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Your guide to growing a smart garden in July
Welcome to your monthly guide to growing a productive, resilient and smart garden in Melbourne!
This newsletter is an initiative of My Smart Garden, a free program that will help you grow food, prepare your home and garden for a changing climate, create homes for local wildlife, use water wisely and recycle waste.
My Smart Garden is a proud collaboration between the cities of Hobsons Bay, Moonee Valley, Maribyrnong, Brimbank, Wyndham, Stonnington, Moreland and Yarra.
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Smart Gardening in July
Our resident smart gardener, permaculture designer and educator Kat Lavers, shares her tips and advice for July in your patch.
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Winter fruit tree pruning and shaping
- Winter is a great time to prune and shape your deciduous fruit trees and vines (with the exception of apricots). This encourages strong growth and helps form the structure of young trees. Mature trees prefer to be pruned in summer after harvesting the fruit. This controls growth and allows cuts to heal more quickly.
- Shape young trees by tying or spreading branches of while they're young and flexible to create the desired form (eg. vase, espalier, umbrella). Shaping is great for small gardens as it encourages more fruiting wood at a height that is easy to reach. It also keeps branches from blocking pathways or shading other garden beds. Shaping of deciduous trees is easiest in winter when the structure of the tree is more visible.
- Check out these notes from our recent pruning workshops.
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What to plant in winter
- Deciduous fruit trees and vines are best planted now while they are dormant and are cheaply available as bare-rooted plants.
- Check the websites of our local experts at the Werribee Park Heritage Orchard or Heritage Fruits Society to get your hands on rare heirloom varieties. Make sure you check pollination requirements and use multi-planting or multi-grafting to increase diversity and extend your harvest season.
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Fruit tree care
- Did your peaches and nectarines suffered from a bad case of peach leaf curl last summer? Now is the time to spray with a copper or sulphur-based fungicide. This treatment needs to be applied during the dormant period – it’s too late by the time you see damaged leaves!
- Take a preventative approach by making sure your tree is well watered and fed with compost and mulch to encourage strong growth.
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Hardwood cuttings
- Now is the time to take hardwood cuttings from many deciduous fruit trees and vines. Mulberry, pomegranate, grape, currants and fig grow so easily that sometimes you can simply poke prunings directly in the ground where you want the tree to grow. Keep the moisture up and protect from sun during heatwaves.
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Composting, worm farming and bokashi!
Friday 23 July, 2-4pm
Maidstone Community Centre, register here
Join compost expert, Ella Boyen, and discover the different ways to recycle and get the most out of your food waste - including bokashi, worm farming and hot compost.
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Growing vegies from seed
Wednesday 4 August, 7:30-8:30pm
Online via zoom, register here
Fill your vegie beds with homegrown seedlings in time for spring. In this hands-on workshop you'll learn all the secrets of propagating vegetables from seed, focusing on low and no-cost methods.
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Lacto-fermentation for beginners
Tuesday 17 August, 6:30-8pm
Online via zoom, register here
The Fermented Mumma will guide you into a new passion of lacto-fermentation! A simple yet effective way to not only preserve food, but to increase its nutritional content and avoid food waste in our homes.
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Understanding weather for Melbourne gardeners
Tuesday 17 August, 6:30-9pm
Online via zoom, register here
This workshop will help you join the dots between large-scale climate patterns and local gardening advice.
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Create a habitat garden
Saturday 21 August, 10-11:30am
Online via zoom, register here
Join Chiara Perri and understand the benefits of habitat gardening while getting an introduction to indigenous plants that were once abundant in the western parts of Melbourne.
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Grow Asian greens
Tuesday 17 August, 7-8pm
Online via zoom, register here
Learn how to successfully grow your Asian greens, without getting eaten out of house and home by insects! Craig Castree will show you what they grow well with and how to stop them from bolting quickly.
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Habitat gardens in Hobsons Bay
Sunday 29 August, 10am-12:30pm
Altona Library. Registration opens on 20 July, set reminder here
Are you interested in creating a Habitat Garden to attract native wildlife? Hobsons Bay City Council is looking for 30 households from across the municipality to participate in this exciting program! Learn about our local flora and fauna and how your garden can become a stepping stone for native wildlife.
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Spring into gardening
Thursday 2 September, 11am-1pm
Maidstone Community Centre, register here
Discover the joys of edible gardening this spring in a hands on workshop with Ella Boyen from Compost Community.
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Olives to oil success
Did you hear? 6.6 tonnes of olives were dropped off last month as part of 3000acres Olives to Oil event. Even though a few restrictions made it a much smaller event, the olive haul was not! And if you were one of the participants, you'll be glad to know the oil will be ready for collection from CERES on Saturday 17th July between 12pm and 4pm. Thanks to everyone that brought their harvest!
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National Tree Day planting events in your local area
Stonnington National Tree Day planting event
Sunday 1 August, 10am-12.30pm
Basil Oval Playground, Darling Park, Malvern East, register here
Brimbank National Tree Planting Day
Sunday 1 August, 10am-1pm
Taylors Valley Parklands, Keilor. Meet at Calder Rise Neighbourhood Park, Keilor, register here
Find your local site at National Tree Day.
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Pollinate the West: seed swap and community bike ride
Sunday 15 August 2021, 11.30 (bike ride) and 1-5pm (seed swap)
Seddon Uniting Church Hall, register here
Permaculture Out West presents Pollinate the West - a seed share & community bike ride festival! If you're a Westie, you can share or receive seeds, meet like-minded growers across the West, or join our "pollinating cyclists" to deliver seeds to growers across Maribyrnong. Click here for information on the talks, workshops and kids’ activities on the day.
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Help manage the spread of the Queensland Fruit Fly
Gardeners from across Melbourne are reporting the presence of Queensland Fruit Fly. These devastating pests attack a wide range of common fruit and vegetables including apples, pears, stone fruit, feijoas and tomatoes. We encourage all home gardeners to learn to identify and respond to this pest.
Watch our webinar with entomologist Dan Papacek to learn about identification, delve into the lifecycle and behaviours of this pest and look at the management options most suited to home gardeners.
Find more information and advice on the Agriculture Victoria website.
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Recommended reading in July
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Can’t get enough of our workshops and want to learn more? Each month we share hand-picked books to help you garden smarter. Many of these are available from your local library.
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Permaculture Design: A step-by-step guide, Aranya
From the co-originator of permaculture David Holmgren, RetroSuburbia highlights successful design and strategies for food production in South Eastern Australia. It’ll help you assess a garden’s potential, build soil fertility, manage soil contamination and prioritise crops for small spaces.
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RetroSuburbia: The downshifter’s guide to a resilient future, David Holmgren
From the co-originator of permaculture David Holmgren, RetroSuburbia highlights successful design and strategies for food production in South Eastern Australia. It’ll help you assess a garden’s potential, build soil fertility, manage soil contamination and prioritise crops for small spaces.
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Earth Users Guide to Permaculture, Rosemary Morrow
An accessible introduction to permaculture, including observation, ecology, design process, increasing resilience and social permaculture.
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Submit news
If you would like to submit a relevant gardening event to the My Smart Garden eNewsletter, please send a 50 word summary to contactus@mysmartgarden.org.au.
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