Christmas around the corner

This week as promised

• Rocket Science Workshop
• Christmas Recipes
• Drought proofing your garden
•  Zucchinis

Ok, first off the ranks, Rocket Science, lets just say its the edible kind of Rocquette so don't be afraid, Camden Council is running this in conjunction  with Camden Kids, preference will be given to children <6yrs old not engaged in formal childcare, enquiries can be made via 46455106, the workshops will run for an hour, adults must accompany children, its a free workshop and is on the 17th and 19th of December at Camden Community Garden on the Town Farm site. The workshops will be a chance for youngsters (and adults) to get their hands dirty, learn a little about the origins of their food as well as take home some uselful goodies.

First off your favourite Christmas recipes from around, and to save you looking everywhere and me typing endless mateial in try the next couple of links, Taste.com.au, Saveur.com, Christmas with maggie beer, these should keep you going for some time.

Summer has hit with a vengance out west, Camden recorded 37.3, and if your wondering do i need to drought proof my garden the following figures might help, courtesy of BOM.

Month	Ave Rainfall, mm	Max Temp, C	Ave Temp, C
August	3.4	29.3	19.5
September	21.8	33.9	23.4
October	34.2	34.9	25.4
November	30.0	37.3	26.3

Here is a link from ABC Gardening Australia, Mulching Vegetables. The following link is to last weekends episode of the same show regarding cooling our streets and was well worth watching for the bigger picture, Cooling our streets.

The small one is tennis ball size.

As the weather warms up crops are starting to produce copious quantities of produce, and one to certainly keep on top of are cucurbits, namely squash, zucchini, pumpkins and the likes of cucumbers, depending on the quantity planted you could well find yourself loving or hating them, so make sure you pick them in their prime as it only takes a couple of days to go from 8 ball to soccer ball, or Zucchini to Marrow, (see pic).

One common affliction of this family of veg is powdery mildew and the organic control of this is certainly reccomended, here is a discussion on the most popular method, Garden Web, Mildew discussion. Also have a look at this link from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Rbgsyd.nsw.gov.au

In the news next time

• Its tomato time.
• Camden rolls out "Purple Carpet"