Box Hill Job

In late 2013 I completed this design for some clients in Box Hill, after a consultation process. 

Paying particular attention to the back yard, they wanted to have play space for their children, some garden beds for growing veggies and some as lower maintenance gardens, back yard chickens, and some fruit trees, while maintaining a small section of lawn, surrounding the old Japanese maple.

In order to make way for the orchard we had to bring in the big machines, which we used to pull and and remove 40 odd cubic metres of concrete, a bunch of scrub and to re-arrange a bit of dirt too...

 To end up with a clean slate ready for re-building

:( this gall wasp ridden lemon tree eventually went too! ):

We installed these retaining walls using recycled railway sleepers and gravel (no concrete).

 Then started work on the VEG style chicken coop and orchard system

 Then we added some edging and sheet mulched over the top of fertilized, mineralised and de-compacted soil. The paths were underlayed with crushed rock road base. 

 ...and finished with the native and perennial gardens, evergreen olives and citrus, sand pit, grey water and irrigation systems, and a shed with water tank.

Winter planting of fruit trees to follow...

Agroforestry Pruning

More recently I have been pruning some trees at Dalpura, an Agroforestry property in the Otways. 

We have been lifting these eucalypts in order to create longer sections of stem for future harvesting.
We build piles of the prunings to add organic matter to every second row, which are being preserved as both habitat and as felling rows for when it comes time to harvest the trees.

Some trees are 'thinned' or removed to make way for the straighter and more vigorous trees. I addition the felled trees re-shoot from the base and after a time the best shoot is selected as a new stem, a process known as coppicing.

The result is a multi-generational and diverse forest which has both medium and long term yields.

Some of the smaller stems harvested will be inoculated with mushroom spawn for Shitake production, while the rest is harvested as firewood. Eventually the remaining and most vigorous trees will be harvested for varying grades of timber.

2013 creatons INCLUDING WICKING BEDS

I have been working on a few new projects both in my local suburb of Ivanhoe and further-a-field.

 This terraced 'wicking bed' system is surrounded by a possum proof structure and is attached to a fox proof chicken coup.

'Wicking beds' are like giant self watering pots which have a range of benefits, particularly in our water poor climate.

Also, the paving in the back garden of the same house in Ivanhoe is made up of recycled concrete, broken up at another clients place and relaid here as 'crazy paving'. 

 

Further more the soil is being improved utilising a rainwater harvesting and infiltration system, sheet mulching, worm castings, and compost.

With some help, I have been restoring and relaying some of the rock work at St.Michael's Church (cnr Collins St and Russell St).



Furthermore I will be adding plants and maintaining the garden for the next foreseeable future. 

 

Over the bridge in Newport I implemented another VEG design, with raised beds, chook house, and chook run/orchard. 

 The berries in the front will benefit from a laundry-to-landscape greywater system.

VEG

For the past year and a half I have been designing and implementing landscapes with Very Edible Gardens. Here are some examples of the work we have completed;

A community gardens project in Strathmore:

 A landscape in Rosanna:

Before:

 After:

         

with a VEG straw yard and chicken run: 

 and a pond

A landscape in Northcote with recycled concrete crazy paving and VEG beds:

Before:

and after:

Kew Children's Garden.

In 2011 I completed this landscape in the front yard of a friends house in Kew. The yard is shaded by some very large Lemon Scented Gums and was previously filled with shaded out native trees and shrubs, rendering the space unusable.  The basic idea here was to create a lush under-story and have a functional garden under the canopy of these huge trees, while ensuring the trees have a long life also. My friends wanted a space which was both fun for their kids and was still a welcoming and attratctive front entrance to their house. This project was completed with their help as well as with some water system help from Raphael Schouten.

After clearing the space of most of the under-story, we created a wet/dry creek bed, which runs off storm water into the property. Such that when ever it rains water flows through the system soaking into basins along the way, and back to storm water again. A beach of granitic sand leads down to the river bend which can be crossed over a bridge of large rocks.

A grey-water system running off the laundry was also installed to ensure the under-story received adequate water to the root zone, as not a lot of rain gets through the canopy of the large trees.

A branch of one of the Gums was blocking out a large portion of valuable winter sun. This branch was removed and recycled into the pyramid feature/play equipment which you can see here.

Further more the jetty boardwalk was constructed out of painstakingly dismantled timber from the old front gate, and doubles as a bench seat for adults and kids alike.

The owners built the cubby house (which has since been converted to a chook house for their recently added bantam chickens!).

The  under-story of shade tolerant native trees, shrubs, herbaceous perennials and tree ferns which we planted have flourished in the rainforest like conditions created. One year on...
...and now today:

Port Melbourne

Here in Port Melbourne the client wanted to make use of the somewhat small and wind swept elevated deck in order to grow some food for their adjacent kitchen.

These clients are pretty keen collectors and recyclers so

they already had a bunch of materials and off-cuts which I was able to re-organise into garden structures...

... a pot stand for herbs.

We also had some boxes made up which were lined and turned into 'wicking garden' beds.

Plants have both thrived and died in this challenging space. The wind is always a factor but not half as damaging as the wildlife!

A work still in progress, the next stage will be getting climbers established on the windwood side and above to provide a sheltered sitting environment.