THE VALUE OF SHADE

Recently, when reading Peter Andrew’s book Back From the Brink, it made me take a good look at my upright willow trees and ask myself if I was utilizing them to full advantage. I planted these trees in 1998 at the end of a drainage system to serve three purposes.

• To soak up excess water
• To create a green view  behind our vegetable garden
• To provide a wind break

I quickly became disenchanted with these trees, as they spread their roots out into the area where I had previously planted pumpkins. It was a space where the pumpkins could spread. But, with the willow trees stealing all the moisture from the ground, my pumpkin crops began to fail. We ripped the ground and pulled up the roots, but within 6 months the roots had again colonized the area. The past couple of years this ground has remained bare. The trees were serving their intended purpose, but they had restricted my use of this portion of my garden.

Pruning willow

The willow trees had grown too tall. In August 2008 while they were deciduous, I hired men to reduce the height of the trees by cutting them back with a chainsaw. I used the solid wood for the fires and the twiggy branches for support structures for climbing beans and sweet-peas. When they grew again they had a bushier shape. I have seen trees like these repeatedly cut back to fence height to create a dense hedge.

Willows are fast growing trees and within 15 months these three had bushed out and once more towered over the garden.

Green willows

I asked myself, “How can I best utilize this shade and this space?”

We have experienced a particularly hot November this year with heatwave conditions normally associated with the months of January and February. By noon each day I’ve had to place shade cloth loosely over the top of the lettuce in my raised garden beds to stop them scorching off.

Shaded letttuce

To germinate fresh lettuce seed I planted a row of mignonette lettuce seed at the edge of this bed and laid a length of shade cloth over it.

Germinating lettuce

In less than a week the seed had germinated and I then raised the shade cloth to stand on the western side to provide shade from the hot afternoon sun. Once they have hardened off, I will remove the shade cloth. Again when I transplant them I will shade them for a few days. As a child at my Grandmothers side, she taught me how to transplant seedling, water them down and then shade them with sprigs cut from green shrubs. By the time the sprigs had wilted and dropped their leaves the seedlings had recovered from any transplanting shock.

To utilize the shade of the willow trees I decided to create more compost bins which by next summer will become raised garden beds. I believe in recycling. As on most farms one acquires over a period of time piles of used materials too good to throw away. I had just enough sheets of rusty roofing iron and sufficient steel posts to create three new compost bins. Plus, I had the willing labour of my Japanese WWOOF members, Daiji Kuwano and Madoka Uchiyama. I taught Daiji how to line up the steel pegs by closing one eye and sighting down the line. He got it right down the line, but due to different positioning against the iron, could not do so across the bins. I also taught him how to use a pair of fencing pliers to twist wire.

New compost bins

This will have to be an ongoing job for my Willing Workers on Organic Farms. Firstly I will introduce composting tiger worms into each bin to assist with the breaking down of the organic matter. My Wwoofers will harvest all composting material into the first of three bins. When the first bin is filled, my Wwoofers will have to turn it over into the second bin and again begin filling the first bin. They will do this until all three bins are full. When Autumn comes the willow trees will drop many of their golden leaves over the filled bins. At the end of winter 2010 my Wwoofers will once more have to turn over the contents of each bin, cutting off any willow tree roots which have grown up into the compost. I will then have three raised garden beds into which I may plant my vegetables. I will place afternoon shade loving lettuce at  the rear, climbing beans may be encouraged to grow up wires strung across and around the bins through the steel posts, and pumpkins will be allowed to drop over the iron to run across the vacant space. At the end of the 2011 harvest the bins will have more composting material added, and once more the following spring my Wwoofers will find themselves turning the soil, the depth of the bins to remove willow roots, so that I may continue each summer to use these as shaded, raised garden beds. Only by completely turning the contents of these bins every year will we be able to eradicate the willow roots to use this ground.

Every year as I take visitors through my garden they wave their arms to encompass the view and ask, “How do you find the time to do all this?”

My answer is always the same, “Wwoofers!” I then tell them that they can read about the construction of my garden and the role wwoofers have played in my book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine.

Book cover

Das Helwig Haus B&B owned by Eberhard and Fay Helwig is situated at Glen Aplin, near Stanthorpe on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland, Australia.

This is a region noted for Australian wildflowers, four wilderness National Parks and sixty wineries. In 1997 Eberhard and Fay established the Remembrance Field of red Flanders poppies, a European wildflower.

To obtain my book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine email me at helwig@halenet.com.au The price is $33.00 posted to destinations within AustraIia. You may phone me on 07-4683 4227 if you wish to pay by credit card.

Internationally it is available on

http://stores.lulu.com/strictlyliterary

http://books.google.co.uk/

Technorati Tags: Australia, Australian, compost, composting, Das Helwig Haus B&B, lettuce, Queensland, shade, stanthorpe, trees, Wildflowers wilderness and wine, willows, WWOOF, wwoofers

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