The ‘Gundaroo Tiller’ is an Australian adaptation the traditional European broadfork, and an essential tool for our small market garden. It may look like just a big clunky fork-thing, but it is actually a finely tuned instrument of permaculture soil conditioning goodness. Truly. Famously, when Allan Yeomans‘ saw his first Gundaroo Tiller, he called it…
Recently Harris (who heads the Forest Garden projects at Milkwood), has been in Chile teaching, designing and implementing forest garden systems. We thought you’d like to take a peek at some Chilean permaculture action? Given our Gondwana connection, there are many correlations between Chile and Australia in terms of plant species (similar nitrogen fixers, for…
We love growing coriander for its many benefits and its flavor, but in our climate it just bolts so quickly, it’s a blink-and-you’ll miss it affair. Fortunately the fabulous Meg McGowan showed up at last weekend’s Aquaponics Workshop with a simple, doable solution to breeding slow to bolt coriander for any climate…
In just over a month we’ll be hosting an Intro to Organic Market Gardening course smack-bang in the middle of the Milkwood market garden. This will be 2 hands-on days of crop planning, garden design and as much planting, growing and harvesting knowledge as we can squeeze in. This course is designed for people interested…
This winter I was determined, nay, rabid, about finally purchasing all the apple trees we would need to have a steady supply of appley goodness in 4 years time at Milkwood Farm. We’ll have heaps of time to plant them all out to their vaguely appointed destinations before bud-burst, I thought. However, what with moving…
Anyone wanting to grow a wall of summer (literally) should try scarlet runner beans. Just thinking about them makes me smile. They are incredibly enthusiastic climbers and grow up, up, up, blooming bright red flowers ever which way. Then they bear heavily, with bean pods you can eat whole when young (green bean pods with…
This spring we’re extending the market garden, and that means more rabbit-proof fencing, and more ‘breaking ground’. In permaculture, we try not to break (both literally and figuratively) ground wherever possible, but one exception to that rule is when cultivating annual vegetables en-masse. Before we started this market garden, I thought that maybe we could…
What can I say. It took over 5 years to build, but we’re finally in. I am so happy that the thrown-together interior decor, yes even that lampshade, doesn’t bother me in the slightest. Would we do it all again? Heck no. Was it all worth it? You know what, I’m going to surprise myself…
Next round of Milkwood Market Garden internship apps close August 30th! Please help us spread the word! Or jump straight to it and >> apply here <<
The lovable loo humanure toilet was designed by Joseph Jenkins. This design is, for my money, simply the best domestic-scale compost toilet ever. It’s so, so simple. It’s easy to build and easy to maintain, results in awesome compost, and means that we don’t have to poo in drinking water. What’s not to love? It’s…
A weed may be defined as ‘a plant out of place’. And one persons’ unwanted plant may be another’s medicine, food, soil builder or erosion controller. Recently Sydney artist Diego Bonetto has been working on wild weed paper: hand-made paper embedded with hand-harvested weed seeds of many and varied species found in the Sydney basin…
If you are a pak-choi seedling and you live at our farm, you face certain challenges in life. Even before you get planted in the garden and battle the delights of our climate, things are risky. Especially in early spring, when Mumma rats are hungry, and there is little lush greenery about. As a luscious…
Thought you might like to see a great way to grow mushrooms outdoors if you have a shady place that gets watered regularly… This technique also works indoors, but the laundry basket is usually bagged or boxed until the straw is completely colonised with mycelium. This technique has both upsides and downsides, but most importantly,…