It's been a hot, dry summer this year. But, in spite of this (and perhaps because of it) we've recorded our biggest ever two-month harvest - almost 140kg. The freezer is bursting and we already have a year's supply of tomato passata! Read on to learn the 5 key lessons we've learned in growing vegetables productively in a regular Canberra suburban garden with the usual uninspiring clay to begin with... 

Seriously, this has been the most exciting tomato year ever! 

In fact, until this year, I can't say we have ever had that much success with tomatoes, and I was actually a bit skeptical that this year would be any different. But something changed this year and the result has been a harvest of over 50 kilos of tomatoes so far!!

Ever wanted to know what to do with all that lemon balm that keeps popping up all over your garden? Here's a recipe to make use of it..

So we dug up the lawn and planted up the beds, and then because we're a bit nerdy, we started weighing all the produce that came in...

And the results were really interesting. Here's our list of what grew well, not so well, and what grew extremely well over the summer of 2017/18...

If you are wondering why the blog went a bit quiet over the last couple of months, this is why. For the past few months I've been thoroughly caught up in the management of the 14th Australasian Permaculture Convergence (APC 14 for short) which was held in Canberra for the very first time this April.

There's a bit of press out there about eating weeds and how healthy they are. But really, is it worth it? I am always game to try new things and have been experimenting all summer with some edible weeds. The verdict: some are a bit naah, but fat hen passes all the taste tests with flying colours. It tastes just like spinach - only it's nicer. No kidding, it really is! If there's one weed worth eating, this is it...

We have a lot of rocket in the garden - perhaps a little too much! Perennial or wild rocket, diplotaxis tenuifolia, is a fabulously successful plant in Canberra that provides pungent leafy greens for most of the year. The trick is finding enough ways to eat the stuff.

**Note: this blog has been recently updated with what I believe to be the correct Latin name for the subspecies of yam daisy we have been growing - microseris scapigera (not microseris lanceolata). This is the alpine form of the plant and likely to be the species naturally growing in Namadgi, where the original seeds had apparently been collected. The confusion arose due to the original plants we bought being labelled as microseris lanceolata, which I have since learned is actually a larger sized and less palatable plant.**

​Yam daisies or murnong (microseris scapigera) are really delicious bush tucker - a root vegetable that tastes like a pre-salted chip! The good news doesn't end there - they're also really good for you. But while once common around Canberra, they're pretty hard to find in the wild now.

But you can grow them in your own garden - specialist nurseries sell them and you can buy seeds online (albeit for a small fortune). They're actually not all that hard to grow, though I have learned the hard way that they do have some particular requirements.

Here are some lessons from my experience growing them for a couple of years.

**Note: this blog has been recently updated with what I believe to be the correct Latin name for the subspecies of yam daisy we have been growing - microseris scapigera (not microseris lanceolata). This is the alpine form of the plant and likely to be the species naturally growing in Namadgi, where the original seeds had apparently been collected. The confusion arose due to the original plants we bought being labelled as microseris lanceolata, which I have since learned is actually a larger sized and less palatable plant.**

When Europeans first arrived in the Canberra area, it was said that the open hillsides glowed yellow with yam daisy flowers - a delicious indigenous staple food. This little yellow flowered plant looks remarkably similar to a dandelion, but up close it is quite different.

Sadly today yam daisies are quite hard to find. Decades of sheep grazing has almost eradicated this plant from its former habitats. The yellow flowers you see around the suburbs, and increasingly in our national parks, are usually exotic dandelions and cat's ears.

So next time you're walking through the bush and you come across a yellow flower, how can you tell if it's really a yam daisy?

In this post I'll show you how.