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AN ABUNDANCE OF PERSIMMONS

This photo of persimmons hanging ripe on our tree at Das Helwig Haus B&B was taken in the autumn of 2006 when Maude, a French girl, was here for six weeks as a Wwoofer. She is shown cuddling Patches, the black and white feral female cat who arrived at our home in 2005 and adopted us.

Maude, Patches and persimmons

Since then Patches has featured in many of my photographs. Since then the tree has grown and the Satin Bower Birds have multiplied, so that it is no longer possible to allow the persimmons to remain hanging on the tree until the end of May. Read the rest of this entry »

AN ABUNDANCE OF TOMATOES 2

I wrote an earlier post about what I did with an abundance of red tomatoes, one of the summer crops grown by the farmers of the Granite Belt, who generously give me boxes of ripe fruit. I also commented that I usually only grow cherry tomatoes in my organic garden. About fifteen years ago I purchased a packet of golden ripple cherry tomato seed from the Diggers Seed Club and since then I’ve never needed to purchase more seed, nor do I save the seed. Every autumn at Das Helwig Haus B&B, about a month before the frosts arrive, a flock of Satin Bower birds return from the rain forests to overwinter in our garden. They are a fruit eating bird and quickly turn their attention to the fruits of my garden, clearing any remaining figs, picking at the half ripe persimmons and enjoying the cherry tomatoes. The fertile seed of the tomatoes pass through the bird and is deposited throughout the garden. Thus it is that these tomatoes have now become one of my most prevalent weeds. They are easily recognized and transplanted or pulled if found in inappropriate positions. This particular tomato has a tendency to climb or ramble, and would be useful grown in hanging baskets on patios. The photo below shows how one tomato bush has rambled over the tops of roses and up the trellis of the gazebo railing.

Cherry tomato bush in the rose garden.

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AN ABUNDANCE OF FIGS

Two years ago when Barbara Buchannan offered to become my companion for five months and assist me like a member of the WWOOF organization, it was her tales of sun-ripened figs that made her European friends envious. She told them of her pleasure in standing under the tree shown below, choosing sun warmed fruit that almost melted in her mouth.

Sun ripened figs

When I established our garden at Das Helwig Haus B&B I planted four fig trees of different varieties. Ian Robertson, CEO of the Australian Open Garden Scheme, congratulated me in 1997 for choosing to use a fig tree as a specimen tree to add texture and color within our floral garden. During our cold winter months on the Granite Belt the bare branches give a surrealistic view on a foggy morning and emphasis the Japanese influence in the design of this portion of my garden.

Fig tree amongst flowers

Every year this particular tree yields buckets of small, dark skinned, red fleshed, sweet figs. Every year we eat fresh figs, I make fig jam, I dry figs and I preserve figs in syrup as a dessert. This small fig variety is not readily available from plant nurseries. I was given a sucker to grow by one of the Italian born farmers on the Granite Belt. The sucker flourished and grew into a decorative and productive tree. Read the rest of this entry »

AN ABUNDANCE OF TOMATOES

Although I grow organic tomatoes in my garden they are mostly for salad use. I find that the cherry tomatoes have less insect problems than the commercial varieties. My garden at Das Helwig Haus B&B on the Granite Belt of southern Queensland is surrounded by commercial fruit orchards and vegetable farms. The down side of this is that all the insect pests manage to find breeding spots every year, hence the need for farmers to use insecticides and those pests are happy to move on to my unprotected crops. The plus side is that the farmers will kindly give me their excess produce.

Cherry tomatoes and hot red chilies.

Last year I was allowed to pick tomatoes from fields that had been abandoned. It is commercial practice to only pick tomatoes while they are green. When the price drops, or the farmer thinks the plants are past their prime, the crop will be abandoned as uneconomical. When time permits the farmer will clear his land for a different crop in his rotation plan. Thus, each year I witness the waste of many vegetables as they rot in the field.

Sun ripened Roma tomatoes

The good thing is that as the crop was still green when the farmer abandoned it, these tomatoes had several weeks to ripen naturally in the sun, free of insecticides. . Read the rest of this entry »