Darebin Backyard Harvest

Darebin Backyard harvest

FestivalProgram

Celebrating local food gardens. Sharing food growing knowledge and skills across generations and cultures.

www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest 19 – 27 November 2016 About the Darebin Backyard Harvest Festival

Now in its sixth year, Darebin’s ever popular Backyard Harvest Festival is presented by Darebin City Council in partnership with Darebin Ethnic Communities Council. The November festival celebrates Spring planting, inspiring home gardeners of all ages, skill levels and cultural backgrounds to sow their favourite herbs, vegetables and fruit for the summer harvest. There is also an Autumn Backyard Harvest festival held as part of the Homemade Food and Wine Festival each May. This festival is all about local residents sharing skills and knowledge on growing fresh food at home. Many families and cultural groups have been cultivating abundant food gardens in Darebin for years, and this festival showcases and celebrates their achievements. Previous festival goers have said they made new gardening friends and felt very inspired to give food gardening a go. They loved the cross-generational, cross cultural sharing of gardening and food preparation skills. There are 16 different home gardens and 7 workshops in this years program, covering everything from water efficient gardens, fruit tree grafting, to keeping chooks and quails.

“Fantastic initiative. Very interesting and inspiring…they had lots of great and new ideas of how to go about things, loved their enthusiasm and generosity in sharing. I have started to seriously consider how I can transform my own Preston backyard. Thank you Darebin!!”

Why not leave the car at home and plan a fun day riding to a few open gardens or workshops? Where possible, weekend garden tours which are a comfortable riding distance apart have been scheduled together on the same day. Take advantage of our 20% off the ticket price when you attend 3 or more events. Contact us for a suggested self-guided cycling route. You will need a reasonable level of fitness and confidence with on road riding.

2 Darebin Backyard harvest Festival Darebin Backyard Harvest Festival Program Guide 2016

Time Event Location Page Saturday 19 November 10am – 11am Robbie’s Aquaponics Garden Thornbury 4 11.15am – 12.15pm Practical Aquaponics Workshop Thornbury 4 12.45pm – 1.45pm Lee’s Generous Sharing Garden Reservoir 5 2.15pm – 3.15pm Fotios and Effy’s Mediterranean Garden Preston 5 3.45pm – 4.45pm Damian’s Biodiverse Permaculture Garden Reservoir 6 Sunday 20 November 10am – 12pm Preserving Spring Produce with the 2 Kelvin Road, 6 Alphington Community Centre Alphington 12.30pm – 1.30pm Steve and Georgia’s Suburban Farm Reservoir 7 1.45pm – 2.45pm Water Efficient Garden Workshop Reservoir 7 3.15pm – 4.15pm Sharing Homegrown Food with Luigi and Emanuela Reservoir 8 Monday 21 November 6pm – 7pm Kat’s Small Scale Urban Farm Northcote 8 7.15pm – 8.15pm Keeping Quails with Kat Lavers Northcote 9 Tuesday 22 November 6pm – 7pm Kim’s Recycled Renters Garden Reservoir 9 Wednesday 23 November 6pm – 7pm Angelo’s Fertile Food Forest Preston 10 Saturday 26 November 10am – 11am George and Marika’s Mini Market Garden Reservoir 10 11.30am – 12.30pm Antonis Greek Garden Reservoir 11 1pm – 2.30pm Sylvester Hive Community Garden Launch Corner of Dean and 12 Gray Street, Preston 2.30pm – 3.30pm Michael’s Cottage Food Garden Preston 11 4pm – 5pm Maya’s Exotic Edible Garden Preston 13 Sunday 27 November 10.30am – 12pm Organic Backyard Chook Keeping Workshop Northcote 14 1pm – 2pm Harry’s Micro Orchard Garden Northcote 14 2.15pm – 3.15pm Fruit Tree Propagating Workshop Northcote 15 3.45pm – 4.45pm Food Forests with Angelo Eliades Preston 15

19 – 27 November 2016 3 Robbie’s Practical Aquaponics AQuaponics with Garden Robbie Kershaw Featured in his book Edible Garden Designs, You are invited to participate in a workshop where Jamie Durie writes “This family is the very model Robbie will introduce you to the basic principles of environmental awareness”. Robbie’s garden and benefits of aquaponics, provide an overview has also been in The Age, Sydney Morning Herald, of backyard style designs, the equipment you will ABC Melbourne, 3AW, Good Organic Gardening need and how to set up a system from scratch. and Sanctuary Magazine. Both front and back He will also address the common problems with yards are devoted to food production, and feature stabilising and establishing a new system, as well two aquaponics systems in which trout and as ongoing maintenance. vegetables are grown in a mutually dependent relationship, enabling both to thrive. One system is homemade while the other is a purchased kit, and both are seamlessly incorporated into rest of the garden, which produces a huge variety of vegetables and herbs. Composting and free- range chickens also contribute to this garden’s sustainability credentials.

Saturday 19 November Saturday 19 November 10am – 11am 11.15am – 12.15pm Private Garden in Thornbury Private Garden in Thornbury (address provided on booking) (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

4 Darebin Backyard harvest Festival Lee’s Generous Sharing Garden Lee is passionate about sharing the health and wellbeing benefits of tending to and eating from her bountiful garden in her social housing estate. She wanted to break down the perception many of her neighbours had that food gardening is expensive, and is committed to making food gardening low-cost and accessible. Lee generously shares her surplus harvest, saved seeds and garden knowledge with her neighbours, friends, family and local community. Her garden features a wide range of fruit and veggies such as potato, pumpkin, tomatoes, leafy greens, strawberries, kiwiberries and even a banana palm. The sense of achievement and satisfaction Lee enjoys through growing something with her own hands and sharing / swapping seasonal excess with her neighbours is inspirational. Lee’s garden demonstrates that growing and sharing food can bring the community together.

Saturday 19 November 12.45pm – 1.45pm Private garden in Reservoir (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic .gov.au/backyardharvest

Fotios and Effy’s Mediterranean Garden Established 33 years ago, this garden is passionately tended by Fotios and Effy in their retirement. It features a cleverly grafted olive tree which produces 3 kinds of olives. Fotios believes in recycling, which is evident in the materials used to make the hot house and garden borders. This farm-let style garden produces fresh organic produce all year round, with tomatoes his speciality. Fotios believes his tomatoes are now a unique variety, because he has been saving seeds for 33 years. Seed saving selects for fruit best suited to local conditions, optimising flavour and quality, and helps preserve genetic diversity. The garden uses rain water tanks and homemade compost mixed with animal manure.

Saturday 19 November 2.15pm – 3.15pm Private Garden in Preston (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

19 – 27 November 2016 5 Damian’s Biodiverse Permaculture Garden Damian has been enthusiastically practicing permaculture since he attended a talk by permaculture co-founder Bill Mollison in 1977. He is also involved in replanting native vegetation on Herring Island in inner suburban Melbourne. What permaculture and bush regeneration have in common is that they both aim to establish biodiversity whether building up microbes in the soil, integrating chooks and fruit trees or attracting wildlife to the garden. The complex mix of species form mutually beneficial relationships, all performing multiple functions such as nutrient cycling, pollination or pest control. Damian’s garden reflects his love of growing food for both humans and local native species.

Saturday 19 November 3.45pm – 4.45pm Private Garden in Reservoir (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

Preserving Spring Produce presented by the Alphington Community Centre Join Maria from My Green Garden in a delicious and practical workshop where she will discuss the kitchen garden and cook up some easy recipes using produce from a typical food garden in Spring, such as a pesto, dips, vegetable pickles and fragrant herb oils. The small kitchen garden at the centre will also be open for viewing.

Sunday 20 November 10am – 12pm Alphington Community Centre, 2 Kelvin Road, Alphington $10 / $5 concession (children free) for workshop Free to visit the garden Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest 6 Darebin Backyard harvest Festival Steve and Georgia’s Mini Suburban Farm Steve and Georgia have transformed their home to a suburban mini-farm in just six years. Their garden includes over 90 fruit trees pruned to a range of forms, including espaliers, to increase productivity and make the most of spaces. It also features a front yard food forest, berries, raised veggie beds, bees and chickens. Companion planting is used to attract beneficial insects for organic pest control. The garden’s environmental footprint is reduced by using re-purposed materials as much as possible, and water efficiency measures, including grey water reuse. The garden is highly productive, and provides the bulk of the couple’s veggie, fruit, honey and egg needs year round.

Sunday 20 November 12.30pm – 1.30pm Private Garden in Reservoir (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

The Water Efficient Garden Workshop As Melbourne’s climate gets hotter and drier, keeping a productive garden thriving while minimising water use is a challenge. At this workshop, Steve will discuss simple, cheap, DIY techniques to use less water, and make the most of the water you do use, including: garden design and plant selection, mulching, efficient irrigation, rainwater capture and grey water reuse.

Sunday 20 November 1.45pm – 2.45pm Private Garden in Reservoir (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

19 – 27 November 2016 7 Sharing Homegrown Food with Luigi and Emanuela From the moment you arrive, your gregarious and hospitable hosts Luigi and Emanuela will entertain you with gardening and food preserving knowledge and stories as they showcase their abundant Mediterranean inspired garden. Features include intensively cultivated vegetable beds, a home built hothouse, food preserving area and backyard pizza oven. Luigi will share his secret to growing the biggest eggplants you have ever seen!

Sunday 20 November 3.15pm – 4.15pm Private Garden in Reservoir (addresse provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

Kat’s Small Scale Urban Farm Kat Lavers is a passionate gardener, permaculture designer, trainer and facilitator. She coordinates the My Smart Garden program for Hobsons Bay City Council, runs Green Steps training for Monash University and has taught permaculture in Australia and Mongolia. Her house and garden, ‘The Plummery’, is a small- scale urban permaculture system. The 1/14 acre site produces almost all the vegies, herbs, fruit, mushrooms and electricity consumed by the household, as well as recycling all organic waste on site. There is also a retrofitted light earth studio made from onsite clay and reclaimed materials.

Monday 21 November 6pm – 7pm Private Garden in Northcote (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

8 Darebin Backyard harvest Festival Keeping Quails with Kat Lavers Keeping quails is a fantastic way to produce eggs in a small garden. They’re quieter than chickens and hardy too. In this workshop Kat will introduce you to her covey of quails and discuss their food and housing needs, including tips and tricks to reduce maintenance. And of course we’ll also taste some delicious quail eggs!

Monday 21 November 7.15pm – 8.15pm Private Garden in Northcote (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

Kim’s Recycled Renters Garden The fact that Kim rents has not held her back from being an enthusiastic and creative food gardener who loves to experiment. Kim wants to encourage renters and non renters alike to try food gardening no matter how big or small a home they have. Kim’s garden reflects her love of recycled materials, gardening in tune with the changing seasons and growing what she loves to eat. Her garden is always evolving, with a range of tropical and temperate fruits, vegetables and herbs grown in her front and backyard, making use of the different microclimates around her home. You will find Kim’s enthusiasm infectious as she shares anecdotes about her garden triumphs and failures, proving you don’t need to have a ‘green thumb’ to give it a go.

Tuesday 22 November 6pm – 7pm Private Garden in Reservoir (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

19 – 27 November 2016 9 Angelo’s Fertile Food Forest Angelo is a sustainable gardening and permaculture presenter, trainer and writer and passionate food forest advocate. His garden won a Darebin Sustainability Award in 2012, and was featured in the prestigious Open Gardens Australia event in 2014 and 2015. Angelo’s high density food forest garden produces a huge diversity of food – stone fruits, berries, herbs and vegetables. What appears to be a verdant tumble of vegetation is actually strategic placement to create synergistic relationships and enhance the microclimate and growing conditions for each plant. This is also an effective pest control technique resulting in a wonderfully abundant organic garden.

Wednesday 23 November 6pm – 7pm Private Garden in Preston (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

George and Marika’s Mini Market Garden With higher density living, George and Marika’s backyard is an increasingly rare example of a large area completely given over to edible crops in the style of a mini market garden. George and Marika have nurtured their highly productive garden for 33 years and are passionate promoters of home food growing. Their garden supplies them with virtually all their fresh food all year round – plus excess to share! This is one of the festivals largest and most prolific gardens, featuring an orchard, mature grapevines, large vegetable beds, and a composting system. George will generously share his pruning and creative organic pest control techniques during the tour.

Saturday 26 November 10am – 11am Private garden in Reservoir (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

10 Darebin Backyard harvest Festival Antonis’s Greek Garden This garden reflects a piece of Greek culture in Reservoir. A giant cactus (called a prickly pear) is a key feature of the garden landscape. Established in 1975, when Antonis first came to Australia and now devotedly tended in his retirement, this garden includes a variety of seasonal and perennial edible fruits and produce. It also features a brick oven used in the past for making bread, integral to Greek cuisine. The garden is sustained with natural fertilisers and rainwater from large tanks.

Saturday 26 November 11.30am – 12.30pm Private garden in Reservoir (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

Michael’s Cottage Food Garden Michael has lovingly turned the front and back yard of his rented home into an attractive and productive food garden without breaking the bank. Tidy garden beds, pretty brick baths, a rustic chook shed and greenhouse have all been built through the ingenious use of recycled materials. Chickens are integral, producing eggs and disposing of household scraps and providing valuable fertiliser, but are also cleverly managed to prevent them from decimating precious vegetables. The front garden is reminiscent of a European cottage garden with plenty of bee attracting flowering plants among the herbs, while the rear is devoted to vegetables and fruit trees including a feature fig. Vegetables and greens are carefully selected to ensure the household has a supply of fresh tasty produce all year round.

Saturday 26 November 2.30pm – 3.30pm Private garden in Preston (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

19 – 27 November 2016 11 Sylvester Hive Community Garden Launch Join us to celebrate community food gardening at the launch of the recently completed Sylvester Hive Community Garden! The garden is a joint project of the Pavilion School (recognised for their work with disengaged young people), Darebin Council and the local community. A ‘Hive’ is a place where people meet and connect, and the garden will be a base for building relationships between school staff, students and local residents over time, as well as a place to grow delicious local organic food. Costa Georgiadis from ABC Gardening Australia will give a FREE talk about how growing food using Permaculture can bring gardeners and non-gardeners alike together through the celebration of nature’s cycles and seasons, nurturing the soil and the soul. Costa will entertain and inspire through his personal anecdotes of other community gardens, schools and community groups and what makes growing food communally work. Bring a plate of food to share for lunch Make your own free healthy, pedal powered smoothies with Bike n’Blend. Free Coffee and tea courtesy of Friends of Baucau – remember to bring your reusable coffee cup or mug!

Saturday 26 November 1pm – 2:30pm Pavilion School grounds, Corner of Dean and Gray Street, Preston FREE Admission (Registrations not required)

12 Darebin Backyard harvest Festival Maya’s Exotic Edible Garden Maya has created an edible garden that is as beautiful as it is fruitful. Decorative, highly productive hedges are formed from an extensive range of pruned and grafted fruit trees using a unique combination of espalier, cordon, ‘Bouche Thomas’ and/or dwarfing rootstock to create intriguing shapes and patterns. The garden features over 28 apple trees of several varieties, a range of cane and bush berries, persimmons, cherry guavas, feijoas and citrus. Mature grape vines are trained against the house helping cool it in summer and yielding delicious summer grapes. Maya practices organic and biodynamic gardening methods complete with recycled rain water and extensive composting systems. A netted chicken fence protects the rear garden from striking ‘Araucana’ chickens, originally bred in South America, who are kept as much for their wonderfully friendly nature as for their beautiful pale blue eggs. A home built coffee roaster in the backyard completes the picture. This garden is a delight to all the senses, not just the tastebuds!

Saturday 26 November 4pm – 5pm Private garden in Preston (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

19 – 27 November 2016 13 Organic Backyard Chook Keeping with Jessamy Miller Want healthy, happy and productive chooks as part of your sustainable backyard? Jessamy Miller has a monthly column and an online blog on backyard chooks for the ABC’s Organic Gardener magazine and holds regular online Q and A sessions answering poultry queries. She is also an editor for Australasian Poultry and Grass Roots magazine. In this workshop, she will demonstrate how to set up your henhouse, integrate chooks into the garden, and manage your flock using organic methods. Get the lowdown on what to feed your birds, and how to deal with some common issues.

Sunday 27 November 10.30am – 12pm Private garden in Northcote (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

Harry’s Micro Orchard Garden Harry is passionate about gardening in small spaces and has been lovingly tending his fully organic micro orchard garden for 12 years. At 72 square metres, this garden demonstrates you don’t need a large plot of land to grow a wide variety of fruits and vegetables. Harry planned, constructed and planted the garden with his daughter to encourage science concepts through organic gardening. Clever grafting methods yield citruses, apples, pomegranates and stone fruits. The all year rotation of herbs and seasonal vegetables supplement the food requirements for of a family of five.

Sunday 27 November 1pm – 2pm Private Garden in Northcote (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

14 Darebin Backyard harvest Festival Citrus and Apple Tree Propagating Workshop with Harry Kalathas There’s nothing more satisfying than propagating your own plants. In this workshop Harry will demonstrate two propagating techniques: basic aerial layering and grafting for citrus and apple trees. You will gain an understanding of the tools and equipment and seasonal timing requirements for each technique as well as how to take care of grafts and propagated plants during their initial growing period.

Sunday 27 November 2.15pm – 3.15pm Private Garden in Northcote (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

Food Forests with Angelo Eliades Passionate food forest advocate Angelo Eliades from Deep Green Permaculture will demonstrate how a conventional backyard has been transformed into a thriving, productive biodiverse demonstration permaculture food forest garden with over 30 fruit trees, dozens of berries, multitudes of medicinal herbs as well as plenty of exotic edibles from around the world and native bush food plants too.

Sunday 27 November 3.45pm – 4.45pm Private Garden in Preston (address provided on booking) $10 / $5 Concession (children free) Tickets: www.darebin.vic.gov.au/backyardharvest

19 – 27 November 2016 15 CITY OF DAREBIN National Relay Speak your Service language

TTY dial 133 677 or T 8470 8470 274 Gower Street, Preston Speak & Listen PO Box 91, Preston, Vic 3072 1300 555 727 T 8470 8888 F 8470 8877 or iprelay.com.au E [email protected] then enter darebin.vic.gov.au 03 8470 8888