Early birds catch the redcurrants

The birds in my garden are getting quicker at taking the unripe redcurrants from the many bushes I have growing here. It used to be that we shared, and the blackbirds and kereru¯ didn’t help themselves until the fruits at least had some colour to them, but now the birds start almost as soon as the fruits are formed and must pucker up when they eat them because they certainly aren’t ripe! I’ll have to apply netting or there’ll be nothing for us. Growing the redcurrants together in a block would make netting them easier, but they’re scattered throughout the garden, making it difficult to protect them from the marauding avians. It improves the amount of fruit set as well, but that’s the least of my problems; it’s keeping the fruit on the bushes that’s challenging me right now. Cats are hopeless, as are mechanical bird-scarers. As a keen but not especially talented photographer of plants, I’m very aware that there are times when leaves, fruits and flowers look better than other times. After a light rain and while everything is still, every part of the plant you might like to capture as an image will be brushed with droplets of water, and those sparking gems can add so much to a photograph. A heavy dew produces the same result but be quick to capture the moment, as the hot sun, upon arrival, will dry that dew up quickly. All sorts of plants in your garden take on a mystical, mythical hue when dewy or sprinkled with raindrops.

Despite the challenge of growing corn in the south, I’m growing a range of corn this year. That’s largely due to the availability of the unusual seeds we’ve been blessed with in the form of beans, pumpkins and corn that came from the marvellous seed saver from the north, Mark Christensen, of Heritage Food Crops Research Trust in Whanganui. Those seeds have created a huge amount of interest with growers who come into the environment centre in Riverton. My ears pricked up at talk of corn seed from around the world, and I chose three that intrigued me: ‘Blue Hopi’, ‘Black Andean’ and ‘Painted Mountain’, all of which I’ve sown and grown to the size that they’re ready to go outside and face the southern conditions. So far they look happy and certainly quite different from each other. The black-kernelled corn is fast growing, its leaves dark in colour and robust in form, whereas ‘Blue Hopi’ looks shrubby rather than statuesque. With a bit of luck, I’ll have lots of corn seed to try again next year, and perhaps some to eat.

That’s what home brewers of beer do when they’re thinking ahead to the warm days of summer, and that’s what I did, only my brew’s not for drinking. My brew consists of sheep manure and molasses and I’ve no plan at all to drink it! The plants in my nursery will though and that’ll put some colour in their cheeks! I’ve always made brews of some sort with which I can feed my plants – barrels of comfrey leaves or seaweed left for months to turn to soup, stinky and dark. Usually I do nothing more than give the brew an occasional stir with a stick, bringing the heavier material to the surface where it releases its pongy, anaerobic gasses into the air. This time I’ve aerated the mix with pelletised sheep manure and water squirted through the hose, my thumb pressed tightly on the end to produce a blast that fizzed the contents of the barrel up to a froth. By forcing air into the brew in this way, I’ve changed the way the brew behaves, frightening off the anaerobic bacteria that make the stink so often associated with homemade liquid fertilisers, and encouraging the aerobic microbes that make sweeter smells. I added about a cup of molasses to feed the little organisms that I hope will flourish in the conditions. The process only took a couple of days, as opposed to the several months required by the other method, and I will start using it today, when the numbers of beneficial bacteria in the brew should be at their highest and the fragrance its best. My plan is to use the liquid on the plants in my nursery. I’ll test it on a selection first, in order to give them a boost towards Christmas, as some of them are tagged as gifts for family and friends and I want the plants looking healthy on the day. Tomatoes and poroporo are very similar plants, at least in their This column is adapted from the weekly e-zine, get growing, from New Zealand Gardener magazine. For gardening advice delivered to your inbox every Friday, sign up for Get Growing at: getgrowing.co.nz

early days, and both can be grown easily from seed. Why grow poroporo, even if it is a breeze? Although its fruits can’t match the tomato in taste or popularity, poroporo is pretty, with yellowanthered, purple flowers and darkyellow or orange fruits that look like miniature tamarillos, another member of the family. Poroporo has attractive hand-shaped leaves and grows as large as you want it to, being vigorous but pruneable.

It looks especially good in a forest garden and is adored by the bellbirds and wax-eyes, which feast up large on the sweet fruits – poisonous fruits, people commonly say, but it’s not true at all. I sow poroporo seed in trays and prick them out into small pots when they have their first true leaves, then care for them in the same way as I do my tomatoes except they sit outside, not in the tunnelhouse, being more robust than their South American cousins. Eventually, I plant them throughout my garden and enjoy the speed with which they grow. They look lush and behave as though they are growing in a jungle.