Autumn would have to be my favourite time of the year. There is so much happening in the garden. Pruning, tidying the perennials, planting out the Winter veggie garden and of course lots of raking leaves as those pretty changing colours start to fall to the ground.
This year as we have had 6 plus weeks of Covid-19 isolation I have enjoyed some extra time in the garden. I do not work a lot but the part-time work I was doing from home had to be ceased and so I threw myself into the garden and walking for exercise.
On my 3/4's of an acre I have around 22 fruit tree's out the rear and 3 large weeping cherries at the front and each day I made an effort to collect these leaves for the 2 worm farms and the 7 compost area's we have running, You can essentially put all your leaves that break down well - maybe leave any Eucalypt leaves out into your compost, I had the food scraps the chooks don't eat and some drier material such as sugar cane mulch if case it gets too wet and of course grass clippings.
I have mostly the black compost bins and so turning the pile is crucial, I have brought some good tools for this, and I have 2 compost area's the chickens can access. They do the turning for me as they fossick through the pile looking for any edible food and bugs.
In the past, I used to collect other peoples leaves of the streets, before I realised if I was quick enough before all the winds came I could collect enough here for decent compost from my own trees.
Realistically in past I never really had much time, but Covid has slowed downtime for me and given me this silver lining I can use to benefit my gardens, so come spring, I will have lots of lovely compost for the veggie garden and Summer plots.
Keep safe. xx
