One thing I love about having a garden is being able to grow food that I can’t usually buy.

I have just finished harvesting my first native finger lime crop. I bought the tree last year and keep it potted in a sunny spot in my backyard. Although the tree is tiny, I managed to harvest about 15 little finger limes.

Native finger limes are amazing fruit. They start off as long green fruits that look a bit like rough, scaly chillies – in fact my husband thought it was a chilli plant. When they are ready to eat, they turn a deep, dark orange-red colour.

Inside, the lime’s flesh looks like orange caviar (although pulps can range from white to pink, lime green and lemon – depending on the type of lime you have) and smells fresh and citrusy. It’s hard to describe the taste – they sort of taste like limes but with a fresher, more tart flavour. And the little balls of fruit just burst in your mouth.

I am still experimenting with them in terms of eating. So far I have spritzed them in sparkling mineral water and added them to fresh fruit salad but that’s about it. If anyone has any other ideas, then please let me know.

This morning I snapped these naughty cockatoos raiding my mandarin tree. They are such messy and wasteful eaters. First, they break off a mandarin, scoff about half of it, and then throw it away and move on to the next fruit.

While I’ve been patiently waiting for my mandarins to ripen – they are almost there – I have noticed a lot go missing. I thought it was the possums again but now I know the real culprits.

It seems that competition for home grown produce with the local wildlife is extra fierce in suburban areas like mine where people are demolishing old houses and flattening existing gardens to make way for McMansions.

Unfortunately, this increasing trend in housing is reducing garden space to tiny lawn areas bereft of food producing trees – native and cultivated. In fact most of these gardens are devoid of anything really. This means that if you do have a garden that bears fruit in such an area, then wrestling your produce from the local wildlife becomes even harder due to lack of native food sources.

While I don’t mind sharing some mandarins with the local wildlife, I will net the trees soon if too many go missing. It’s been two years since I’ve had a good mandarin crop and I am not keen to let it all go to the birds.

I’ve just finished reading Making Your Home Sustainable by Derek Wrigley. It’s a really useful book for anyone wanting to retrofit their house to improve its energy and water efficiency.

When architect and solar consultant Derek Wrigley moved into a townhouse in Canberra in 1991, he began retrofitting it to reduce its dependence on fossil fuels. Throughout the book, Wrigley uses the house to show how homes in Australia’s southern states can be made more sustainable.

The book is ideal for home owners who can fit out and alter their house. However, there is a small and informative section that provides renters with ways to improve their home’s efficiency at minimum cost.

The book covers more than just basic green living tips – it provides detailed information (but easy-to-understand) about solar energy, energy efficiency, appliances, mass and thermal comfort, insulation, ventilation, minimising water and effective landscape use.

It’s a great resource for all us retrofitters out there. To buy the book, visit Scribe Publications.

I hope all you mothers out there had a great Mother’s Day. I started my morning with pancakes and coffee – thanks to my husband and son.

The rest of the morning was spent with my feet up watching my Mother’s Day present – the Gardening Australia DVD on waterwise gardening.

It’s a collection of segments from the show that feature saving water in the garden. If you’re a Gardening Australia fan like me, and into saving water, then you’ll love this DVD.

It shows how you can still have a great garden but without the need for loads of water. The DVD features some great waterwise gardens in Australia, useful tips on drought proofing plus which plants look great in the garden but need little water.

A great 92 minutes worth of entertainment, and an excellent way to start Mother’s Day.

Finally, there is a water tank that you can pack up and take with you when you move. If you don’t want to create your own do-it-yourself tank or fork out for the more expensive metal or plastic tanks, which remain as permanent fixtures to your home, then possibly the Handytank could be for you.

The Handytank is a 1,000 litre water tank which can be bought at Kmart, Mitre 10, Home Timber and Hardware, Thrifty-Link and Trade Link stores. It comes in a flat pack so can be transported home in most cars and is assembled and fitted in about 20 minutes. The manufacturers also claim it can be easily dissembled for easy moving.

I love the idea of a water tank that you can take with you when you move, such a great idea for people renting. Now if you could just do the same with solar panels…

Aquaponics is one thing I haven’t thought about venturing into. I always thought setting up an aquaponics system looked too labour intensive, and it needed a lot of water. Plus I love the smell and touch of soil, and all the little critters that good, healthy dirt brings.

However, through Greenfoot I have been in contact with a few people who run their own backyard aquaponics systems and, once set up, they assure me aquaponics is less labour intensive and uses very little extra water.

It’s also the symbiotic nature of such a system that I find quite fascinating. (more…)

Early last year my friend Matt began his journey into the mythical world of growing garlic. Towards the end of last year I was able to sample some of his delicious and potent little cloves of garlicky goodness.

According to Matt, late February to early April is the best time for planting garlic in Sydney.

Taking Matt’s advice, I’ve held onto my bulbs from him until now - although I did eat about half … yum. I finally planted them today. My son helped by stuffing a clove into each hole I made in the soil. He then used his little watering can to moisten the soil.

Being 29 weeks pregnant, my belly and bad back are beginning to hamper my gardening abilities. Therefore, I’m winding up most of my garden beds for winter by heavily mulching them over and letting them rest.

However, I figure garlic will be pretty easy to grow over these months and won’t need much care or labour. The garlic now lives in the sunniest sections (during winter) of my garden.

Matt has kindly provided another update on his garlic expeditions - no doubt he has just planted some more garlic in his own garden. Read on for Matt’s update. (more…)

This time of year is pumpkin eating time in my house.

It’s the time when I harvest my mini pumpkin vines and the little, knobby, round, orange vegetables lie happily around our kitchen and balcony.

They are really easy to grow and perfect for smaller gardens that don’t have a lot of space. I usually plant a few seeds and keep a couple of the strongest seedlings alive.

I let the vines ramble about my herb and vegetable patches, plus let them climb up the back fence trellises. They probably only get up to about five metres long so are quite manageable. (more…)

If you are reading the Australian newspaper today, page 22 features an article with me and my son. It’s part of a larger article focused mostly on people downsizing their lives in some way.

You can check it out online too. The photo isn’t included in the online version but I can say it involved throwing a lot of my pumpkins around, and trying to encourage my son not to look at the camera ;-).

Last year I was tortured by tomatoes. This year I’ve found a solution - cherry tomatoes.

Since cherry tomatoes are so small they grow and ripen quickly, leaving less time for disease and pests to set in.

My vines have just finished producing but during the past couple of months I harvested a good handful of small, deliciously sweet cherry tomatoes every day.

They are excellent in salads, and make a great fresh pasta sauce with home grown basil. Or you can eat them straight from the garden, which my son loves.

To keep my sanity, I will keep to cherry tomatoes from now on.

Has anyone else got any great tips for growing tomatoes?