a) digging up the grass seems like a lot of hard work ;-)
b) the two boys across the road use our front lawn to play kick-ball across the laneway from their yard to ours (and I like that they are outside in the fresh air instead of inside playing computer games); and
c) the boys' bratty mates from down the road are the type that would trample over any newly established garden beds and pick any obvious fruit or veg and throw it around, just for something to do.
However, I've been musing a lot about how to best utilise our small yard since harvesting the yacon recently, and I decided that out the front really is the best place for both the yacon and the sweet potato patch (where I can make it permanent without monopolising half of my tiny vegie patch). Both the yacon and sweet potato are attractive, robust plants, without being "obvious" vegetables that might be tempting to the bratty local teenagers. They are also long harvest plants that require a bit of time and space, but are excellent at crowding out weeds (the sweet potato being a groundcover, and the yacon casts dense shade underneath it). The thought of digging up all that grass was still a bit daunting though.
And then my Pygmy Date Palm fell over.
Beside our driveway we have a small garden bed behind a retaining wall, that contains hardy succulents and the pygmy date palm, as you can see in the photo above. I hadn't really given it any thought until the palm fell over last week; upon inspection the roots have rotted away and it is badly infested with sooty mould and scale. It's too far beyond saving.
Which got me thinking.
Don't you think this area would look nice with tall, fluffy yacon leaves at the back and sweet potato growing along the ground all around it?
The only fault is that is located a long distance from any water source (hence the use of succulents in that bed), but I'm thinking that a Wetpot or Wise Wally type of irrigation system would overcome that difficulty.
Now, don't tell DH yet, because he's going to have to dig out all those yuccas and agaves! Shhhhhh.
6 comments:
sounds really good!
Have you ever seen the Gardening Australia Permaculture DVD presented by Josh Byrne ? It shows a great use of the front yard for food crops.It is in our local library. I have often considered it because the front of our place has great sun compared to the back. I'd be interested to know how you go.
PS - thanks for visiting my site after my long break. I am often looking at your great site as a point of reference. Being only two hours up the road from you, I am very interested in your plant choices. It is VERY motivational.
Cheers,
Michelle ( BusyWoman)
Great idea! I am looking forward to the 'after' photos!
Perfect place to use wicking worm beds to grow all those things, you need only water about once a week peak summer, dropping a hose into the pipe.
If you haven't seen them before you can check them out on my blog under the label WATER, about second post down.
Blessings:)
It would work well, just make sure you mix in a few bucket loads of pre-soaked water crystals and fertiliser.
More people are going to have to start thinking laterally, like you, to cope coz it aint going to get any better :(
Hi Michelle (hey, you've got real name now ;-),
I love Josh Byrne's stuff, so inspirational. I'll definitely be recording how we go out the front. And thanks for your kind words :-) Are you on the coast or inland from me? Your plant choices would make a difference if you get frosts? Looking forward to following your new journey at home :-)
Hi Suz, I'm looking forward to the "after" shots as well, as I'm not real keen on all that digging, LOL.
Oooh, sensational idea Molly, I've been looking at the wicking beds on Scarecrow's site for a while, and if I am digging the whole bed up I could certainly incorporate something along those lines there. Thanks!
Hi Jayne,
Thanks, I'll definitely be digging in both of those as our usual summers around here are hot and relatively dry (last year was an exception, but I feel that the El Nino is about to kick back in?).
Cheers, Julie
Ah, wet pots. I didn't know the name of them - but I watched a permaculture DVD last year that had people in India using them on their roof-top gardens. Looked very cool.
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