To create interesting growing areas when we first arrived at the farm we planted a circle of Pink Lady apple trees in the orchard. The trees were grown from seeds from the very best fruit that we had ever tasted and had travelled with us from our potted garden in Sydney, all the way to Nana Glen. When they were planted the trees were only a foot tall and as thin as a pencil. Over a few years they grew strong, finally finding their feet in good soil. in the centre there was 4 ficus trees originally planted to form a canopy of leaves where the idea was to create a living room encircled by espaliered apple trees and a shady roof of shiny ficus leaves.
We were advised to remove the Ficus trees due to the eventual size that they would grow to and their nature to send out gigantic hungry tap roots that would find their way into the gardens and ultimately be a challenge to the health of our plantings. So with that said…. they had to go.
To replace them we decided to create 2 great circular garden beds built from a slowly developed huge compost pile that allowed us to construct meter wide beds with a soil depth of about 2 foot.
Everything that we have grown in there since has done exceptionally well from Russian Garlic, Radish and Dragonfruit which is currently climbing up a Bamboo Tee Pee.
The vision for this tee pee trellis structure is to encourage the Dragonfruit to make its way up the trellis which will hold the clumsy cacti in a way to display the fruit, provide maximum sunshine and increase flowering and fruit production.
Yet to be planted around the base of the tee pee will be a perennial flowering vine that will also increase the bee population, provide a beautiful aesthetic element as well as creating a comfortable shady spot to sit inside the structure.