A day off and a tour of Angelo’s garden.

I’ve had a date marked in my calendar for a while now, and marked in my brain for 12 months. Angelo from Deep Green Permaculture opened his gardens up for visitors to see this last Saturday and Sunday and I was most keen to check it out. 🙂

Permission was sought and granted for me to leave the kids with Martin and take some time off and we coordinated how we were to run the day as my nephew turned 8 on the Saturday and we had a birthday party to attend Sunday afternoon.

After a night of precious little sleep I headed off to the train station via shanks pony  to cover the 1.7km walk. I spent the time on the train talking to the V-Line staff about all things gardening and tree-change whilst knitting length into the jumper I’ve been making myself. Then, after a quick coffee I caught the tram out to Angelo’s place. From the tram stop to his house was another short walk of about 500m.

First it needs to be said that Angelo’s garden is tiny! There is a mere 60m² (640² feet) yet every spare inch of it (and several inches you would never think would be spare) are filled with plants. And I mean FILLED! Paths are difficult to locate but still easily accessible with a little care to the overhanging plants, and in hiding holes around corners where you would think nothing would or could grow, there are pots and so much more. It’s one of the most exciting gardens I’ve ever had the pleasure to visit.

Before I share my photos, know that Geoff Lawton created a video for Urban Permaculture in Angelo’s garden and if Geoff thinks it’s good then it must indeed be amazing! 🙂 The video is here but you do need to sign up for Geoff’s videos. There aren’t too many that come out and none of them are very long so signing up won’t spam you, I promise. 🙂 Click HERE for the video.

I arrived a little after Angelo started the 11:30am tour but there is no way it could be a tour in the conventional sense. Instead, Angelo stood and spoke, answering questions and more whilst people crowded in to listen.

Yeah, I wasn’t getting any closer until some people left.

Grapes up the wall along with another vine I don’t recognise.

More grapes and fruit to boot. This is from a potted grape. And can anyone identify the thick stemmed succulent-looking plant?

And the potted Keriberry looked more than healthy, heading out to meet up with the grapes.

When I did manage to get in the gate it was like walking into a green oasis. Each square metre was planted out with several different plants. For example, the first garden I saw had a purple cherry tomato with mint, strawberries, a large citrus tree crowded with fruit, a ferny herb I didn’t recognise, a Chilean guava bush, an unidentified berry and more. The next metre of garden bed was planted with another selection of plants, all different but all growing beautifully together.

The Chilean Guava surrounded with mint and strawberries, a berry, the large citrus (lemon I think) to the south (left), an apple in there too and more.

And the purple fruiting cherry tomato in there. It’s in a surprising amount of shade but the fruit are beginning to ripen and there were several fruit on the vine so it’s doing well.

I saw many plants usually considered tropical and even though Melbourne is a temperate climate they do still see frosts. I can’t count the amount of (presumably dwarf) bananas I saw growing around the place. I also saw other tropical plants including arrowroot, turmeric and members of the ginger family, a dwarf mango and more I can’t remember.  too. I saw cactuses to cranberries, raspberries to keriberries, bamboo to persimmon, apples and nectarines and peaches and plums as well as grapes, currants, liquorice, hops, tansy, fennel, potatoes, citrus and more. There was a lovely scented rose-bush, vines trailing and reaching for the sky and even the good old Hills Hoist was becoming a dual purpose tool, being grabbed onto by the grapes as they reached for the sun.

Looking above the tomatoes and mint to the bananas.

There were nutrient mining plants everywhere. Yarrow here but comfrey was also in abundance.

Apples

Greenery greenery everywhere

 

One of the surprising things about the garden is its lack of height. The neighbours have a large olive tree, a huge fig and more yet nothing in Angelo’s garden would have been higher than 7-8 feet and at most the grapes might have reached 10ft up along a wire trellis on the side of the house. Perhaps the potted bamboo might have scraped in at 11ft. Maybe.

A dwarf nectarine. Never bothered by possums as it’s too low down and closed in for them to be comfortable. The neighbours taller fruit trees are far more enticing.

There was very little unused space. This was about the emptiest area I could find.

A water garden! Several pots with water plants and tiny fish.

The thing to consider too is that there was also a (very) small area of lawn, a concrete area with table and chairs to enjoy al fresco dining with a sun umbrella over the top, compost bins and more. Yes, Angelo has even fitted this in to his garden space. 🙂

I’m not sure if this is taro or arrowroot. I think it’s the latter.

Lots of tropical plants.

Persimmons

Paths.

A dwarf Mango

Ginkgo Biloba

Neem. I haven’t researched this but I imagine it’s where neem oil, a natural pesticide comes from.

Cardamom or turmeric perhaps? Another tropical.

These tomato bushes housed several deliciously ripe tomatoes. They’re growing in hydroponic pots.

The nasturtium growing through here must have been nearly a metre tall!

Nectarines.

Yacon or Peruvian ground apples. I have these in my garden too but MUCH smaller. It’s all about soil.

 

Comfrey and kale

Prostrate thyme and a great way to disguise an area of broken or uneven concrete where you could easily trip up.

I’m not sure what this is but wondered if it was water chestnuts

Roses. Not only beautiful but bee fodder and with a delicious scent.

Now THIS idea I intend to imitate. These are cranberries, a water-loving acid soil loving ground cover. In a pot the water can easily be maintained without flooding out other plants. Brilliant.

Plums and plenty of them!

Every available inch was planted with or covered with something green, growing and useful.

I’m not sure I’d go this far but I guess I have them growing everywhere here. Yes, this is a hawthorn in a pot!

Can you count the species here?

If you can see through the verdant greenery you can see there are a series of paths through here. In a garden where you need to wheelbarrow soil additives in or large loads of produce out, these paths wouldn’t work but in a small garden it is easy enough to navigate with a bucket in hand. And as Angelo practices chop and drop, his soil is beautiful and full of nutrients and mulches.

I couldn’t identify most of the species in this garden and I reckon I do ok for a self-taught new gardener.

More yarrow. I really MUST get some into my gardens.

Currants I think, and a path.

The compost bin barely visible amidst the greenery and edibles. I imagine these are close to the happiest and best fed plants in the garden. Not that the compost would be much better than the rest of the beautiful soil Angelo has worked hard to create.

I am a newbie gardener so I have no idea what this stunning flower is. It was about 15cm long and trumpet-shaped.

We weren’t the only visitors to the garden. There were bees everywhere!

The asparagus was going to seed but there was a lot of beautiful fernery in there.

More asparagus and celery in the background (I think).

There were a few ornamental flowers through the garden too. I saw some osteospermums too.

Rhubarb.

Fruit trees under-planted with many different varieties.

More fruit

Calendula.

Grapes starting to ripen. The vines curled all around the table and Hills Hoist.

My photos cannot do Angelo’s garden justice. Everywhere you look there is something to look at, edible, medicinal or to help raise the fertility of the soil. This is permaculture at its intense best. I would love the opportunity to be able to sit and study Angelo’s garden, analysing and learning about each plant he has and why. Why A and B are planted with C but not with D and how the garden functions over the seasons. I think the most astounding things about Angelo’s amazing garden is that it still feels amazingly like a work in progress! Yes, even more. 🙂