New Blog on Medicinal and Edible Plants

I have a new blog on plants and their uses Medicinal Plants, Wild Food & Ethnobotany, which lists all of the plants that grow in my local environment, both native and weeds, and documents all of their uses. You can find simple herbal remedies that have been used by people for thousands of years, and learn what plants that grow near you are edible. If there is a particular plant that you want to know more about, you can make a request. I hope you like it!
I may still post on here from time to time, but that is my active blog.

Before (2009) . . . . . . . . . . After (2011)

Since my last entry, which was over a year ago (pathetic, right? In my defense, I have been very busy) I have finished the paving and added many more native and edible plants to the garden.The above pictures taken from similar angles note the changes. I have planted many edible plants, with a focus on perennials, tropical edibles and native edibles. I harvest a lot of cherry tomatoes, sweet potatos, cassava, water chestnut, kang kong, portulaca, rasberries and figs.

In the foreground of the picture on the right are several Bunya cones. These are not (unfortunately) from my garden, but were harvested from a place about an hour north from here. Bunya cones are from the Bunya Pine- Araucaria bidwillii, a large tree native to queensland, from which traditional people harvested the large (5cm or so) pine nuts or seeds, and had ceremonies and feasts centered around these beautiful trees. I was lucky enough to experience my first bunya harvest this year!!

The cones are large and very heavy, with sharp recurved hooks on the end of each scale. Cones can contain from between 10 to 40 large seeds, which can be easilt separated from the scales when green. Each seed is protected by an extremeley tough integument, or seed coat, which requires much effort to remove if the seed is raw.

Seeds can be cooked by boiling for several minutes, or my favourite way is to roast them in an open fire for several minutes. The seed coat turns black from the fire, and some of them explode with a loud noise, throwing bits of nut everywhere, but they are very delicious cooked this way. Cooking helps to soften the seed coat, enabling it's easy removal. Once shelled, the seeds can be used in stir frys, salads, pesto, pasta etc. I even read a recipe somewhere for Bunya nut and Witchety Grub Soup!

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One of the edible natives growing in my garden is Rubus probus, the Large-Fruited Native Rasberry (very similar to Rubus rosifolius but a faster growing taller plant). It's fruit are around 3cm big, and are sweet, juicy and delicious. This plant is a vigorous grower and can quickly take over an area. It has many recurved spikes along its stems and leaves.

It prefers full sun, but will grow in part shade, and loves moist, humus rich soil.

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It spreads vegetatively from runners, which send upright individual shoots that form a clump resembling a bush, as shown below.

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I recommended growing this plant in a large container. This fruit is quite an exceptional native food, it is easy to grow, very tasty and has great potential as a commercial crop.

The two photos above are a before(left) and after (right) of my side garden. I had to cut out two small trees as they were going to be giants when they grew up, and right next to my house and my neighbours house. So in their place I planted a heap of ferns, bromeliads and some native shrubs. I have finally bought some paving for this area!! hooray!! so am extremely busy right now doing that, and will post when it is finished and landscaped. Sorry the photo is on its side.

This is Ella, helping with the paving.She is usually white.

Diploglottis, the Native Tamarind

Davidsonia, The native Plum

The poor rescued Cycad. I had to cut most of it's leaves off to help it overcome the shock of having most of it's roots removed by some ignorant sod, before I transplanted it. So those are some of plants from the previous blog in my kitchen garden.

25 March 2009

Kitchen Garden.

Have been busy putting in a garden and paved area outside my kitchen. The photo on the right is before, when I had just started putting paving down. It is recycled concrete, I got it from down the street after some company had ripped up the pavement to fix something or other. They were just going to dump it. The garden edging (left) is old wine bottles, and no, I didn't drink them all myself! behind that is a tier of rocks brought from my last house. The plants are mostly rescued from a skip, so the total cost of this garden was about $5 for the mulch! There is a Cycad rescued from some guys garden, he had ripped up about 6 of them, and left all the root balls still in the ground, this was the only one with any roots at all, and even then only very few, so I hope it survives. I think it is Cycas revoluta(?) sago palm. So the plants are;

Macaranga tanarius, Spear tree

Davidsonia pruriens, Davidsons Plum

Diploglottis australis, Native Tamarind

Castanospermum australe, Moreton Bay Chestnut

Pipturis argenteus, Native Mulberry

Native Elderberry

Rhodomyrtus psidioides , a Native Guava

Cordyline rubra

an Iris

Cycas revoluta

Apart from the Iris and the Cycad, all are native and have edible parts.

10 March 2009,

The Beautiful picture of a buttressed tree in the title above is a photo I took at Mt Glorious, QLD, of a Giant Stinging Tree (Dendrocnide excelsa) , the rainforset up there is just beautiful, with lianas, ferns, palms, figs, strangler figs.

I own a little block of land (left), 640m2, and would love to plant a rainforest here, but I need to grow food also, so Have had to compromise- also, this area is not rainforest, it is open forest, so conservationally, I should be planting species that grew here originally. What I am planting is a mixture of native (prefferably to this area) 'bush' foods, exotic foods and locally native plants. The exotic food plants are mainly hardy perennials, adapted to this climate.

The climate here is very hot in summer with most of the rainfall in early/late summer, and cool in winter, with the occasional frost in some areas. Although an hour south west of here they get a lot of frost. Working with the weather here, I can plant a many layered forest, as we get plenty of sun to penetrate the canopy, and most plants here can't cope with the full sun.

The land here was bare when I moved in a year ago, save for half a dozen young paperbark trees (Melaleuca quinquenervia), and a good sized bloodwood, just a little too close to the house for comfort, but I couldn't bear to cut it down.

So basically I am aiming for a food forest.The yard is divided into sections; front, back, side and kitchen garden. The soil here is quite sandy, so I am adding organic matter. I have planted so far;

Exotic fruit
Mango, Lychee, Papaya, Loquat, Avocado, Grape vines, Passionfruit vines, Lemon, Fig, Banana, Tamarillo

Native fruit
Native raspberry, Native Passionfruit, Carpobrotus-Pigface(Groundcover), Melastoma (shrub), Backhousia citriodora (smlTree), Alpinia caerulea (native ginger), Native mulberry (shrub), Austromyrtus dulcis (smlShrub), Pipturus argenteus – native mulberry (shrub)

Native vegetables
Dioscorea bulbifera (vine), Native Cordyline ,Eugenia reinwardtiana (shrub), Eustrephus latifolius(climber),Geitonoplesium cymosum (climber), Castanospermum australe (lgeTree)

Exotic vegetables
Pumpkins, Sweet potato, Tomato (self-seeds), Okra, Beans, Potato (am looking into a perennial alternative), millet, sorrel, dock, parsley, rosemary, other herbs, Choko

I am currently working on extending the growing space. i have been sheet mulching before planring, and putting a barrier around the fence line to stop the neighbours grass from grwing through and taking over, which it is trying really hard to do. Grass is my worst weed!

I will post some before and after photos when the plants have grown a bit more. If anyone wants specific info on how any of these plants grow, or seeds/cuttings ( in Australia) just let me know.

9 March 2009

Hello all, this is my first Blog. I am writing in Australia, South East Queensland, to be more precise. The main topics of this Blog will be Environmental in nature, and could range from food forests, to conservation, to political action. At the moment I am very passionate about free food. I believe that the 'Supermarkets' having a monopoly on our food supply is very wrong, and that food should be grown in any available unused space; parks, road and train verges, and on council/government owned properties. School kids on their way through the front gate, hungry as they rushed that morning to get ready so skipped breakfast, and there at the school entrance , a mango tree dripping with fresh ripe fruit for them to eat. You get the picture. Unfortunately, food trees on public land are fairly rare, as council feel there is too much maintenance and liability involved.
I have, however, driven down one of these rare streets, that is actually lined with Mango trees, and in their season have seen many foragers helping them selves, and therefore preventing a mess building up under the tree( maintenance), and have not heard( and hope not to) of anyone suing or complaining.
So if council is not prepared to do anything, I think that we should be able to. This year, one of my goals is to plant as many edible trees/plants as I can, both exotic and native. I have heard many other people say that fruit trees should be in parks, etc, so if you think one should be there, plant one!
Well, that is all for today.