Start of productive season in the garden

I have a number of seedlings on the go. It's still not quite warm enough to plant seedlings out, I am hoping that end of October will be warm enough.

Every year I like to try a new plant - last year it was sweet potato. I didn't get much of a crop but I worked out where I need to plant them to get a better crop. I took some cuttings before the end of autumn so as soon as its warm enough I will be plant the cuttings out in the garden.

This year I am trying pepino melons and litchi tomatoes. They both are part of the tomato, potato and eggplant family. The pepino cuttings seem to be easy to strike. If they grow well and the fruit is worth eating I will take cuttings in autumn and keep them over winter.

Peony roses

Peonies are just gorgeous flowers. But they also require patience as they resent root disturbance and  being cut for sale is more than disturbance.

There doesn't seem to be a large variety of peonies available in Australia which is probably due to the expense and time needed to cultivate these beauties.

It's hard to know if the divisions sold are from mature plants or plants grown just for root divisions at the expense of flowers. If the information on the internet is to be believed than I will have to wait at least 3 years before I will see a flower!

I'm just excited that the shoots have started to emerge. Before I planted the peonies at the beginning of winter I put rabbit and horse manure in the soil with a sprinkle of dolomite. The top of the divisions were planted so they were 2 cm below the surface. I was happy they survived the hard frosts in winter, I read that they need cold winters but this year it got down to -6 on a number of occasions.

Now to see how they grow during the hot dry summer predicted.

Cardiocrinum giganteum - long wait for flowers

I've wanted to grow this for years. It's taken me years to get back into gardening and now that I have a couple large plots and I'm working on increasing soil fertility, I thought why not.

From the size of the bulb I would say that it might be 3 years old. Bulbs reach flowering size at 7 years so I have at least a 3 year wait if I am right about the age of this bulb.

The soil had rabbit and horse manure added over a month ago so it should be enough for this apparently greedy plant, more manure can be added at the end of summer if needed. I put a stake next to it so I know where it is after it dies back in winter.

I'm just wondering whether I should buy another one.

How many spring roll recipes can one have

In addition to stuffed chicken wings, I love a spring roll too. I keep coming up with new spring roll recipes. Last count I had 10 spring roll recipes;

• lobster
• crab and prawn
• prawn and pineapple
• poor man's lobster spring roll
• peking duck
• peking chicken
• chicken and pork
• chicken and pumpkin
• rice paper spring roll with bean shoot and wood ear fungus (rice paper when its fried is something else)
• vegan

I do need to start writing my recipes down. The more I come up with the harder it is to remember specific creations.

Great. Now I'm craving a spring roll.

Wings are my thing

I've probably deboned and stuffed about 30kg of chicken wings the past 6 weeks. It doesn't help that I keep coming up with recipes to try. That and I keep wanting to refine a recipe.

None of my taste testers are complaining though.

I've also managed to work out a deal - wings for cow poo for my garden. I have sources for regular free rabbit manure, horse manure and chicken manure. I couldn't say no to cow manure as well.