Number one is Corn. This year was my 3rd year growing corn and it’s the best one yet. I put down about 10cm of mushroom compost on the bare soil back in about June 2022. I covered this over with a silage tarp for winter and didn’t remove this till November when I was ready to plant my corn. The worms had done an amazing job of taking the compost down into the soil and I believe this was one of the reasons why my corn was much more successful this year even though I never watered it after the first week of planting. Today I harvested the remainder of the corn and even with it being much more successful I discovered that I need to plant in smaller blocks. The middle plants didn’t get enough moisture or sun and did not produce any ears. I will be planting my corn in 1m2 blocks so they all get enough water and light. It will also make it easier to top the plants up with compost if needed. I still ended up with the best harvest of corn yet even though the were a few negatives still in there. Corn also gives me heaps of organic matter to help build up the soil over winter. I have chopped this down, laid it over 6 beds and added SFF compost on top. After a couple of months and more organic material I will cover this over with a silage tarp to break down further. This will be ready to plant early spring with a new crop.
Number 2 is Pukekohe long keeper onions. I tried a few different varieties this season and that is still by far my favourite. I’ll be sticking to only 2-3 varieties next season. I will also make sure I water them, so they mature faster. I’ve grown enough this year that I think we will be self sufficient in onions. This is exciting.
Number 3 is the Spacemaster Cucumber. I planted 4 varieties, and the others all went bitter apart from this one. I have recently discovered though that the bitterness can also be caused by the male flowers pollinating the females. They are the only cucurbits to do this I believe. When your cucumber plants are flowering you need to make sure to remove the male flowers regularly. These are the ones without a small cucumber attached. I never knew this and only just found it out.
I like the Spacemaster the most because they take up such a small area. They can be grown on the ground, inside a tunnel house or outside. They are incredibly prolific. I think I would have easily got 30 cucumbers off each plant and the plant takes up much less than 1m2. Phenomenal. They also make great pickles.
And lastly number 4. Silverbeet and Spinach. I accidentally planted a row around 10 metres in total with what I thought was white beetroot. Turns out it was a mixture of Spinach and Silverbeet. Through this error I discovered that it makes a fantastic small windbreak for plants on the other side. Next year I will be doing this again on purpose. This accidental row is still going strong even after being planted way back in august. It has been trying to go to seed but as soon as it sends up a flower stalk I go and chop it off and this has helped stop it bolting. It’s been handy for feeding the chickens as well and they love it.
Each year you are going to have different success and different failures. My garlic failed this year, my tomatoes failed this year, my raspberries were a huge failure and I didn’t even get one. So if you are new to gardening and you cant grow something as well this year as you did last year, don’t let that stop you from trying again. Its so easy to give up but part of gardening is being able to adapt to the different seasons. This summer was dry and challenging, next summer could be wet and with that will come different challenges, successes and failures. You learn more from mistakes than getting it right 😊
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