps them smallish—I do not want 10m high trees I can’t pick the fruit from.

Summer pruning will keep the trees no more than 2m tall.

Smyrna quince:

Yellow Huffcap perry pear.

There to pollinate the next tree

Taking the photos I saw that while the pears were pretty healthy the blight was in there again. Will spray with copper today then on Sunday a strengthening, immunity boosting spray with Neem oil emulsified with liquid soap, whey powder, Seasol and a smidge of Charlie Carp.

Maybe some dipel too tho haven’t seen many butterflies.

She’s apples!

The blue binder twine, when reattached to a post out the front marks where the lot with the trees on it plus the chook run and vege patch will be terraced. Two level strips of ground, easier to mow etc.

Must not forget the currants! Their pots are small so blew over in any wind. Found this old bookcase, jammed the currant pots in there and they have been fine.

They will be planted soon, know where they will go but need to whippersnipper, mow then neighbor will run a cultivator/rotary hoe over the strip of land the currants will go.

All taking shape. Have the currants, a crab apple (pollinator for the earlier blossoming apples) then an apple and another crabapple to plant in my front lawn—no where else left and there they will eventually act as more bushfire protection with the trees on the nature strip.

Trees will be mulched with 7mm gravel.

The trees are planted in rows.

Within each row the trees are four metres apart and the rows are two metres apart. My intention was to espaliere them, grow them on wires at 60cm above ground, 100, 140 and 180cm above ground but the landscaper taking care of my trees didn’t give them a 65cm header cut so branches are at any height.

Branches growing into the inter-row space will be pruned off ruthlessly, only branches growing along the line of the row will remain. Plastic bottles—springwater, Coke, flavored milk etc—will be hung from branches using soft, plastic coated wire then filled just enough to make the branch horizontal.

Will place star droppers along the rows, run poly pipe along the rows about 20cm high fastened to the star droppers and fit drippers etc then connect all that to an irrigation controller on a tap.

Rain falls more uniformly throughout the year and a bit more plentifully than in Adelaide but some irrigation will be needed.

Along the line of the garage I will create a foundation, maybe with cement, maybe with just gravel, and place rainwater tank/tanks there. That edge is just useless for growing veges—shadow line.

On the other side of the garage there is a 900mm wide strip of land between garage and side fence. Level it off, some paving slabs and place 2-3 of the 1000L rectangular steel tanks for a bit more rainwater. Add a pump—water veges and trees occasionally with rainwater.

Re the veges—they will go in 600mm high raised beds—I ain’t getting any younger nor are my joints—and I am thinking of making them wicking beds. Something to think about.