WHAT TO DO IN THE GARDEN THIS WEEK

My grandfather was a restless soul. A drover most of his life, he barely settled as a vegetable gardener in retirement years, travelling around the country working market gardens and orchards as the season dictated. I know this secondhand from my mother, having only met my grandfather a few times, each of those in my mother’s vegetable garden. Which is why I found it unusual for him to tell me that sometimes the best thing to do in the garden is to let it rest. Be still, he would say, and let the garden do its thing.

To be specific, he would suggest leaving vegetables in the garden to self-seed and regerminate. So this week I’m going to leave some of my coriander, rocket, basil, parsley and carrots to flower and set seed. It’s an experiment for me to see how many new plants I can get and how much I may have to thin them out later. I’ve already experienced the joy of self-seeding tomatillos.

Another idea he promoted was leaving “sacrificial plants” to manage slugs and snails. This is an idea also suggested to me by NZ Gardener deputy editor Mei Leng Wong.

I’m leaving some of my bigger, older lettuces that are already being targeted by snails and slugs, in particular near the garage and old wood fence where they seem to hide at night. You can either go out at night and pick the slugs and snails off or simply pull the plant out of the ground snails intact and throw in the bin (or compost if it is far enough away from the garden).

Wellington market gardener and

Kaicycle Urban farm manager Thomas Zahner is also a big believer in “sacrificial plants”. He plants flowers that attract beneficial insects to help control pests and for pollination.

“We’ve just planted a whole lot of cosmos, asters and cornflowers for pollination and calendula, marigolds and nasturtium to attract beneficial insects, all the classics.” These can go at the end of vegetable rows or be interplanted.

“Nasturtiums can act as a kind of trap plant, and with our tomatoes we’ve got those interplanted with alyssum, marigolds and calendula.”

Zahner says the cold and windy Wellington weather limits what can be direct sown – even in summer.

Kaicycle is located in Newtown where the prevailing winds are southerly and north-westerly “We get slammed by both of those and there’s not really a lot we can do about it like a lot of Wellington gardens,” he says.

“We propagate all our own seedlings in a tunnel house because of the cold and the wind. It’s just way faster. Mainly the only thing we’re sowing into the ground is the carrots and radishes, obviously because carrots don’t like being transplanted and radishes grow pretty well.”

Seedlings they’re planting at the moment include beetroot, spring onions and turnips. “We don’t really stop planting that stuff, and we’ve been planting a bit of silverbeet lately as well.

“But the main summer crops like tomatoes, cucumbers and zucchini are pretty much finished, we’ve finished the successions for those, so we won’t be planting any more, same with chillies as well. It’s a bit late now to start them.

“We’re still putting some beans in, but it’s getting pretty late for that as well I think. Lots of lettuces are going in, some basil we’re still planting.”

It’s been a good summer for the farm. “We’ve had quite a bit of sun and we’ve had a bit of rain which is good, so things aren’t too dry. And we don’t get the humidity like they do up north where it’s really sticky, so we missed out on things like powdery mildew.”

It’s a really abundant time of year for the farm. Lots of tomatoes, zucchinis, cucumbers and all those summer vegetables are ready.

“We’ve got some kamokamo coming on now. Lots of greens like silverbeet, chard, herbs like parsley, and sorrel, sprouting broccoli are coming on as well, the summer ones. The cabbages should be ready soon; we’re a real shady property so they take forever to grow.

“We’re harvesting kale and beetroot and cabbages, carrots and onions, spring onions and beans as well. We’ve been succession planting, but it’s getting towards the growing end of summer.”

“We’re starting to think more about the autumn winter crops like those brassicas, cabbages and brussels sprouts and broccolis.

“We haven’t planted out any winter crops into the garden yet, in the māra, but we’re starting brassicas, started cabbages and brussels sprouts and some sprouting broccoli as well in the tunnel house. These will go out this month and into March.”

Gardeners in warmer areas probably have another month up their sleeve before they think about prepping winter vege.

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