Engineering Bed Development

Jan 2004

I choose the site next to the Keilor Engineering Office to put in the very first staff veggie bed at Brimbank City Council at the end of January 2004. The idea was to make use of the lovely rich compost from the compost bin at the office and the worm farm juice/castings.


Veggie Garden before 290104

Carl, my good work college helped me dig over the site and add a couple of bags of gypsum, cow and horse poo, and of course the lovely rich worm-filled compost.

We soon discovered that a third of the site still had a foot of compacted crushed rock just below the mulch surface! So the fork didn’t make a great deal of headway in these areas and the tomatoes planted above this definitely struggled that year!

We planted nine tomato plants, mostly cherry tomatoes and we were rewarded with yummy snacks at work from the beginning of March right through to the end of May.


Veggie Garden after 290104

So after the tomatoes were pulled out in June, it was time to do something about that gravel!

During June and July, I spent many hours before and after work digging out the crushed rock areas and sieving the top section of the soil to remove the larger crushed rock.


Eng Bed gravel 090704

Finally half the bed was ready for planting and in went some left over celery and lettuce from Murray. Most of the lettuce didn’t survive the transplanting, so I bought some discounted punnets of parley and rocket and put that in.


Eng Bed celery lettuce 090704

The second half of the bed was finally finished towards the end of Sept so, I bought a punnet of silver beet and beetroot, and planted these next to the carrot seeds I sowed at the front.


Eng Bed celery lettuce carrots beetroot silverbeet 230904

Everything was sweet…


Eng Bed 121104


Dutch carrots and yummy peas 101204

…Until some bored local kids over the Christmas break decided to pull out the rest of the carrots, the lettuce and some parsley - hopefully they ate them!

Thankfully the rest was left alone, and we enjoyed yummy beetroot, silverbeet, celery, peas and parsley.

Oh yes – and Murray helped me squeeze in the peas at the back of the Silverbeet too.