Growing smaller plants in the Clare Valley of South Australia

Kennedia prostrata growing over a stone retaining wall, 2007

Introduction

This page was created so that shrubs and ground covers could be added to the trees already covered by my page, Growing Trees in the Clare Valley.

Contents of this page Shrubs Vines and creepers Ground-covers Herbs Vegetables Index

One of my aims is to help create a largely self-sufficient community in the Clare Valley.

BoM rainfall statistics, Clare PO
Month	Jan	Feb	Mar	Apr	May	Jun	Jul	Aug	Sep	Oct	Nov	Dec	Year
Av. Rain	25	24	25	47	73	80	82	80	73	57	37	29	632
Med. Rain	16	15	18	38	65	78	76	78	64	49	30	23	625

Shrubs

Sturt's desert rose growing on a retaining wall, 2007

Sturt's desert rose, Gossipium sturtii

It is fast growing, but tends to become straggly after a few years and lives only for five to ten years. It is easily propagated from seed.

It is a native of the dry inland of Australia.

Yacca, Grass tree, Blackboy: Xanthorrhoea quadrangulata

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I grew fifty or so yaccas from seed. Of perhaps twenty that were planted at Elysium about 1995-98 around five are still alive.

They are slow growing and they seem to need to be watered periodically through summer if they are to establish in the Elysium soil. This one is among other garden plants and was watered every week or two during its first few summers. Once established they need no water other than natural rainfall.

It seems useful to plant yaccas in an elevated bed, such as can be made by placing a couple of car tyres on top of each other and filling with earth.

Vines and creepers

Photographed on 2005/11/02

Kiwi fruit

These plants have not yet produced any fruit.

It is now April 2008. The Kiwis are much bigger, but still no fruit.

This Coral Pea is supported by a wire-netting tree guard which has long since ceased to be visible. Photographed 2005/03/10.

Black Coral Pea, 2007

Ground-covers

Creeping boobialla growing in my garden, 2007

Creeping Boobialla

It should be protected from grazing animals. It handles some foot traffic.

Creeping boobialla will creep a metre or so and climb to some extent.

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Creeping boobialla growing over a dam wall, 2007

Herbs

Basil

Basil, 2007

The soil it is in has been built up using lots of sawdust mulch and more recently cow manure over a period of four years or so.

Parsley

Flat leafed parsley, 2007

The soil it is in has been built up using lots of sawdust mulch and more recently cow manure over a period of four years or so.

Vegetables

Climbing peas

Pumpkins

Pumpkins, 2007

Pumpkins will cover a lot of ground in a few months in the summer. They do need some watering, but are very tolerant of heat.

On a hot day the plants will wilt. This seems to be a mechanism to limit exposure to the overhead sun. They recover thoroughly from wilting at night unless desperately short of water.

If you wanted to grow survival food in the Clare Valley you would have a hard time finding anything better than pumpkins and sweet potatoes.

Onions

Tree onions, 2007

Rhubarb

Rhubarb Late May, 2007

The plant in the photo is getting ready to die-back for winter.

In 2008 they died-back earlier, due probably to the record heat-wave and the drought.

In 2009 this plant did not die back over winter at all. This presumably was due to the lack of severe frosts; my wife and I noticed that many of the ferral briars in the area also retained their leaves right through winter.

Sweet potato

Sweet potato tops, 2007

Sweet potato roots, 2007

I first planted some cuttings in mid-summer 2007; it would have been much better to have planted them in spring (after the risk of frosts has finished), but a neighbour gave me some in summer.

I am very impressed at how easy they are to grow; exceptionally easy to plant from cuttings and easy to keep growing. They seem to need little water in summer and do not suffer much from insects. There was some damage from slugs or snails, but the plants grew so quickly that they seemed to out-grow the predators.

The size of the roots in the photo (the larger one is 800g) is surprising considering the shortness of the growing season these plants had. The first frosts of winter killed off the above ground parts. The two roots in the photo came from just one plant.

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2008 notes

From one plant, 2008/04/28

I need to learn to grow smaller ones; these tend to go slimy before they can be eaten.

Probably the simplest way to grow smaller ones will be by keeping plants from getting too big. They could either be planted more closely together, or more plants forced by dumping a spade-full of dirt on the runners to encourage rooting, and then chopping the runners.

Another way of growing them smaller would, in theory, be to harvest them after they have grown for a shorter period; perhaps a couple of months. In practice this is not easy; it is difficult to pick the right time to dig them without greatly disterbing the roots.

The dog is for scale.

2009 notes

My record sweet potato is now 7kg (although I'd rather not grow them so big), and I've had 14kg of tubers on one plant.

Index