• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar
  • Skip to footer

Country Life Experiment

Simple Country Living

  • Home
  • About
    • Start Here
    • FAQs
    • Contact
    • Disclosure
  • Food
    • Mains
    • Desserts
    • Cakes & Biscuits
    • Jams & Preserves
    • Snacks & Treats
    • Drinks
    • Food Hacks
    • Recipe List
  • Simple Living
    • Organisation
  • Garden
  • Country Life
  • Family Time
    • Kid Wrangling
  • DIY
    • Farm House
    • Crochet
    • Christmas

Plan Your Summer Garden Now!

I know it seems crazy to be thinking about Summer vegetables right now because it is freezing cold and the middle of winter, but hear me out! Gardens take a little bit of planning. You can’t just whack a few seeds in the ground and pick tomatoes two weeks later. A little bit of time is needed.

IMG_1527

What do you want to grow?

Start planning your summer garden by listing what you would like to grow. Don’t forget to think about how much space and time you actually have to grow vegetables. Even if you’re only going to manage a couple of tomato plants, that is a great start.

Consider also your climate. If you are lucky enough to be able to grow tropical fruit, go for it. Around here, we get frosts into November and even our summer nights can be cool, so we need to choose plants that will tolerate those conditions.

IMG_2001

 

Consider too, what vegetables you will actually use, and how much. We grow a large amount of vegetables, but we preserve a lot to use through out the rest of the year, as well as selling some of our extras. Clearly most people do not need to grow as much as we do.

What we are planning to grow this year

Now, if you have been reading CLE for a while, you might remember that Country Boy loves to grow vegetables. We have a huge garden, and he spends most of his free time in it. I don’t know many people who are as enthusiastic (crazy) about their vegetable garden. He also seems to have a more is better attitude to vegetables. If you are just starting a vegetable garden, begin with just a few plants and go from there!

However, if you are interested in our garden plans for this summer, here is what Country Boy is planning.

First up on our summer garden are tomatoes. This year we are going to plant several varieties, including some of our favourites, as well as a few new varieties, just for the fun of it.

IMG_0127

The varieties we have planted before include Legend (medium red), cherokee purple (large dark purplish salad tomatoes), sunrise (small yellow – not cherry tomato size), green zebra (these are my favourites), yellow pear (small pear shaped cherry tomatoes), lemon drop (cherry tomatoes with a hint of lemon in their flavour), brandy wine (large red slicing tomatoes), Jaunne Flammee (a small orange tomato), and camp joy (red cherry tomatoes).

Some new varieties we are trying include Rouge de Marmande, Red colossus, Roma, and Napoli Paste. All of them are meant to be good for making into tomato cooking sauce.

IMG_2329

Carrots are also on the agenda. I’ve put in a request for multicoloured carrots, just because I think they look so beautiful

Of course we will be putting in some corn zucchinis, capsicums, and cucumbers, silverbeet and lettuce, as well as beans and snap peas.

Radishes, watermelon, potatoes, beetroot, and several varieties of pumpkins will all be planted while chilli, egg plant, and squash will also make an appearance.

IMG_5991Decorative gourds and sunflowers will be thrown in the mix just because they are pretty.

IMG_2279

Herbs are a regular feature of our garden. Many don’t survive the frosty winters so need to be replanted each year. Parsley, dill, basil, chives will all be added to the garden

Order your seeds

There are lots of different places you can get your vegetable seeds from. Your local nursery will probably have a small variety of common vegetables, however if you’re after something a little more unusual you will probably have to get on line and order some from specialists seed companies.

We like to buy heirloom varieties of vegetables, both because of the incredible variety available, and also because we can collect the seeds to grow again next year (which you can’t do with hybrid plants). We also prefer the ethics associated with these type of plants (which is a whole other post sometime).

IMG_4933

We tend to get most of our seeds from Eden Seeds, and occasionally from The Diggers Club. Both companies produce yearly seed catalogues that have pictures, descriptions of the plant, and fruit, and information about where it will grow. You can also check their websites out for information and orders. There are several other companies that also produce heirloom seed varieties.

Get Planting

Once your seeds arrive, read the packets, follow the instructions and get going. Depending on where you live, you may be able to start planting your Summer garden in the next month or two.

If you want to know more about how we have laid out our garden, and how we manage it, check out this post.

Do you grow your own vegetables? Have you started planning your summer garden?

Let everyone know:

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Twitter
  • Email
  • More
  • Tumblr
  • Pocket
  • Print
  • LinkedIn
  • Reddit

You should also check out...

Previous Post: « The Beautifulest Place
Next Post: Berry Clafoutis »

Reader Interactions

Have your say... Cancel reply

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Primary Sidebar

Hi, I’m Jo

I'm a city girl turned farmer's wife, school teacher, ideas woman, and mum to three country kids. Country Life Experiment is all about simple country living, growing and making our own food, and life on our family farm in rural Australia. Join me as I give country living a try. Read more...
  • Bloglovin
  • Facebook
  • Instagram

Search

Browse by month

INSTAGRAM

A lovely, easy Christmas with family, good food, a A lovely, easy Christmas with family, good food, a few presents, an afternoon swim and dinner on the veranda as the sun set. Time to stop and be thankful for the many blessings of the year. I hope you had a lovely Christmas too!
We have been mulling over how to fix up the drivew We have been mulling over how to fix up the driveway and lead up to our house for a while. Currently it’s just a dumping ground for old bits of metal and a big pile of mulch, but C would like to create a turning area and put in a garden. First up though, there’s a huge old stump that needs to go. What better excuse is there to have a fire on Sunday afternoon? C and the kids jumped on the quad bike and trailer, and hauled back a big pile of sticks and logs to help the stump burn. Once the fire was going, marshmallows were found and roasted. No better way to spend time together.
Team work makes the dream work. We were asked rec Team work makes the dream work. 
We were asked recently whether we “make” our kids work on the farm. The answer is of course not. Having said that, all three love to help out whenever they can. They all work hard because they want to; because they take pride in working hard and contributing in a meaningful way to our family life; because they love living on our farm and don’t remember life before we moved here. Whether it be planting trees or doing sheep work or feeding animals, they all want to be involved. As a parent, nothing is better than watching them grow in skill and confidence as they work along side you. We’re so glad that we get to spend time with our three, working together.
We’ve had an unexpected addition to the family ☘️🐑. She is a lot easier to look after than the other family members but she does try to escape her yard and head butt people. Poddy lambs are super cute but they tend to think they are a human. Clover the lamb is sure that Meg is her mum. Can’t think why… 🤔🤣
The perfect way to end a long winter weekend: toge The perfect way to end a long winter weekend: together, cooking damper around the remains of the bonfire.
It’s been a tough few weeks on the farm. We got It’s been a tough few weeks on the farm. We got through shearing without a hitch (thankfully 🙏) but we’ve had a run of the flu followed by Covid run through the family since then. The kids and I have tested positive (this is my second time getting it 🦠) though so far C has managed to avoid it. There has been a lot of lying on the couch feeling pretty ordinary. Han had to reschedule her driving test for a 4th time due to Covid, which is disappointing for her because she wants her freedom and for us because it would be so much more convenient if she could drive herself places. Just to add in to the mix, our hot water system has chosen now as a good time to die so we’re on cold showers until we’re all out of iso. This is not meant to be a whinging post but sometimes life just sucks a bit and it’s good to be real. Fortunately, the sight of the fire going with a stack of wood next to it cheers us up. Things will improve soon. Onwards we go…

Newsletter

Popular Posts

{Recipe} Spiced Plum Paste
Pickled Cucumbers
Pumpkin Fruit Cake
Home Made Ginger Beer
Honey Spice Biscuits
Roasted Cauliflower and Potato Salad

Categories

Footer

Hi, I’m Jo

City girl turned farmer's wife, school teacher, ideas woman, and mum to three country kids. Country Life Experiment is all about simple country living, growing and making our own food, and life on our family farm in rural Australia. Join me as I give country living a try. Read more...
  • Bloglovin
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest

Copyright © 2023 · Foodie Pro Theme by Shay Bocks · Built on the Genesis Framework · Powered by WordPress