Ocean Organics NZ

01/07/2025

NICKI'S GUIDE IN THE GARDEN FOR JULY

Matariki is rising and with it comes the Māori New Year. It's not just a date on the calendar; it’s a moment we can pause, reflect, celebrate the present, and look forward to new beginnings. Think of it as nature’s reset button: a time to release what no longer serves you, before shifting into a new season of growth.

This time of the year is also about connection - spending time with whānau, sharing kai, planting trees, and making space for a fresh start, both spiritual and physical.

Within the Matariki cluster, two stars stand out for gardeners: Tupu-ā-nuku and Tupu-ā-rangi. The first looks after food that grows in the earth, our vegetable gardens. The second, food that comes from the sky, fruit from trees, berries, and birds. Traditionally the brightness of these stars signaled what sort of winter to expect: clear and bright stars promised a warm and abundant winter, while hazy stars warned of a bleak winter.

This season marks the beginning of the gardening year. Now’s your chance to look back on the successes of last year, what thrived and what didn't. Time to tweak the garden plan, shift things around and add infrastructure if it's required. Check your seed stash, plan what you want to grow next year and don’t forget to order new fruit trees!

At this time of the year there is no pressure to be in the garden, but if you feel like getting your hands in the soil, late-season veg like broccoli, bok choy, cauliflower, kale, kohlrabi, and cabbage can go in. These seedlings will need to be protected from slugs and snails with cloches, such as cut off soda bottles, and regular night raids with a head torch. Team that with pest deterrent companion planting - chives, rosemary, sage, thyme and lemon balm.

You can sow parsnips, radishes, celery, beetroot, globe artichokes, coriander, mizuna and rocket. Warmer zones (or greenhouse growers) can get in peas, snow peas, spinach, and lettuces. For colour, go wild with calendula, cornflowers, alyssum, violas, poppies, stock and snapdragons.

Plant crowns of rhubarb, asparagus, yacon, and Jerusalem artichokes, and divide up your strawberry runners. All of these will love a feed of liquid seaweed, compost or aged manure.

Get ready for kūmara season by sprouting your own tipu (shoots for planting). This can be done by placing a kūmara in half in a jar of water, or nestling it in damp sand. Once the sprouts are 20 - 30cm long, gently remove them from the kūmara and put them in a jar of water for a week or two for their roots to form.

Give some love to your perennials and shrubs. Deadhead flowers, cut back herbs to the base, and clear out spent veggie beds, but do leave roots in the soil to rot down and feed the micro-life. Leaf litter lying around? Shred it, compost it, or pile it up and let it rot into rich leaf mould for next season.

Rejuvenate tired garden beds with cover crops (like broad beans, oats, peas, lupins), compost, leaf mould, vermicast, or a good layer of well-rotted manure and Ocean Organics NZ full spectrum Soil+.

Fruit trees are top priority. July is when nurseries are sending out bare rooted fruit trees (the best way to order) - they will need to be planted immediately, staked, and mulched with woodchip. Prune existing trees, clear away any rotten fruit from underneath, and deal with fungal issues using a copper spray if you’ve had problems in previous seasons . Otherwise, stick to regular seaweed sprays and neem oil to fend off overwintering bugs (3 applications, spaced 7–10 days apart).

While you're at it, prune roses, hydrangeas, feijoas, and berries. Pruning is best done on a dry day in the week to 10 days following the full moon.

And when the work’s done? Grab a cuppa, curl up by the fire and contemplate what the next season will bring.

Mānawatia a Matariki
Nicki Murray-Orr Vital Harvest

16/06/2025

Apologies!
Our shop is closed today as our team are attending a Noho Marae to celebrate Matariki. ✨⭐️🌟💫

01/06/2025

NICKI'S GUIDE FOR JUNE IN THE GARDEN

June is the official start to Winter, Matariki is rising and solstice is just around the corner, it is a natural time to slow the pace in the garden. Here in Eastern Waikato, we’ve only had a light frost or two, and when the sun’s out, it’s Swanni off! We’re not quite into the coldest month yet, so if there are still projects to tick off, this is a great time to get them done. Take stock - what went well last season, and what could use a rethink? Sketch out your plans for any changes in the garden layout, make notes on which plants thrived or struggled, and consider relocating shrubs or trees while they’re dormant.

Clear out old crops by cutting them at the base - leave those roots in place to decompose and nourish your soil. Minimal soil disturbance helps keep your underground ecosystems healthy. Prune back spent crops, deadhead flowering plants and get those compost piles going.

To keep harvests ticking over, stagger your plantings. In June, you can still sow:
Veggies – broad beans, broccoli, cabbage, cauliflower, kale, red and white onions, spring onions, radishes, silverbeet, spinach, parsley, rosemary, sage, thyme and, in the greenhouse, beetroot, bok choi, celery, lettuce, coriander, mizuna and rocket.
Companion flowers – alyssum, borage, calendula, cornflowers, stock, violas, and poppies. These add colour to the winter garden and support pollinators too.

Young seedlings benefit from extra protection at this time of the year - frost cloth, cloches or the greenhouse. On deck containers can work well for winter growing. Birds, slugs, and snails are out in force now - DIY cloches made from soda bottles and bird-deterring sticks can help, and for snails, nighttime torch patrols are surprisingly effective.

Now’s a good time to plant asparagus and rhubarb crowns. With strawberries, you can multiply your plants by removing and planting the runners. Large, older mother plants can be split or replaced with fresh runners to keep your patch productive.

Garlic growers, if you haven’t already, get those cloves in now. Choose the biggest cloves, plant in loose, well-drained, compost-rich soil, and mulch generously - garlic doesn’t like to compete with weeds. Feed regularly to support strong bulb formation. I’m experimenting with the less rust-prone Elephant garlic this year - whether it meets my culinary needs is yet to be determined.

Not growing edibles right now? Sow cover crops like mustard, peas, oats, lupins, or broad beans to enriched your soils. Cover crops suppress weeds, improve soil structure, and maintain microbial life. Legumes also fix nitrogen at their roots, benefiting your next crop. Planting broad beans or lupins in the beds where my tomatoes will go in spring is my go-to cover crop strategy.

June is perfect for planting deciduous fruit trees. Support them with stakes, mulch well with woodchip, and feed with compost. Pick up and compost any fallen or rotting fruit to prevent disease. When pruning, start by removing damaged or diseased wood, then shape the tree to open it up to light. Sterilise your tools after each tree to prevent the spread of disease. Only use copper sprays if you see signs of fungal issues; otherwise, maintain tree health with regular mulching and seaweed foliar sprays.

Seed catalogues are my winter gardening fix when all else is said and done.

If you need help with your garden, orchard design, pruning fruit trees, or any landscaping questions, jump onto my website for a free 15-minute consult or message me. I’m happy to help.

Nicki Murray-Orr – Vital Harvest

01/05/2025

📝 Sign the petition to stop the increase of glyphosate levels in New Zealand food!

📅 Deadline to sign: May 22, 2025

🔗 Sign the petition here: https://petitions.parliament.nz/66da9603-f385-44ff-abda-08dd8139b86b

New Zealand Food Safety is proposing to dramatically raise the legal limits of glyphosate residues in the food we eat.

Right now, the limit is 0.1 mg/kg for wheat, oats, and barley.

They want to increase it to 10 mg/kg - and to 6 mg/kg in dry peas.

Why? Because residue levels are already exceeding the current limits. Instead of reducing use, the proposal is to simply change the rules.

Glyphosate is the main ingredient in Roundup, one of the most commonly used herbicides in the world. It’s absorbed by crops, stays in the food chain, and ends up in our bodies.

In 2015, the World Health Organization’s International Agency for Research on Cancer classified glyphosate as a probable human carcinogen.

A growing body of independent research links glyphosate exposure to:

- Certain cancers, including non-Hodgkin lymphoma
- Hormone disruption
- Neurological effects
- Gut microbiome damage
- Liver and kidney dysfunction
- Fertility concerns

Glyphosate has been found in urine, breast milk, placentas, and umbilical cords, showing how deeply it’s embedded in our environment.

We are being exposed through supermarket bread, grain-fed meat and dairy, public parks, gardens, and the air around sprayed fields. Every exposure adds up.

This isn’t just a human health issue. Glyphosate harms soil microbiology, weakens crop health, and contributes to nutrient decline. It affects pollinators, beneficial microbes, and long-term food resilience.

Over 30 countries and regions - including Mexico, Luxembourg, Austria, and parts of Germany, France, and the United States - have already banned or restricted glyphosate use. Meanwhile, New Zealand is considering loosening its limits.

We should not be raising the legal threshold of a chemical we don’t fully understand. Not while studies keep emerging. Not when there’s so much at stake.

📢 Take action:
🖊️ Sign the official petition to Parliament: https://petitions.parliament.nz/66da9603-f385-44ff-abda-08dd8139b86b

📬 Make a submission to NZ Food Safety: https://www.mpi.govt.nz/consultations/proposals-to-amend-the-new-zealand-food-notice-maximum-residue-levels-for-agricultural-compounds/

📄 Prefer a paper version of the petition? DM me and I’ll email you one. Just make sure to print, sign, and return it to me by post so it can be presented to parliament.

This affects every one of us who eats, grows food, or cares about our whenua.

Please sign and share. It matters more than most people realise.

- Copied from Jade

Edit: don’t stress if the Signed number doesn’t go up after you sign, I’ve been assured that the website will refresh the count every few hours, it’s just checking that there are no double ups. Thanks team!

About this consultation and the notice This consultation covers the next round of proposed changes to the Maximum Residue Levels (MRLs) for Agricultural Compounds Food Notice. The notice: establishes MRLs for agricultural chemicals and veterinary medicines (Schedule 1) to manage residues that may oc...

01/05/2025

NICKI'S GUIDE IN THE GARDEN FOR MAY

Summer ended with a bang in the Waikato! Extremely dry conditions were finally alleviated by an ex-tropical cyclone, much to everyone's relief, but a fortnight later, it's still raining! The tanks are full, the ponds are refreshed, and the pastures are green, so a bit of sunshine would be nice now... Fluctuating extremes - that’s autumn for you.

This sudden shift in growing conditions is a great reminder of why it’s important to get a couple of months' growth into winter vegetables before sunshine hours and temperatures really drop. Hopefully, you’ve already planted most of your brassicas - broccoli, cauliflower, kale, and cabbages - because any new plantings from now on likely won’t be ready until spring. That said, don’t let that stop you from popping a few more in, especially if you’ve got a cloche or a greenhouse. Plants will take off as soon as warmer weather arrives. I also hope your potatoes, pumpkins, and kūmara are tucked away somewhere dry and rodent-proof by now - because the rats have discovered my Jerusalem artichokes!

After a long summer of heavy-feeding crops, your soil will be in need of a boost. My method is no-dig: I cut spent crops off at ground level, sprinkle on some Ocean Organics Soil+ or Combo, add a couple of cms of homemade compost, and finish with a blanket of mulch before planting new seedlings. I have a “no bare soil” policy, so where I’m not planting seedlings and mulching, I’m sowing a cover (or “green manure”) crop like lupins, broad beans or mustard. These will add nutrients, suppress weeds, and improve soil structure. Cover crops are a stress-free way to rest your garden over winter.

What to plant now:
You can still direct sow broad beans, peas, shallots, onions, coriander, mizuna, rocket, parsley, and radishes. Seedlings of silverbeet, beetroot, fennel, spinach, celery, bok choy, and lettuce can also go in this month. Choose specific cool season lettuce varieties like Oakleaf and Merveille des Quatre Saisons ('Marvel of Four Seasons'), available from Kings Seeds. Red leaf lettuces generally cope better with cooler temps and low light - perfect for winter salads, along with mesclun winter greens. Now’s also the ideal time to divide and plant strawberries. And don’t forget to feed everything regularly with an Ocean Organics NZ liquid seaweed - strong, vital plants are more resilient to pests and disease.

Garlic planting season is upon us! After being dealt a rough hand with rust the last few seasons, I’m opting for Elephant Garlic this year. It’s not technically garlic (it’s in the leek family) and is therefore less susceptible to rust. I’ll stagger my plantings across April, May, and June to see what suits my often humid, wet climate best. While the traditional time to plant garlic in NZ is on the shortest day (and harvest on the longest), it can actually be planted anytime from April through to the end of July.

Don't forget winter colour - now’s the time to sow or plant winter flowers like poppies, alyssum, calendula, cornflowers, stock, and sweet peas. It’s also your last chance to get spring bulbs into the ground before the soil gets too cold.

Tips & tasks:
Deter hungry birds from disturbing new seedlings by building a teepee of sticks over your plantings. Plastic soda-bottle cloches and a bit of 'digit control' (aka night missions with a head torch!) will help keep slugs and snails in check.

Clean and sharpen your secateurs and loppers - fruit tree pruning can happen once trees have finished fruiting. Prune grapes, roses and berries. The next couple of months are perfect for planting deciduous fruit trees, shelter trees, moving shrubs, and dividing perennials. Check fruit trees for stakes that are rubbing or ties that need replacing. As leaves fall, support tree health with an Ocean Organics NZ Liquid Foliar Concentrate spray.

And finally - collect as MUCH leaf litter as you can. It’s fantastic for adding to compost, using as mulch (especially if you run over it with the lawn mower), or making leaf mould, an excellent soil conditioner. If you do nothing else, your future self will thank you for collecting the leaf litter before it all blows away.

Happy gleaning!
Nicki Murray-Orr
Vital Harvest

01/04/2025

NICKI'S GUIDE IN THE GARDEN FOR APRIL

It's the Summer that keeps on giving.. well in the Waikato anyway. It has been amazing for beach goers, but has us farmers and lifestyle block owners a little on edge re the water status, we are in desperate need of rain! Whether you are copping winds, storms or lack of rain, the mornings are getting crisp and growth is definitely starting to slow in the garden. There are however a few jobs we still need to tend to before we can slow down as well.. specifically harvesting the crops we want to store (pumpkins, kumara, potatoes, apples..), saving seed, planting out winter seedlings and making compost.

Don't race to rip spent Summer crops out of the ground, as they can be quite useful protecting the next round of tender young seedlings. Simply make a little space by cutting a few off at ground level, dollop on a fresh layer of compost and a sprinkle of Ocean Organics NZ Soil+ fertiliser and plant your seedlings. As these plants grow to fill the space, the older crops can be removed by cutting them off at ground level. Spent crops will make fantastic compost and if all things align, you will have been able to save seed from the old crops too!

Autumn is an excellent month of seed saving if you have the room to allow a few of your best varieties to fully complete their life cycle (NB these will need to be heirloom or open pollinated varieties, not hybrid, which have F1 or F2 on the seed packet, as these will not grow true to type). When the seed heads of flowers or lettuces for example have dried, shake them into a paper bag. Scoop out the seeds from your best pumpkins and tomatoes, rinse off the flesh and leave to dry on a paper towel. Leave the last few beans on the vines until they dry and rattle. Store all fully dried seed in a cool, dark and vermin proof spot. Seeds evolve very quickly and every year that we save seed from crops that thrive in our backyards, the better they will be suited to our soil type and environmental conditions.

Harvest potatoes, squash, kumara and pumpkin (once the pigtail just above the latter has shriveled and dried) and ideally on a ¾ moon, the week after the full moon, for optimal storage. Cut off and plant out strawberry runners in soil that has been well fed with compost or aged manure. Let your asparagus go to seed and cut it back to use as mulch once it starts to die back, then feed with seaweed or compost. Keep picking leafy greens to ensure they continue to replenish.

Direct sow carrots, radishes, daikon, turnip, broad beans, parsnip, parsley, rocket, coriander, mizuna and peas. Sowing peas and sweet peas into toilet rolls, to then plant out, roll and all, when the seedlings are about 10 cm high, this is a great way to prevent losing a few to hungry birds. Garlic can go in this month if you are looking to get a jump on growth in rust prone regions.

Plant out broccoli, beetroot, bok choy, celery, cauliflower, cabbage, chard, kale, kohlrabi, fennel, globe artichokes, leeks, lettuce (those that prefer cooler temps such as buttercrunch, canasta and drunken woman), onion, silverbeet, spring onions and potatoes (in frost free zones). Ensure you harden off indoor grown seedlings, this includes those bought from garden centres, by placing them outside for 4-7 days before planting out in the garden.

Keep all Brassica seedlings netted while the white caterpillar butterflies are about. The first frost should deal with these pesky critters. Slugs and snails will also be venturing out, so remain proactive with your night raids. Cutting the bottoms off soda bottles and placing over precious new seedlings makes a mini glasshouse and can deter snails, although it's not foolproof. Directly sown seed will also need to be protected with netting until they get established. Brassicas and leafy greens will appreciate regular liquid feeds for another month or two.

Flowers to plant include calendula, cornflower, dianthus, larkspur, poppy, sweet peas, stock, borage and spring bulbs.

Cover crops, such as mustard, buckwheat, broad beans, phacelia or a mix of peas, oats and lupins, are a great way to fill in gaps in a winter garden and to rest and replenish tired beds.

Prune stone fruit (peaches, nectarines and plums) and copper spray if required. Pip fruit will be pruned later in the winter and citrus in the Spring. This is the best time to feed and mulch citrus. Plant natives, ornamentals, citrus, feijoas and blueberries, divide perennials and move shrubs or small trees if you need to. Order bare rooted fruit trees from a nursery now for a June/July delivery.

Happy gardening,
Nicki
Vital Harvest

01/03/2025

NICKI'S GUIDE IN THE GARDEN FOR MARCH

As we head into Autumn, it’s time to get moving in the garden if we want to enjoy fresh, homegrown veggies all winter. Seedlings need a couple of months of growth before temperatures drop if we’re to harvest from them throughout the winter. Planting key crops like broccoli, kale, and cabbage every month from now until May will ensure a steady stream of harvests. Protect those precious young plants from cabbage white butterflies with some netting - once the first frost hits, you can remove it. Autumn is also the perfect time for planting fruit trees, dividing perennials, and moving things around if needed.

Sow carrots, beetroot, kohlrabi, and parsnips, if we get a bit of moisture (fingers crossed!), they’ll germinate easily. Once established, they’ll be happy to sit in the garden all winter. You can also sow radishes, leeks, onions, and greens like bok choy, spring onions, fennel, parsley, mizuna, rocket, coriander, spinach, lettuce, and celery. Companion flowers like calendula, chamomile, larkspur, cornflower, snapdragons, nigella, borage, and spring bulbs are also great to plant for the bees.

Enrich your soil with compost or well-rotted manure and continue to mulch to prevent soil compaction from heavy rains. Alternatively, give your soil a boost with cover crops like broad beans, buckwheat, lupins, or mustard. The key to healthy soil is avoiding bare patches, so even an old sack or some carpet can help protect and keep the soil biology thriving until you’re ready to replant.

Plant rhubarb and asparagus crowns, and divide your strawberry plants by separating the runners from the main plant (the mother). If the mother plants are getting tired, replace them with fresh runners. Lift kumara vines to prevent them from re-rooting and keep their energy directed into tuber production. Pinch out the tips of pumpkins to stop further vine growth and help the pumpkins fatten up.

Traditionally, garlic is planted on the shortest day of the year and harvested on the longest, but in wet and humid climates like Waihi, it’s worth planting it a little earlier to avoid rust. Rust tends to show up late in the season, so planting early gives your garlic a better chance to grow before it arrives. If rust does strike, your garlic is still edible, but it may affect bulb development and might not store as well. Make sure to plant it in rich, composted soil with plenty of space between the plants. Mulch heavily to keep weeds at bay, and apply liquid foliar feeds every two weeks during the first few months.

In the orchard, prune your stone fruit as soon as the fruiting is done, and wait until later in winter to prune your pip fruit. It’s best to avoid pruning citrus at this time of year, as the native lemon tree borer may lay eggs in any fresh cuts. Spring is the best time to prune citrus, but if you must prune now due to damage, make sure to use pruning paste to seal the cuts. This is also a perfect time for planting citrus of all kinds and ordering bare-rooted fruit trees from nurseries for a June/July delivery.

Now is an excellent time to make compost with all of those Summer crops coming out of the garden. As the leaves start to fall, rake them up for your compost heap or store them for a year or more to make leaf mould, a super nutritious, carbon-rich soil amendment. Pop them in rubbish bags with a few holes poked in the bottom or wrap them in a circle of chicken wire, with a sack over the top to keep them in place, and they’ll break down into leaf mould without you having to do anything other than keep them moist.

Each year, we save seed from crops that do well in our gardens, so they become better suited to our soil and environment. Let a few plants complete their life cycle and go to seed. Beans, lettuce, tomatoes, pumpkins, and flowers are perfect starting points.

My next Workshop – Edible Gardening on the Home Block 22nd March. Message me or head to the Vital Harvest website to register.

Happy growing,
Nicki Murray-Orr, Vital Harvest

01/02/2025

It's all go on the harvesting front right now - tomatoes, zucchini, beans, cucumbers, corn, onions, leafy greens, potatoes, stone fruit… sometimes it’s hard to keep up! My peaches are absolutely perfect, today! Is everyone preserving and sharing the bounty with neighbours, community fruit and veg stands, or at swap crop meets? The garden is incredibly abundant right now, and as crazy as it sounds, it’s time to start thinking about what we want to grow and eat in the winter months.

February is the month to get the first of the brassicas (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kale, Brussels sprouts) in the ground. Continue planting a few of each variety every month from now through May to ensure steady harvests all winter long. While the white cabbage butterfly is still around (usually until the first frost arrives), netting your brassicas is a healthier prevention method than using derris dust (Google it if you're brave enough!).

As we head into the most prolific week for sowing and planting, according to the lunar calendar (1st - 10th Feb), consider planting coriander, rocket, parsley, spring onions, leeks, dwarf beans, lettuce, bok choy, celery, fennel, spinach, silverbeet, and chard. From the 18th onwards, root crops like carrots, parsnips, kohlrabi, daikon, radish, and beetroot can be sown. Plant flowers such as anise hyssop, borage, calendula, chamomile, cornflowers, dianthus, larkspur, nigella (love-in-a-mist), and snapdragons.

Stone fruit can be pruned after harvesting, which helps to avoid silverleaf, a fungal disease that particularly affects stone fruit. Summer pruning is also an effective way to bring overly large trees back into check.

If your tomato plants are getting too tall and hard to manage, pinch back the tops so they focus their energy on ripening fruit instead of growing taller. Trim back some of the excess leaves to allow sunlight to reach the fruit, and continue feeding with liquid seaweed. Cucumbers, zucchini, and pumpkins are particularly prone to powdery mildew at this time of year. Remove any affected leaves right away and keep up with the liquid feeds.

As your crops start winding down, cut them off at the base, leaving the roots in the soil to decompose and nourish the next round of plants. This creates less disturbance, adds valuable organic matter, and saves you time. Afterward, you can plant quick-growing crops like mizuna, cress, lettuce, rocket, or radishes. Alternatively, try a cover crop like lupin, buckwheat, or phacelia to prepare the soil for winter brassicas or garlic. Mustard is a great soil fumigant, especially after tomatoes, but since it’s a brassica, avoid planting it where you’ll be putting in broccoli or cauliflower. Broad beans, which I particularly love for a winter cover crop, are best planted in March.

Collect flower seeds from those that are drying, such as cornflowers, sunflowers, poppies, scabiosa, nigella, and calendula. Herbs like coriander, dill, fennel, and parsley are perfect for letting go to seed, which you can toss back into the garden (but be careful with parsley unless you want a carpet of it!). For vegetables, you can save seeds from lettuce, beans, carrots, and spinach. You'll need a bit of space for intentional seed saving—clear out any plants you don’t want to save and let the best of them fully mature. Block planting helps with this, as more plants lead to more genetic diversity. I usually let my favorite lettuces naturally drop their seeds and create new seedlings, which I then dig up and replant in fresh beds (aka my lazy seed sowing styles). For capsicum and tomato seeds, scoop them out onto a paper towel to dry. For tomatoes, an effective seed saving method is to swish the seeds in water for a couple of days before drying them on paper towels. Let beans stay on the vine to dry until they rattle, and shake other types of seeds into a paper bag once they’re dry. Be sure you're saving only heirloom or open-pollinated varieties, to ensure they grow 'true to type', and label everything- trust me, you think you’ll remember, but you won’t! :)

Happy growing,
Nicki
Vital Harvest

01/01/2025

NICKI'S GUIDE FOR JANUARY IN THE GARDEN

Happy 2025! January is an abundant month in the garden, but the heat can be demanding. Keep your plants thriving with regular liquid seaweed feeds, mulch and mindful watering practices. Aim for a deep drink every few days, ideally early morning, rather than a daily sprinkle. For established crops, simply check the soil with your finger and water only when it feels dry.

Minimise bare soil to conserve moisture and keep weeds in check. Fill any gaps by mulching, planting crops in dense blocks or adding fast-growing plants around slower growers. Maintaining a “living mulch” helps nurture vital underground microbiology.

Essential tasks this month include pruning your tomato plants by removing the lower leaves up to the first fruit set. This promotes airflow and reduces the risk of disease. Continue harvesting vegetables regularly to encourage more growth. Harvest garlic, onions, and shallots once the leaves begin to brown and set aside the best garlic bulbs for next season’s planting. If you haven't saved your own, now is the time to secure garlic seed for the April/May planting window. Feed and mulch citrus trees, collect drying flower seeds, and refresh the soil with compost or well-rotted manure. Be sure to stake your dahlias and sunflowers for support.

Things to sow and plant include coriander and rocket (in the shade), chamomile, chives, parsley, radish, basil, dwarf beans, beetroot, celery, leeks, silverbeet, spinach, spring onions, and heat-tolerant lettuce varieties like Drunken Woman, Little Gem, Buttercrunch, or Canasta. If you're in a warmer region, you can still plant a few climbing beans, cucumbers, and zucchinis. Flowers to sow include alyssum, borage, calendula, cosmos, cornflower, marigold, lavender, sunflowers, and zinnia. Consider cover crops like lupins (great before winter brassicas), buckwheat, and mustard (ideal for cleansing soil after growing potatoes, garlic, or tomatoes).

Pest control is crucial this month. As the heat and lack of airflow stress plants, pests can become a problem. Squish any you spot immediately, blast hose aphids, or add Neem Oil to your seaweed feed. “Catch crops” like nasturtium draw pests away, but be sure to inspect them regularly.

Smart irrigation is key to both water conservation and healthy plant growth. When plants search for water, they grow deeper, stronger roots. Deep watering every few days encourages this. Early morning is the best time to water. If that’s not possible, avoid midday watering and instead hydrate wilting plants in the evening, making sure to allow a few hours before sunset for water to dry on leaves. For new seedlings, water daily. For more established crops, stick to the moisture test.. water only if the soil feels dry.

Keep an eye on the worm farm and compost. Both worms and microorganisms need a moist environment to stay active. The worm farm may need to be moved to a shadier spot and the compost may require a regular bucket of water. Turning your compost will help everything break down at a similar rate.

If you’re like me, you’ll be watching your fruit ripening like a hawk (hopefully getting to it before the other birds do!). Nets may be necessary and a little judicious thinning can encourage larger fruits and prevent bruising or the spread of disease. Once stone fruit has been harvested, the trees can be pruned.

Wishing you all a healthy and abundant 2024.
Nicki – Vital Harvest