SUSTAINABLE GARDENING

I spent some time this week reading a book by a fellow Australian, Peter Andrews. The book is called Back from the Brink and in subtitle How Australia’s landscape can be saved. He writes of the natural geography of Australia, and to my surprise, describes how the rivers previously ran in a series of shallow ponds across high country like arteries feeding the water into capillaries that spread the water down over many terrace like flood plains. With the coming of white settlers the country was quickly changed so that all the rivers now run deeply in eroded channels through the countryside, with tributaries draining water, often salty water, into them.

I am the same age as Peter Andrews, who has worked farms in South Australia and New South Wales, while I have spent much of my life on farms in Queensland. Just as people on the land learn to read cloud formations and understand rainfall patterns, they also learn to read their land. I believe I have these skills, but in reading Peter’s book I came to better understand two things. Salinity and how water moves underground. Peter does not believe in applied irrigation or the way water is stored in many farm dams, but espouses storage of water, moving water, within the ground.

Garden poppies

This morning I photographed these red Flanders poppies in my home garden. Note that they are waist high.

Field poppies

The red Flanders poppies in the field are only knee high. Why is there a difference in growth? Before this post finishes I will explain the reason.I suggest my readers turn back now and re-read my post under TRAVEL TALES, in a series called Australian Countryside 3 where I wrote about eucalyptus trees.

I stated my belief that young eucalyptus trees on the hillside of the the valleys containing city reservoirs were preventing rainwater runoff reaching the reservoirs. Am I a voice crying in the wilderness? Does no one else see these problems caused by the proliferation of eucalyptus trees?

After reading Back from the Brink I now know that Peter Andrews shares much of my concern about the proliferation of eucalyptus trees as woody weeds, thriving on the underground movement of water. I’ve noted some of the things that I have done correctly in my garden and on our farm. I’ve become aware of mistakes that I have made, which could quickly be corrected. I took my dog, Trixie, for a walk this morning to photograph farm views to illustrate Peter’s message.

House on the hill

Peter believes that hill tops should be used for forestry and grazing, the forestry preferably being introduced species that will usefully mulch the ground with their deciduous leaves or needles. Wildlife and birds feed and drop their faeces in such forests adding fertility to the soil. Grass does not grow between or under eucalyptus trees.  Queensland is losing two percent of grass land every year because of the proliferation of eucalyptus trees. It would appear that when I removed most of the eucalyptus trees in front of our house that I should have eliminated all of them. I only removed these trees after I had established Radiata pine trees.

Clearing trees in winter 2006

In this winter view of ducks and geese on our farm dam taken three years ago, you can see the yellow bulldozer down towards the river, leaving in its wake the pushed over eucalyptus trees. In the previous view you see the trees I allowed to remain. These trees included the Radiata pines which have appreciated the reduced competition for ground water.

Radiata pine trees

Nonetheless, after four months of drought these trees are now stressed, shedding brown pine needles to mulch the ground below them. Peter’s belief is that in this way such trees restore fertility to the ground and with the assistance of birds and animal droppings enrich water slowly moving downhill. Our house garden, the Remembrance Field and these trees are on the hilltop section of our farm.

Below the forested hill in Peter’s plan is the farmland which should be mulched to prevent evaporation of soil moisture. The shallow roots of grass do not reach much of the underground water as it moves to the flood plain. However, once the eucalyptus trees are removed the grass will grow in the good seasons. Peter espouses allowing weeds, like thistles, to flourish amongst the grass as these tap rooted plants will draw on water deeper in the soil, bring up nutrients to be stored in their foliage. Only when the weeds have reached maturity should they be fed off to livestock, or slashed as mulch, which will rot down and increase the fertility of the soil.

Young Scotch thistle

In earlier years when Eberhard took care of our grassland he would hunt down all these thistles and hoe them out, considering them an untidy weed. Such is the attitude of most farmers when Peter tells them to let their weeds flourish. No wonder his views are controversial, yet he has proved time and time again that his methods achieve results. His pasture land will remain green in droughts due to the increased fertility of his soil and the underground water moving slowly down hill beneath the surface of the ground. He states that once the weeds have restored the fertility of the soil the grass will flourish and choke out the thistles and other weeds.

Eventually this slow moving water will emerge on the low ground – the flood plain. We had two dams and a watercourse constructed on this flood plain in 1996. In my next post I will write about this surface water flow and storage of water on our flood plain, but clearly as is shown by the green grass beside this dam the underground fertile water that seeps away from my garden on the hill and down the slope drains to this area. Salty water is heavier than fresh water, so any salt in this water seeps at a slightly lower level until it enters the dam.

The flood plain

Note in the above photo that the roots of the three eucalyptus trees beside the dam have drawn all the moisture from the ground above them on this slope, yet beyond the reach of their roots on the flood plain the grass is still green.

Now I must answer the question I posed about the different heights of my red Flanders poppy plants. The garden bed was rebuilt with fresh composted soil in March after the bobcat brought in the sand for the raised vegetable gardens, shown in a previous post called SALAD DAYS.  I planted this bed with daffodil bulbs and mulched it heavily with hay.  As the daffodils finished blooming the poppy plants established themselves over the bulbs. Obviously their seed had been added with the compost. Although these plants have received no more irrigation water or rainwater than the field during their growing period, they are much healthier.

Peter Andrews deplores cultivation of ground. He gives too many reasons for me to name them all here. He considers that crop seed should be directly tilled into mulched soil, but land could be systematically and lightly ripped over a period to time if it has become compacted by heavy machines or hard footed livestock. We do slash our poppies at the end of the season.

Slashing the poppies

When the mulch has rotted we plough it into the soil to add humus. We may cultivate it again a couple of times to eliminate weeds. We give the Remembrance Field a final cultivation at the end of June to germinate the poppy seed. We do this because it ensures the poppies will be flowering for 11th November. In other years I have been happy with the results, but this year the poppies are stunted. Why? Reading Back from the Brink I discovered the answer. Salinity! It had not occurred to me that salt was the problem. Peter explains that salt arrives in the rain at 60 parts per million. If there are no deep rooted weeds or trees to take up the salt in the soil it eventually passes into the slow moving, unseen underground water moving down the slope. To keep my poppies alive in the hot bare ground I have added more water than they could use, increasing the salt content of the soil. If fresh water is put on any ground the salt in that water has increased five fold by the time it drains into creeks and rivers. This means that the irrigation water I’ve been using on the field throughout July, August, September and October is five times saltier than rainwater. No wonder every farmer says, “Nothing makes things grow like rain!” With a bit of luck we could get storm rain in the next couple of weeks to flush this excess of salt from the soil of the Remembrance Field. Where will that salt go? Eventually it will reach our dam and river.

The poppies in my garden grew in fresh compost that had not accumulated salt. Because this ground was mulched with hay and later with the decomposing leaves of the daffodils they were not watered with river water as often as the poppies in the field. This is also why my salad vegetables in the raised garden beds are thriving – fresh fertile soil and mulch means they are not contending with an excess of salt.

In my next post I will write about the water which flows over our ground and into our dams and the Severn River. I will explain the mistakes I have made and how Peter Andrews believes such mistakes could be corrected. As the subtitle of Back from the Brink says, Australia’s landscape can be saved.

See www.sustainableinsight.com.au

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 Fay’s book Wildflowers, wilderness and wine email Fay on helwig@halenet.com.au

Internationally it is available on the Amazon.com website.  http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002ACXQ0M/sr=8-1/qid=1244294755/ref=olp_product_details?ie=UTF8&me=&qid=1244294755&sr=8-1&seller=

http://stores.lulu.com/strictlyliterary

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

Technorati Tags: Australia, Australian, book, compost, Das Helwig Haus B&B, eucalyptus, Flanders fields, Glen Aplin, poppies, red flanders poppy, salinity, salt, severn river, the granite belt, vegetable, Wildflowers wilderness and wine

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