Like we were, you might be surprised to hear that Australia has it’s own native raspberries – and they’re just as yummy as European varieties, and much better suited to our warmer coastal climate. There are varieties native to the Illawarra, but the Atherton raspberry, from Queensland has especially nice berries and is really productive, so it’s won a spot in our yard.

They’re best contained to a small area in the garden, as they’re keen suckers and fast growers – they love climbing too, so trellises are a good idea.

We planted a row of them in September and we’re indulging in raspberries now. And they’ll continue to fruit just about all year round!

For more info, see our Atherton raspberry article.

Within months of planting, we’re already snacking off our insanely fast growing panama berry tree, enjoying it’s sweet red berries that are the size of a big blueberries and taste like a cross between strawberries and figs, with a hint of caramel. You can literally see these trees grow before your eyes – this one only stood 70cm tall when we planted it out about 6 months ago!

These hardy sun loving trees love frost free subtropical climates like Wollongong, can be used as a wind break, and grow to a maximum of seven metres tall. Being such a fast growing tree, they’re perfect to plant in between slower growing fruit trees, and take out when the other trees come into production. They’re also fantastic in community and school gardens, providing quick, rewarding results and yummy snack food.

 

This is the first of our once a month fruit tree profile blogs, so keep an eye out for the likes of black sapote, babaco, japotacaba, grumacharma and many other fabulous fruit trees that thrive in Wollongong, but most people have never heard of!

For more info, check out our panama berry article.

From a bare backyard of grass, a pool and concrete, our suburban food forest and mandala veggie bed system has sprung to life over the last eight months as shown in the video below. Over 100 fruit trees, shrubs and vines have been planted, as well as an array of soil improving groundcovers and trees.

The next eight months of change will be even more exciting, with the last of the fruit trees going in, chickens and ducks coming on the scene, and the veggie beds being planted out for a bumper summer harvest. Look out for an update backyard ‘timelapse’ video in another six months time!

Ah the smell of fresh mulch….mulch works wonders in the garden, and few things add to the visual appeal of a garden like a fresh layer of mulch on the beds and paths. The massive 8 cubic metre pile of mulch that’s been taking up so much room you could hardly even make it to our front door the last few days just might have been a hint about our respect for mulch.

Wood chip mulch is brilliant to define paths and scatter lightly through the orchard to encourage fungi in the soils (fruit trees love fungi!). And once the mulch on the paths has broken down, its fantastic compost around the fruit trees. It’s great if you can get to know someone who works in a local tree lopping company and get locally sourced wood chips for free. Grass clippings are also an easily sourced free mulch for garden beds (dry them out first or they’ll become thick and clumpy). Mulch is great at keeping moisture in the soil, saving valuable water. It also provides habitat for little critters, adds valuable biomass as it breaks down and stops soil compaction…happy mulching!

Miracle fruit that makes sour things taste sweet, chocolate pudding fruit, juicy bright yellow babacos, ugnis that explode like a strawberry sherbet bomb…there’s a whole world of gorgeous fruits out there that you will never find at the supermarket!

Our suburban block is designed to grow over 120 organic fruit trees, shrubs and climbers. Of these 120 plants, 50 will be unique species, including native food plants.

Check out our fruit trees article and the 'greenprint' for a mouthwatering summary!

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What a fantastic day we had bringing life to our nature strip with the help of our wonderful neighbours! Like most other nature strips around, ours was just a strip of grass between the road and our front fence. But in just one day we transformed it into a beautiful space that welcomes people to our home, provides a great space for people to walk through, and will continue to grow as valuable habitat for local wildlife. And it will never need mowing! All we did was:

• Spread some gypsum to break up the clay
• Sheet mulch the area with newspaper to keep the grass out
• Create a wide wood chip mulch path for passers by and the postwoman
• Plant 50 native plants - mainly locally native grasses, shrubs and a few low growing trees that won’t hinder the powerlines (we got the plants cheap from Wollongong City Councils Greenplan nursery, on a sale day)

So many people have commented on how great it looks, and have said that they would love to do the same. So we’re looking forward to helping our neighbours through ‘nature strip working bees.’ Thanks again to our neighbours for helping us! Let’s bring life and beauty to all nature strips!

 

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Would you rather be able to get an amazingly fresh and tasty lunch from right outside your back step than have to drive down to the supermarket? Sounds good to us! We’re on a mission to transform our lawn into lunch.

Now most people would sensibility start small. But we decided to tackle the whole lawn in one day - about 600 square metres of it. So off we went with a turf cutter, cutting the grass and flipping it over in an attempt to kill that ever so vigorous kikuyu. Yes we almost killed ourselves in the process – turf cutters have a mind of their own, and lawn is not exactly the lightest thing to flip over!

But our future fruit trees will love us for replacing the kikuyu (which they really don’t like), with non invasive grasses like cow pea, millet, pintos peanut and clover (which they love). And we were able to keep with the organic nature of our place and not use any chemical weedkillers.

We baked the flipped over lawn for a week, spread a bit of top soil ontop, and sowed some soil improving seeds. The ever invasive kikuyu is trying to make a comeback, but we’re keeping ontop of it by hand weeding. And we’re looking forward to having the most luscious, organic supermarket in our own backyard!

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The Greenprint is the landscape design for Happy Earth. It’s our vision, our dream, and what we’re working towards. It’s come about from all the ideas and experiences many wonderful people have inspired us with on our journey of sustainable living.

As sustainable food production is key to eco living, the heart of the design is – you guessed it – organic vegetable gardens and an abundance of fruit trees. But this design’s a bit different to most. You won’t find any rectangular rows of veggie beds here. What you will find is a vibrant forest of food that works with the house – so for example, water for the garden is harvested from the roof of the house, and the trees in the garden provide the house with cooling shade in summer, and warming sun in winter, as well as fuel for the woodfired combustion heater. Our garden also works with the gifts of nature – so it’s all about placing the right plants in the right places, according to the amount of sun, wind and moisture in that particular spot, and looking after the most wonderful and important workers – the millions of microbes in the soil. Check out our Greenprint article for more info.

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