To do December
Compost
Grass clippings, oh so many grass clippings....This is a bountiful time for making hot
compost. Mix 50 percent grass clippings and manure, with 50 percent straw and
shredded cardboard. Boom shanka!! Try putting your hand in that after a week, better
still run some alkathene pipe through and create yourself an outdoor shower like the
famous Frenchman Jean Pain did to supply his household with hot water all winter long!!
If you would rather throw all your grass clippings into a cold compost pile, add a layer of
carbon (straw, shredded paper, cardboard) every 10-15 cm.
Mulch
Use pea straw, lucerne or straw to mulch around your garden. Soil doesn’t like to be
naked and the moisture will be sucked out of it on a hot day. You’ll get less weeds, and
need to feed and water your plants less over time.
Plant
Hopefully the last of the frosts has passed, so you can plant out all your zucchinis,
pumpkins, tomatoes, corn and all those frost tender beauties.
Try ye old Aztec Three Sisters Method. Beans grow up the corn, fixing nitrogen for the
corn to use, with pumpkin growing down around the corn’s feet, keeping the weeds at
bay and preventing moisture evaporating from the soil.