Completed over the course of several Christmas holidays, these are our enormous raised beds, now containing 10 cubic metres of weed-free garden mix and a range of vegetable seedlings, herbs and fruit bushes.
We've used windproofing cloth to provide a pest-proof fence. It should keep the rabbits, peacocks and hens away and we can add fruit netting over the top to keep the birds out as required.
On the left, there is silverbeet then curly kale. The middle row contains spring onions and red cabbage. And on the right hand side, it's celery and then dwarf beans.
All the vegetable seedlings seem to have doubled or tripled in size in the fortnight since they were planted. They wilted severely by the time evening came around for the first few days but now they stand up proud, eagerly awaiting their evening watering.
I'm particularly intrigued by the red cabbage and can hardly wait to see how they transform from spindly plants into great big dense purple globes.
In the other bed, I've planted low maintenance Mediterranean herbs - purple sage, pizza thyme, garlic chive - so that I don't need to water so often. The irrigation system is a work in progress. There's a row of sprouting garlic cloves to the right of the herbs, only one month late, and then globe artichoke, guava, blueberry, loganberry and blackcurrants beyond.
I suspect that my raised beds won't ever look as good as they do now. But I still hope that one day they look as attractive and productive as the edible section at the Botanical Gardens...
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