Peter’s Chicken Pieces & Soil Conditioning

The sorting of Stuff continues. . .

It is amazing what you find when looking through family ‘treasures’. This cardboard box back was found in amongst some of Gran’s books and photos. Though Peters is known for its ice-creams, clearly at some point they also provided the convenience of chicken pieces to the busy house-wife back in the day.

I am amused and disturbed by some of the ‘must keep for another day’ magazine excerpts and lists on the back of envelopes or down the margins of magazines in tiny, squeezed up writing.

On this topic, I would have to have added at least a tonne or more of paperwork, cardboard and newsprint to the garden in various areas. Plus several tonnes of lumber from the trees that previously stood on the block above the house. The glossy stuff goes into the community recycling bin and the garden gets the better stuff, which it devours at such at rate that I don’t ever expect to be able to satisfy its hunger.

Our sandy soils continue to absorb whatever is left for them. Green waste is best left on the surface for us as it assists in dispersing water and allowing it to enter into the sand quicker. Left uncovered, water will simply run off the extremely hydrophobic or water repelling, coastal sand and end up elsewhere. For this reason, small, two foot wide swales were some of the first techniques used when the major earthworks were completed.

They are small and many because they are also temporary. The aim is to build up the soil whilst I develop other areas of the block which will eventually accommodate larger swales for the planting of trees.

We’ve worked our way through numerous packing boxes, dusty and crappy boxes from the old country house and still we pick up extra boxes during shopping expeditions or even from other businesses around town giving them away.

Some of the hot spots for any locals wanting to get extra cardboard are Bunnings, outside Toy World and most of the IGA’s have an abundance also.

Between the main garden, my container gardens and the worm farms we actually have a demand for this resource that is normally recycled or put into landfill. Through utilising it in our garden there is no  requirement to have it collected by truck, transported by truck and recycled using further resources such as coal powered electricity and water.

Now who would have thought that Chicken Pieces could inspire such a post?