Advice. Ideas.
Inspiration
Anita’s Garden
Volume 3, Issue 35
Useful Links Editorial
Webpage
Blog Welcome to the thirty-fifth issue of
my newsletter for Volume 3.
Newsletter back issues
I hope you are all well. I’d like to take
Facebook this opportunity to warmly welcome
new subscribers to my newsletter.
Instagram
We are well and truly into autumn
Twitter
now, so don’t delay sowing and plant-
Linkedin ing seedlings for the cooler months.
Carrots can be sowed direct to the
Pinterest ground or in containers that are deep
enough. I grow them successfully in
35 litre buckets. Italian Seeds Pronto
have brought back carrots to their
Contact me
range. Choose from Nantese di Chi-
oggia, Parisier Market, Chantenay
 Feedback
and Jaune du Doubs. I have grown
 Newsletter input these in the past with much success.
(tips, recipes, gar-
den photos etc) Radish can also be sown direct to
where you want to grow them, or in
 To be added to my containers if you’re short on space.
mailing list Italian Seeds Pronto also have a love-
ly selection of radish. Choose from
anitakundu.nz@gmail.com
Zlata, Gaudry, Ravanelli Colorati and
Dattero Rosso. We love Zlata as it is
stands out as a particularly sweet
variety.
Inside this issue:
Our beetroot and kohlrabi are doing
very nicely. If you haven’t already
sown yours, it’s not too late to pop
P ot te r ing aro u nd 2 some in but I would start from seed-
Anita’s Garden lings rather than propagating them
from seed at this stage. Awapuni
stock three beetroot varieties—
Top 5 gardening tasks 2 Cylindra, Round and Golden.
for the week
Celery is something else that needs to
go into the ground very soon if you
News 2 want it to grow a decent size by win-
ter. I propagated mine from seed
back in September and transplanted
the seedlings into six-cell punnets in
Making gardening more 3
early December. In mid-February,
enjoyable
they were large enough (and it was a
bit cooler) to plant them in the
ground. I spray my plants with liquid
19 March 2021
copper every week to prevent rust.
Leeks are also useful to have in the
winter garden. I like Gigante d’Inverno
from Italian Seeds Pronto, but it’s get-
ting a bit late to start them from seed
now. Get a head start by popping in
some established seedlings from
Awapuni.
Over the past couple of weeks, I’ve been
very busy planting brassicas—broccoli,
cabbage and broccoli. They are the
trinity of our winter garden. Again, at
this stage I would suggest popping in
plants rather than starting from seed.
Awapuni have everything that you need
for your winter brassica garden.
Choose from broccoli, red cabbage, sa-
voy cabbage, spring cabbage and cauli-
flower. Their plants are already estab-
lished, meaning that they get a head
start before the cooler temperatures set
in. I don’t mean to discourage propa-
gating brassicas from seeds by any
means. This allows you to explore the
great range of brassica seeds in the
Franchi range, available at Italian
Seeds Pronto (as mentioned on page 2).
If you missed the boat this year, re-
member to sow your seeds from the
middle of January until the end of Feb-
ruary next time. And don’t forget to
protect your seedlings from the pesky
white butterfly by applying organic der-
ris dust over them from time to time.
Useful links
 Italian Seeds Pronto
 Awapuni
 Bulbs Direct
Kind regards,
Anita Kundu
PAGE 2
Pottering around Anita’s Garden
Wondered how last week’s water-
melon looked inside? I asked my-
self the same question as it some-
times looks perfect on the outside
but isn’t ripe inside. Luckily when
I cut it, the watermelon was per-
fectly ripe, sweet and juicy. I will
definitely be growing this variety
again. It is called Charleston
Grey. I got my seeds from Egmont
Seeds. We gave half to our family
who live across the road from us.
Top 5 gardening tasks for the week
1. Plant brassicas
Now is the perfect time to be
planting brassicas. It’s starting to
get a bit cooler and the pesky
white butterfly isn’t as prevalent
outdoors now.
2. Plant tamarillos and pas-
sionfruit
If you have raised plants from
seed, you can also pop them into
News
Italian Seeds Pronto have a lovely
range of winter brassicas, includ-
ing Kale Lacinato Nero di Tosca-
na, Broccoli Calabrese, Broccoli
Spigariello, Cauliflower Roma-
nesco and Cauliflower Macerata.
This season, I’m growing the
kale, Broccoli Calabrese, Cauli-
flower Romanesco and Cauliflow-
er Macerata. All my seedlings
look very healthy and have been
A NI T A ’ S G A R D E N
About a month ago, I posted a pic-
ture of some celery seedlings I had
planted in the garden. They have
grown so much in that time! Here
they are infront (turnips are be-
hind them). I have been spraying
them with liquid copper every
week to prevent rust and so far it
has been successful. We enjoy cel-
ery in veggie soup in winter, along
with leeks, potato, carrots, turnips,
parsnip and swedes.
the garden. Don’t forget to stake
your tamarillo plants at the time
of planting to avoid damaging the
roots later on. Passionfruit climbs
and creeps, so it needs some sup-
port.
3. Order spring bulbs
Don’t delay ordering your spring
bulbs any longer, or you risk miss-
ing out on popular varieties.
planted in the garden.
Bulbs Direct have a lovely selec-
tion of Dutch Irises this season.
My all-time favourite variety is
Blue Magic, which has performed
very well in our garden season af-
ter season. We also have Golden
Beauty, Apollo and Silvery Beauty.
Dutch Iris make fabulous cut flow-
ers and last a long time in a vase.
V O LU M E 3 , I S S U E 3 5
Every week, I try to pick a bunch
of flowers from our garden and
give them to my Aunty Joan, who
lives across the road from us. This
week, I took over this beautiful
bunch of naked ladies (amaryllis
belladonna). We also harvested
the last of our dwarf beans, a zuc-
chini from a plant that never stops
producing and some feijoas.
Bulbs Direct have an incredible
selection.
4. Sow broad beans
You can either sow direct or raise
them in punnets for transplanting
later
5. Plant lettuce seedlings
They grow well in containers and
in the ground.
Awapuni have a special on at the
moment. Spend $40 (excluding
freight) and receive a FREE bun-
dle of pohutukawa seedlings (4
plants). This offer is valid until 9
am, 22 March 2021 or while stocks
last.
Awapuni also have a $5 Native
sale on this weekend if you live
handy to Palmerston North.
 V O LU M E 3 , I S S U E 3 5
Making gardening more enjoyable
Although I love gardening myself,
I do realise that it’s not everyone’s
cup of tea. I also know from my
own experience that although my
love for gardening runs very deep,
there are times that I dread it.
Gardening is hard work. It can be
monotonous, unglamorous and
downright boring, even if you do
generally enjoy it. Whether you’re
someone who dislikes gardening
outright or someone such as my-
self, who has a love-hate relation-
ship with it, there are ways that
you can make gardening more
bearable. You can even enjoy
some fringe benefits in the process!
Listening to audio while gar-
dening
Although gardening does require
concentration, I don’t think you’ll
find that you get too distracted if
you have some audio playing in
the background. Listening to mu-
sic can make gardening more en-
joyable. Create a playlist of your
favourite tracks. An alternative is
listening to podcasts. They cover a
very broad range of subjects and
can be interesting, informative and
educational. My personal favour-
ites are gardening and fitness.
Track your steps
You’ll be surprised by how many
steps you take around your garden
while you’re working in it. Invest
in a fitbit or install a pedometer on
your phone to measure the number
of steps you take. They count to-
wards your daily goal (mine is 10k
steps, as recommended by the
World Health Organisation). It
will help motivate and make you
even more active in daily life.
Host wwoofers
If gardening is becoming more of a
chore than a hobby, it’s possible to
get some help while also having
some company around the garden.
We have been hosting wwoofers for
just over three years now.
WWOOF stands for Willing Work-
ers on Organic Farms. WWOOF
A NI T A ’ S G A R D E N
exists in many countries around
the world but each country has a
separate webpage. You can either
act as a host or a volunteer. Vol-
unteers are usually travellers from
overseas (mostly young Germans
on their “gap year”). We would not
have been able to expand our gar-
den to the extent we have without
the valuable assistance of wwoof-
ers over the years. We haven’t
hosted wwoofers over the past year
due to Covid and being on our own
again has really made us appreci-
ate all the help they have given us.
It’s always interesting and refresh-
ing having young travellers from
overseas staying with us. We en-
joy teaching them about gardening
and find that we learn a lot from
them in the process, too.
Join a gardening club
This is a great way to socialise and
meet fellow gardeners. You’ll find
you learn a lot about gardening
too. Years ago, Mum and I used to
go to the Mangere-Franklin Gar-
dening Club. Unfortunately we
became too busy at home and
stopped going, but I
really did enjoy be-
“Gardening is hard work.
ing a member for a
It can be monotonous,
year. They held
unglamorous
meetings once a
downright boring, even if
month and always
you do generally enjoy it”
had a display, al-
lowing you to enter
flowers and veggies you have
grown, which are judged. There
was always a speaker who gave an
interesting talk and a trading ta-
ble. The club organised gardening
trips. We went on an outing to see
the (then) new Kings Plant Barn
in Henderson, and a couple of
smaller nurseries. Every year,
they held a longer excursion of 4-5
days on a tour bus, staying at ho-
tels along the way. It covers many
gardens and nurseries. At one of
the meetings, someone mentioned
that they had gone to a specialist
bearded iris nursery on one of the
longer garden club trips. We still
keep in touch with the club and I
do hope we are able to return one
PAGE 3
day.
Visit gardens
Visiting other gardens can make
an enjoyable outing on a pleasant
day. You’ll learn so much by see-
ing other gardens in action and
return to your own sanctuary re-
freshed and ready to take on the
world. There are several options.
You can go to public gardens, such
as the botanical gardens. We real-
ly like Eden Garden in Auckland.
Some private gardens are open for
visits. Check whether you have to
make a booking first. I do get
many requests from people asking
whether they can visit our garden.
Unfortunately, our garden is not
open to the public. We are both
very busy working in our garden,
especially since we no longer have
help from wwoofers since Covid.
We just don’t have time to do
tours. Furthermore, our garden is
not up to the standard that it
needs to be in order to show people
around.
Join a gardening group on Fa-
cebook
There are plenty
of great garden-
ing groups on
and
Facebook, rang-
ing from general
gardening (for
example, veggies
and flowers) to the more specific
(dahlias and roses). You’ll receive
updates in your thread, which will
help motivate you around your
own garden. You can post ques-
tions or problems you have and
respond to other people’s posts.
It’s a great way of making friends
and finding other gardeners in
your area. I have met some lovely
people through the gardening
groups I belong to and we meet up
from time to time.
Have a good weekend
Happy gardening!