Good Organic Gardening Issue #13.6

It seems to me that many of us non-horticulturists develop this love of gardening in a gradual way. Maybe when you were young and living in share houses you dragged a well-loved pot plant from terrace house to terrace house, somehow managing to keep it alive despite understanding nothing about ideal light conditions, watering, feeding and so on. (I don’t think I even knew plants needed to be fed back then.) Perhaps that led to a little experimentation with growing a few herbs and upping your cooking ante with them. Then maybe a cherry tomato or two and some salad leaves. Yes, you’ve probably guessed I’m describing my own gardening journey here. My first attempts at growing in garden beds were with flowers — poppies and other annuals, in fact. Anything pretty…

PUTTING ANTS ON THE MAP Researchers from around the world joined forces to produce a global diversity map of the world’s ant populations. They constructed it using more than 14,000 maps of individual ant species and combined the data with computational wizardry to create the treasure map. Invertebrates represent most animal species on earth. Sometimes called “the little things that run the world”, they are fundamental to any healthy ecosystem. Ensuring their conservation in a rapidly changing world is urgent and critical. The problem is we know so little about them and their habitats. Effective conservation efforts rely on good datasets to make meaningful decisions and that’s something lacking in the invertebrate research world. Most conservation efforts focus on vertebrates. The treasure map shows ant species richness is greatest in tropical regions. It is moderately correlated…

KALE ‘RAINBOW CANDY CRUSH’, BRASSICA OLERACEA The plant: A world-first edible ornamental that was released at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2021, this kale is a STANDOUT! With fluorescent-pink-purple leaves that are loaded with nutrients, what’s not to love? Unlike other kales and brassicas, this one’s leaves have a sweet aftertaste, with no bitterness — plus the colour persists even after cooking. Growing: Grow ‘Rainbow Candy Crush’ in a full-sun vegie patch or decorative bed or mixed into your flower borders for some wow-factor foliage contrast. It will reshoot after cutbacks if you need to harvest the leaves and, once established, is relatively low maintenance. Floriana, floriana.com.au ‘LITTLE BIBI’ PBR, MYRTIFOLIA X OPPOSITIFOLIA ‘POLYLAB’ The plant: A versatile plant with a naturally mounded habit and glaucous grey-green leaves year round, ‘Little Bibi’ produces pretty mauve/purple…

PLANTS IN SPACE You’ve heard of gardening by the moon — but how about on the Moon? That’s the idea behind a new project in which Australian scientists are working with an Aussie space start-up on a plan that’s out of this world. The aim is not only to lay the groundwork for future human life on the Moon and other planets, but also to answer questions about food security in extreme environments here on Earth. The project, known as ALEPH, involves scientists from the Queensland University of Technology, RMIT, the Australian National University and Israel’s Ben Gurion University working with Australian company Lunaria One. They plan to put a shoebox-sized sealed chamber or “lunarium” full of plants and seeds on an international spacecraft to the Moon by 2025. “We have to find species that…

When lichen appears, some gardeners get very worried. Be curious, not afraid. Lichen is a flat green growth that can have a slightly leafy look but it isn’t a plant and isn’t usually damaging. It can grow on the bark of trees as well as on fences or other timber in the garden — even on the roof or on stonework. Indeed, it’s estimated that lichens cover around six to eight per cent of the world’s land surface, from the arctic tundra to the desert. Lichens are thought to be both ancient and very slow growing. Rather than worry, regard lichen in your garden as a fascinating growth formed by two organisms, algae (or a cyanobacteria) and a fungus, living together. The algae live among the “leaves” of the fungus. This combination of organisms…

Have you ever stopped to wonder what plant produces saffron? Those long orange threads sold as saffron come from a crocus flower that grows from a corm. The saffron crocus flowers in autumn, producing lavender cup-like flowers with a cluster of golden and red filaments in the centre of each flower. It’s not just pretty. By the time it reaches the retail market, this flower — or the orange-red threads it produces — is worth gram for gram more than gold. It may seem a lot to pay for a spice, even one as intriguing as saffron, but there’s good reason why it’s so expensive. The cost is an indication of the long journey between growing saffron and selling it. Saffron is used to flavour and colour foods such as rice and chicken. The…