hello from gippsland, australia

[neen]

A big hello to everyone, have been looking through the site and decided that I just have to be involved. Happy to learn as much as I can off everyone. We live on a smallish block (2/3 of an acre) in Gippsland which has a temperate climate with reasonable rainfall normally (who knows what will happen?) We have been at this for a while but lately the urgency of growing our own food and reducing our ecological impact has been our major focus. We have chooks, ducks, worms, in excess of 150 fruit trees and lots of vegies but still have a long way to go. My better half is building a wind generator and we are working on reducing water usage and recycling grey water. We rely on rainfall as our water supply and are therefore very interested in any water saving ideas.
Looking forward to getting to know you and sharing in the collective knowledge
regards
Neen

[Shirley]

Hi Neen

:welcomeish:

Looking forward to hearing more from you

[gunners71uk]

hi neen welcome do you move your chicken run around then rest it then put veg where your chooks use to be super veg.lol
regards dave

[The Chili Monster]

[Andy Hamilton]

HEllo there and welcome

I have been reading up on ways of saving water myself of late and have found all sorts of good ideas out there, my favorite is the thing you have fitted under the plug hole in your shower that collect the hot water and pumps it back around the central heating.

[neen]

thanks for the welcome, all. My chickens have two established runs that I can alternate, because if they get amongst the fruit trees they go rampant in the mulch, sometimes damaging the roots. The vegies still get the super treatment, but it is delivered via a shovel...the ducks are allowed to free range, so hopefully they are doing their part.
I recently purchased a washing machine that uses 36 litres for a full load and that has had a huge impact on our water usage, along with the low flow shower head. The shower head took a while to get used to, but at least the kids don't stay in the shower forever now, they absolutely hate it and went close to a full scale rebellion over it. Over here, we just don't have the water to waste. Our grey water is used on our fruit trees and has kept them alive for years. We are experimenting with an organic solution to be used in a hydroponic system. This is far from a natural method, but super efficient with water. I wonder if others have tried hydroponics (for vegies only, of course!)
cheers
Neen

[Christine]

Hello, Neen
I'm glad to read about your use of grey water on trees - my sister insists that it's bad for plants but diverted water from the washing machine kept my immature garden going in a drought year some time ago. Where I live, we don't often get problems with lack of rain - it's all dumped on us as it comes over the Peaks! July was a rare rainless month this year but it started raining on the first of August and didn't stop till the end of October.

[neen]

Christine, so jealous of your rainfall, we are facing the lowest rainfall on record. I use an environmentally friendly washing detergent and keep an eye on the soil pH (I am a part time Laboratory Technician) and so far so good. Water in Australia is a huge political issue at the moment
cheers
neen

[Wombat]

G'Day Neen,

I used to be an industrial Chemist, who do you work for. I also spent a couple of years mucking around with organic hydoponics but never really was satisfied with the results. I need the tile to be able to be more systematic about it!

Oh, and welcome to the site!

Nev

[gunners71uk]

nev is hydoponics the way forward or is it not cost effective dont see much of it down me allotment lol
regards dave

[Wombat]

G'Day Dave,

Orthodox hydroponics uses finely tuned mixtures of chemicals in solution to grow........whatever. I suspect some of the early claims were a bit over inflated, but I have some old books on it and it is pretty impressive. The problem is most of the chemicals are impossible to home produce and are also, of course not "organic".

We have a number of hydroponic shops which sell grow lights and cabinets, chenicals, books and basically all you need to raise your own stash inside away from the authorities. For this purpose it is ideal!

I tried organic hydroponics using a mix of one part wood ash, one part compost, one part chook poo - about 500mls each - dissolved in about 20 litres of water and left to brew for about a week. Subsequent reading and thought suggests that the compost should be replaced by workcastings.

Generally speaking I only got fair results but I think this is afertile field (so to speak) with a lot of room for research. I was trying to grow lettuce. Another variation is aquaponics, where you grow fish and then use the effluent water to grow veggies.

Hope that this helps, mate!

Nev

[gunners71uk]

thanks for that technical lesson.
regards dave

[hedgewitch]

Hello neen and welcome to the ishers.

[neen]

Hi there Nev,
I have worked primarily in the dairy industry and mostly in Micro Labs. At the moment I do three days a week at a secondary school (and get to experiment with their hydroponic set up amongst other crazy but fun things) I still do casual shifts at Fonterra, basic raw milk analysis.
I recently found a recipe for organic hydroponic solution on the net,
1 1/2 teaspoons fish emulsion
1 1/2 teaspoons liquid seaweed
1 teaspoon bloodmeal
all to a gallon of water
Apart from being incredibly fragrant, does anyone have any thoughts?
Do you reckon it will work?
(this recipe came from mother earth news)
I might set up a trial and see what happens
thanks for all the welcomes, too!
cheers
neen

[Wombat]

G'Day Neen!

Thanks for that, I suppose the stuff that i was experimenting with was home produceable (if such a word exists). Have to have a look at this a bit more!

Nev