Farm Up-Date January 2010

The mango season is upon us with a vengeance and Mango Madness is the order of the day.There is nothing to compare to the flavour of tree ripened fruit, picked freshly from your own tree. This is especially so if the fruit is on the outside of the tree and is sun-kissed which further enhances the flavour. Windfalls quite often provide the ultimate in flavour as they tend to fall at the height of maturity.

Our passion fruits are just commencing to ripen too, and of course this is a fruit about which we are also quite passionate(pun intended).

The strawberry Guavas have set their fruit and should be maturing in about 3 to 4 weeks.

The pesimmon tree is one which I must admit I had not expected to grow in this  climate as it is a deciduous tree and native to the mediterranean regions. Perhaps because it is a seedling tree and grown from seed from a tree which is growing at Atherton, a much cooler climate, yet relatively close as things go. And it is thriving as can be seen by the clusters of fruit that it has set.

Our tomato crop is commencing to ripen, with the promise of a good harvest once again. This is not the best time of the year for them as they tend to be effected by the humidity with many rotting on the vine. Then if it rains, which of course it should do at this time of the year, and they are in contact with the ground, then this can also cause rotting. Of course, as the experts will say, I should be growing them on stakes or a trellis of some description. And I feel sure this will occur at some stage in the future. For the moment the priorities lie in other directions and we are picking enough to supply our needs.

And our bean crop continues to provide us with enough for our weekly needs.

One of our recent bonus' was to have four inches of rain in the twenty four hours of New Years eve and New Years day. A great start to the wet season being quite gentle too so that it did not cause any undue erosion and will enable the grass to become better established to protect the soil even further when the heavier rains do occur.

As can be seen, we are blessed with a wonderful commencement to the New Year, and take this opportunity to wish all of our readers a bountiful and fulfilling 2010.