Camden Show

MCSL Girls

April Update

This Update

• Camden Show 

Camden Show

Forget the other show, the only show you needed to go to was Camden Show, this year was bigger than ever and the first year we had been really involved, this year Camden Community Garden partnered with Macarthur Centre for Sustainable Living, Sydney Uni - Cobbitty and the local Spinners and Weavers to put togther a kids interactive display following our produce from seed to plate, or seed to clothes. Sydney Uni together with a great bunch of staff and volunteers highlighted cotton and wools
journey from the plant to clothes, they also showed wheat, oats, rice and corn in their various stages
of growth and followed the cycle from the plant to the

James from the Uni with 2 St Pauls School Kids

end product. The Spinners and Weavers provided the link from wool and cotton to clothes, the Community Gardens encouraged people to take free seedlings grown by themselves and MCSL, there were an assortment of seasonal seedlings on offer and leftovers are being given away to various community organisations.
MCSL kept the kids busy with informative and intercative stuff from kite making to lots of craft, fruit and veggie carving as well as composting and worm farm info sessions, this was on top of all the useful info for the mums and dads on saving money at home. At the end of the weekend the whole display picked up best community stand and the presidents award. Thanks to all involved.

"I love a sunburnt country,
A land of sweeping plains,
Of ragged mountain ranges,
Of droughts and flooding rains."

How true it is

You will find the BOM link on previous posts and can certainly confirm the sentiments behind this classic Dorothea Mackellars poem, less than 48hrs ago sections of the south coast saw water spouts come ashore and reek havoc on coastal suburbs and with that change came plenty of the wet stuff. 

You couldn't pick it 24hrs later and the temps are back into the 30s and the sydney basin feels more like a Borneo rainforest.

can you find steve

Monster squash

So how does this affect the garden, well its all good, for those larger gardens i guess if you couldn't see the weeds last week you can now, for the greenkeepers, its not a matter of keeping them green anymore its keeping them cut before it rains again.

Sweet Potatoes at A/B Mens Shed

Camden Community Garden has been no different, while the rain tended to drive people in doors the serious and/or committed (maybe should be committed) are still out there, weeds not more than a few inches high had now reached dizzying heights, so with a coming together of half a dozen or so souls on the weekend an assault was made on some of the bigger ones. (see image right, Steve is 6ft plus and not standing in a hole). I might add the rain allowed easy removal of many of the larger weeds. The past month has seen considerable rainfall in the southwestern part of the Sydney basin and this has delivered some great results in the gardens, it had been hoped we would have pumpkins in time for the local show, unfortunately we didn't get enough early rain however those pumpkins have now gone crazy and thrown on several metres of growth in a matter of weeks, sweet potatoes are running like crazy and will no doubt produce a prolific crop come the cooler months. If you love zucchinis and squash, look no further than Camden Community Garden, i overheard someone the other night talking about how they grow even more on a full moon and how they would harvest night and morning, it looks like we had a full moon every night from the pic attached, numerous local gardeners have benefited from the harvest as well as some community members. This will continue as well.

Tropical Camden

Camden gone tropical

This update contains:

• Heat waves and floods                
• Goings on in the garden
• Past and upcoming events
• Veggies to plant now

Heatwaves and flooding rain

Little Sandy underwater again.

Only a week ago we were staring down the barrel of drought, feed cut on the town farm and baled months ago was now in high demand and the lagoon which looks a bit like a dinosaur or a Sea World sea lion was receeding rapidly. The lagoon is now full, the feral goats are munching on the new lucerne sprigs down buy the river, Zucchinis are growing before our eyes and the front lawn of the community garden could be almost baled as well. If you want to see the crazy weather figures including 125mm of rain in one hit and 46.4 degrees C click on the following link. www.bom.gov.au

Goings on

New garden beds.

We can't say it wasn't a relief to see some rain, watering constantly and wisely had been quite tough in the community gardens in the oppressive heat, so some deep soaking rain was very welcome, this came luckily only a week after the working bee which in turn was a couple of days after the 46.4 temp reached in camden, so we escaped both extremes, the gardening bee had a good turnout with approx 15 folk attending on the day, it turned into soemthing of a construction day with several new garden beds being built from the sleepers delivered in the days prior, these beds are now starting to fill the head of the platypus out, a tool shed (currently held at the council depot) will mahe up the other eye of the platypus once a base goes down, (over the next 2 weeks), also on the day some curved beds were finished off, as well as native seedlings potted up, some vacant beds also were cleared ready for the new folk and the lawns mowed. Potatoes are still being harvested and another delivery will go to Narellan Congregational Community Service next week with i dare say some squash or zucchinis. A big thankyou to all in attendance as well as the guys that turned up to volunteer at our stall at the produce markets, the funds raised went back into the Community Gardens and fed the troops at the working bee.

Autumn or is it Summer.

Autumn in Camden Community Garden, and an update


Hawk Moth Caterpillars

Summer became Winter and now Autumn has become Summer, it certainly has saved us watering over Summer but its played havoc in the gardens, feathered freinds have a veritable smorgasboard of bugs to choose from with these big fat juicy caterpillars turning up in thier droves to munch on sweet potatoes, we have sighted several forms of these mass defoliation critters, 2 forms are pictured, but the local magpies and butcher birds have finally found them.



Harlequin Beetles

Thankfully they seem to have limited their diet to sweet potatoes, although snails have had a field day on beans around the gardens.



Harlequin Beetles just seem to be everywhere and if we can find a biological control now would be the time to implement it.

All the rain and humidity through summer had a detrimental effect on the likes of pumpkin, cucumbers, and watermelons, powdery mildew was rampant and alot of plants ended up rotting off. We have managed to get a batch of Qld Blue pumpkin in the ground and these have taken off, we hope to have this cropped picked going into winter, sadly not in time for the Camden Show.