5. Good Organic Gardening - September-October 2016 AvxHome.in

Kay & Mark Delahunt | GARDENING FOLK
Gardening tips
1. Plant trees. If you move into a new
house, make planting trees the first
thing you do (yes, even before you
unpack). It gives the garden structure.
When the trees have grown, then
smaller under-plantings can take place.
2. Don’t be afraid to try new things in the
garden. Grow varieties that interest
and excite you. Every garden is an
experiment and every “mistake” is an
opportunity to learn.
Beautiful braided garlic
Paradise pears
from Emily, Charlotte and Anne, the family’s
silver-laced Wyandottes that provide a
constant supply of eggs. “The chooks are
pets and are very tame. They get to spend
a few hours each day running free in the
garden, having dust baths and scratching
around. We feed them fresh vegies as well as
grain. Their favourite food is watermelon.”
Whenever Kay and Mark head to Sydney
to visit their two daughters they come with a
car loaded with fresh fruit, vegetables, eggs
and homemade preserves, so their girls never
forget the taste of homegrown goodness.
Some of Kay’s prized preserves include
bread-and-butter cucumbers, pickled walnuts,
Home-preserved lemons
Kay’s rose petal jam
Native blackberries
“Our garden is a labour
of love, we enjoy the time
spent in it and are not
trying to cut corners.
We want to produce
the healthiest fruit and
vegetables we can, for
ourselves and also the
rest of the family.”
green tomato pickles, Rajasthani cumquat
pickle and preserved lemons.
In the Nundle calendar, March is
blackberry season and every year Kay and
Mark spend their weekends picking buckets
of berries, which are later simmered into
jam and neatly tucked into pies. If there’s a
period of heavy rain, Mark will wake up early
and forage for mushrooms in the forest,
which Kay will turn into a delicious breakfast
to be enjoyed on the deck.
“If the truffles work out … well, that’s great,”
says Kay. “And if they don’t, we’ve still created
the most beautiful view.”
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