Last year we set up a small vegetable garden, 2 raised beds 3mx60cmx40cm, we wanted to try it out, see if we could do it. Can we grow something and be able to eat it? We discovered that we could and we enjoyed it.

A few things were a bit ordinary, some we planted too late so they didn’t work (like tomatoes, we have since been told that in Sydney the best tomatoes grow before Christmas!) All in all we had great success with beautiful cucumbers, delicious (almost sweet) leek, crisp baby spinach (sometimes not so baby, but still the best we have eaten) and fantastic lettuce (especially once we discovered the lettuce without a heart!). So, full of enthusiasm and spinach, armed with our lessons and successes from last year we decided to expand the garden.

We have now committed a larger section of our back garden for our veggie patch.  We have a mini vegetable shop starting to grow with lettuce, tomato, beetroot, snow peas, cucumbers and leek just to name a few. One of last year’s beds had to be demolished to make way for the new and we have kept the other one to dedicate to strawberries (also currently sharing with a few parsnips!)

OK the technical part, the raised beds are made of treated pine and we have a total of 3 beds – 1 is 6mx60cm divided into 5 beds of 1.2m each. The other 2 are 3mx60cm divided in half. Each bed has its own drip irrigation attached to the water tank. All the beds were individually covered in plastic (to prevent the soil making contact with the treated pine) before being filled with organic garden mix and covered in a thick layer of pea straw mulch. We have spent the last few weekends building and filling our beds, now we are ready for planting.

Our goal is to be able to grow the majority of our vegetables, to be able to sustain the growth and supply throughout the season and be ready for the upcoming seasons. We will document our highs and lows, successes and failures.

Just as I am writing this page, a massive hail storm has come through. There is so much hail it looks like snow, a very unusual sight in Sydney. Just waiting to see what the damage has been to our tiny vegetables.

There have been a few casualties, mainly leaf damage. So hopefully they will all make a full recovery…

We will be back with an update on the new growth shortly.