Garden Progress Since January

So I left you all on a lurch last blog without showing you what the garden looked like when we returned from Mozambique after 3 weeks....well, to be honest, I don't have a picture of that garden because it was so disgraceful!!! I just couldn't take a pic of it.

The friend from the market that agreed to help with the garden (to split the end harvest) and who I paid to care for the garden over Christmas wasn't so much interested in doing any garden keeping as he was "managing". Apparently he showed up a couple of times (drunk I'm told) telling other labourers around to work in the garden and that I would pay them upon my arrival. Haven't no agreement with me, no one else did any work, and so the garden went back to its original state of weeds and long grasses. Our "friendship" suffered for a couple of months but we are working things out little by little.

Lessons learned are: to hire gardeners for gardens and let the market vendors do what they does best, sell in the market; have clear written agreements; sometimes "yes" in another culture doesn't really mean "yes" as I may know it; maybe don't start a garden before going on a 3 week holiday :).

So after returning and spending a week remaking the beds, weeding, salvaging the seedlings that emerged and doing alot of planting.... the garden finally looked as it did below on my birthday, Jan 13. You can see the 2 beds in the far right corner is green with weeds, that is pretty much what all the beds looked like before.

Starting anew, January 13, planted.

Planted at this stage is lettuce, spinach, corn, cucumbers, watermelon, strawberries, carrots, rhubarb, parsley, coriander, peppers, radish, cauliflower, broccoli, tomatoes. A couple of weeks later the corn was coming up well along with cauliflower and cucumber seedlings. The coriander was already flowering (finicky herb) so I planted some more for a constant harvest.

Signs of growth, Feb 6th

Watering is a twice daily every day chore (unless it rains!). Since I could not find a hose in Zomba, I started out the first weeks filling up two 10 L watering cans at our home, about 30 m from the garden and lugged them back and forth and back and forth. At 2 cans per bed with 25 or so beds, lugging 50 pounds of water 30m and back 25 times is a GREAT workout. Who needs a gym?? It reminded me of the Disney movie Fantasia where Mickey Mouse is carrying buckets of water and magically gets his broomstick to carry them for him until it all goes out of control....I wish I had a magical broomstick....or at least a hose..

Watering the garden one can at a time. Cans are made in the local market by metal workers!

A hose!

So finally in Blantyre one weekend I bought a hose, so now I could at least reduce the lugging back and forth but I still use the cans since I can weed while they fill and it saves on time (sitting there with the hose for 1.5 hours is not that productive). What about a good sprinkler system, you say? Our water pressure is pathetic so it wouldn't work and besides the only sprinklers available are crazy expensive. Irrigation has not come yet to most of Malawi. Most everyone depends on rain fed agriculture...and the rain presented more issues as I will describe further down.

By mid-February I was excited to pick our first strawberry! Not quite enough for jam, but nice to see some results!

First strawberry picked with a rough looking haircut.

Radishes are ready!

 Around the same time the radishes were also becoming ready to harvest (after less than 4 weeks). Now, I enjoy a radish or two in a salad but I planted way more than I can eat (Danny doesn't like them at all). I chatted with my vegetable vendor in the market, he needed radishes and so we agreed that he would buy them from me. It was time to harvest!

Washing the harvested radishes with Mary, our daytime security.

Ready to go to market!

 So I ended up selling 80 radishes for 800 kwacha credit at his vegetable stand. A good deal for both of us I suppose. A bunch of 3 to 4 radishes goes for about 50 kwacha (25 cents) in the market so I got some free veggies and he made some profit: win-win...plus I didn't have to eat 80 radishes...(they aren't as flavourful as mangoes you know).

Other consistent harvests are the herbs, coriander and parsley which adds nicely to our cooking.

Feb 25th, still looking brown but lots coming up

 It is currently rainy season which means hot days with the chance of thunderstorm in the afternoon. Most weeks however it doesn't rain for days and then the cats and dogs fall. Towards the end of February, the rains were so heavy on a couple of days that half the garden flooded. The pics show it after it lighten up a bit but imagine the beds from the tree in the garden on the right side to the wall, completely underwater! Ugh, there washes away new plantings and seedlings, leaving a mess of debris and weeds.... I thought of all the Malawian farmers who rely on their gardens for their livelihood, with me it's a hobby and a lost bed isn't the end of the world. More respect for them!

Heavy rains flooding the garden.

Rain rain go away....

 And so with a new respect for the elements, the next days I dug a ditch around the garden to divert flowing water away as well as some internal canals to keep the water flow in check. The garden expanded as, along the ridge of the ditch, I planted more lettuce and cucumbers as well as seeds from a pumpkin I bought in the market ...they are coming in nicely nowadays.

Water control

And so with the weeding, watering and water control, the garden is growing nicely. The corn now has tassels (cobs to come), dozens of cucumbers are growing and little tomatoes are showing. Next blog I'll show some up close pics of the plants. Thanks for reading!

March 1st, hope the corn is done before we go!