One of basic techniques of organic growing is the making of compost.

Compost is great stuff. It is comprised of decayed and decaying organic matter (plant residues), soil, humus and vast amounts of microscopic bacterial, fungal and arthropodal life.

The properties of compost are both physical and biological. Physically, the addition of compost to your soil improves soil structure, making soil easier to work and gardening more pleasurable. Compost will improve drainage in clay soils by creating spaces for the water to flow through, but will also improve water retention in most soils as the millions of tiny pieces of organic matter hold onto water.

The biological properties of compost flow from the activities of soil biota. Soil biota are present in much of the world’s soils, and populations will expand rapidly given the right conditions. The making of good compost optimises conditions for soil biota, resulting in a life-rich addition to your garden.

Soil biota, like all life on this planet, need certain conditions to thrive. A well built compost heap, with lots of vegetable matter from the garden, will provide the carbon, nitrogen, oxygen, nutrients, ph (acidity level) and moisture necessary to create compost over time.

In the compost heap, the soil biota are busy. They eat, grow and die at a great rate, proliferating as they consume and decay the matter of the heap, their own dying bodies re-releasing more available nutrients for the next generation. 

By the time the compost has matured and is finished, it has broken down the coarse organic matter of it’s ingredients into a biota-rich, friable organic matter composite. It is concentrated soil life, ready to invigorate your beds.

So when you compost your beds, you are improving the physical properties of your soil, as well as inoculating them with a broad range of biota that help to make nutrients in the soil available to plants both symbiotically (an exchange between living entities), and in readily useable forms as the biota die and decompose.

Over time, the soil biota population will decline as they consume the available organic matter, and as the nutrients in the soil are absorbed by plants and therefore unavailable to the biota. This is why it's important to dress your beds with compost regularly, restoring both biota and the food they need to thrive. 

Broadly, there are two ways of making compost: hot composting or cold composting.

Hot composting is more labour intensive and finicky (gathering materials, layering and turning the heap regularly) than cold composting (dumping all organic scraps in a heap). Hot composting is also faster if done correctly, and will kill pathogens and weed seeds if the heap gets hot enough. However, hot composting results in more CO2 emissions as well as burning off significant amounts of the nutrients stored in the composting materials.

Here at Golden Valley Farm I cold compost because I am lazy. 

My cold composting regime is simple: every bit of vegetable matter that is not eaten or sent to market goes in a windrow/heap around 1.5 to 2 metres wide and around 6 metres long. 

I try to start a heap with more fibrous plant material such as bean or pea plants, tomato plants or broccoli stems, allowing (initially at least) a little more air circulation around the base. The heap then naturally grows in dense and sparse layers as different crops are finished and their residues are taken to the heap. In the photo below, a half formed heap is shown with the most recently added layers of weeds and dirt, then leek tops, then old tomato vines. (You can see the finished heap I am using in the background.)

When the new heap is about a metre and a half high, and it has become difficult to put new matter on it, I cover it with baffles made from weed mat attached to sturdy planks at each end (you can see these in the finished compost photo below). The weed mat prevents any grass seeds from growing on the top of heap, as well as providing warmth for the heap and preventing leaching during strong rains.

At any given time I will have 2 or 3 heaps on the go: one new heap in the process of being built, one maturing heap, and one finished heap which I am using in the garden. My heaps are given a year or more to decompose, and contain more than 4 tonnes of compost when finished.

Because cold composting takes so long, my heaps are located at the top of the garden so that any nutrients leaching from the heap end up in the vegetable beds.

Depending on which crop I am preparing a bed for, I will use the compost coarse from the heap (broad beans, potatoes), raked to a medium tilth (hand-sown and transplanted crops) or fine sieved (if sowing with the six-row seeder). You can see the sieve in the photo above.

Regularly composting your garden builds soil organic matter content, makes the earth easier to use, and ensures healthy populations of beneficial soil biota, meaning you will have happy plants!

There are two reasons I grow organically at Golden Valley Farm.

The first is for human health -- using biological inputs and systems to grow food means that my crops are healthier in themselves, and therefore healthier to consume. Avoiding pesticides, fungicides and herbicides means that the produce from Golden Valley Farm is free of nasty residues.

The second reason my farm is organic is for the health of the world. Again, biological systems and inputs, and lack of ‘nasty-cides’, means that the land I’m farming is in robust health. 

Furthermore, Golden Valley Farm is mostly hand-worked, using renewable energy (that’s me eating lunch) instead of fossil fuels. I think very hard about using plastic and other non-renewables before buying. Additionally, I source inputs (fertilisers, amendments, etc.) as close to home as possible, and my produce is sold within 20 kilometres of the farm gate. 

So I’d like to think I am taking the whole of the biosphere into consideration with every decision I make, whether its choosing a more expensive Tasmanian lime over an import, or  turning my beds over with hand tools instead of the tractor. 

In contrast to this sustainable approach, organic certification pretty much stops at the farm gate. A farmer can import highly processed certified organic fertiliser from interstate (or overseas if it’s cheaper), grow crops on the farm in the conventional way, and then sell them to interstate (or overseas) markets in plastic packaging proudly bearing the certification logo.

I am not saying that all -- or even most -- organically certified farms operate this way, but as organic food becomes a larger share of food sales worldwide, agribusiness is moving into organic production, obeying the certification standards to the letter (we hope), but dismissing the wider ecological concerns of the original organic movement. 

Don’t get me wrong --  more organic food consumed worldwide is a definite good, both for the people eating it and for the land it’s grown on. 

But just growing organically fails to address the global food network’s dependence on fossil fuels. This is a double whammy: not only does all the transport, processing and packaging of global food consume non-renewable resources, it also adds to human CO2 emissions, edging our biosphere closer to catastrophic change. And as the organic proportion of the global food market expands, so does it’s petrochemical footprint.

So while the global surge in organically produced food is a great sign of awareness and discrimination amongst consumers, without the ecological side of the organic equation, we are only halfway there.

To fully realise a sustainable food supply, produce must be organic and local.

This means a move to a more regional supply/demand market, necessarily seasonal, and based on local inputs. It means changing the way we eat: less processed foods, less packaging, more fresh foods and better nutrition. Regional and seasonal specialities will be celebrated. 

We are fortunate here in the Huon that local food traditions have not been completely swallowed by global agriculture and the big two supermarkets, and that we already have an agricultural economy. As the challenges of a changing climate and scarcer fuel are felt, I hope we will be able to provide a model of local resilience.

So is Golden Valley Farm certified organic? No. Why?

Because although organic certification provides an assurance to the consumer that the food was produced with a certain range of registered inputs, it ignores the heart and soul of organics: we should be caring for the planet as well as ourselves.

Besides, if my customers want reassurance, they are free to visit the farm!

A farmer’s life is ripe with simple pleasures. 

There’s no hurrying out the door to the morning commute, no job interviews or workplace evaluations, no harried lunch hour that always seem too short, and no organisational heirarchy to be deferentially observed. The only greasy pole is on the tractor power takeoff.

Even the downsides of farming reveal simple pleasures. Getting up before a winter dawn and breakfasting by the stove as the sky slowly blushes, then clapping your hands, breath steaming as you boot up to begin harvesting for the morning’s market. 

Or finally sitting down in the last rays of a long summer day, tasks accomplished and thinking of what’s to be done tomorrow...

Or eventually fixing some troubled machinery, tired of the fiddling and grease, confident she’ll start tomorrow to do the job required. And there’s pleasure in a well hoed bed. And in taking a minute to watch a pair of wedge-tails circle slowly over the valley.

But my most cherished farming pleasure is lunch. A proper sit down lunch at the table with plates and cutlery, with home-made bread on the board and kettle on the stove for after.

Often in the cooler months I’ll pop into the house around 11 and put a pan of lentils and water to simmer on the side of the stove while I continue working.

Then when my stomach tells me it’s time to down tools, I grab a fistful of collard greens on my way to the house. 

The roughly chopped greens go in with the lentils to cook rapidly for as long as it takes to find a bowl and spoon and toast a thick slice of bread. Season the dish well with salt and pepper, and butter the toast generously.

Simple. Nourishing. Lentils, greens, bread. Pleasure.

After lunch it’s on with the boots and outside to search for the perfect stroke of the hoe, the perfect dump of the barrow, and maybe a 10-minutes chat with the neighbour as he heads down the road...

Last year I spent a lot of time moving tunnels, piece by piece, from one set of beds to the next.

This year I have constructed tunnels that can be picked up and moved in one go.

The base is 25mm extra light galv pipe from Nubco in Kingston, which comes in 6.5 metre lengths. The joins are 'thru-butt galv tees'.

My frames are 6.5x2.5 metres, and around 1 metre at the highest point. There are five 150mm uprights on each long side of the base for the hoop pipe to sit over. These dimensions use up exactly three lengths of pipe, and require 14 tees.

You will notice 150mm of extra end pipe sticking out each end. These are the peg points to secure the structure to the ground. 

Once the frame is together, I put five 3 metre lengths of 1.5 inch rural pipe over the uprights.

Then add a wooden brace in the end bays. The brace goes from the centre of the top outside arch to the strong point on the base of the second arch. The brace prevents the end hoops sagging and keeps tension on the polyfilm. Use a spade bit to create a hole on the outside of the pipe, then use a tek screw to attach the brace to the inner surface of the pipe (I predrill to prevent the brace from splitting).


Once the tunnel is in position, it is pegged down by four pieces of 500mm reo-bar that have been bent in a vice to make a giant tent peg. Make sure you place the peg firmly against the join of the tunnel base -- I pegged on the outside of the pegging points on my first tunnel,  and was then gratified with the sight of  a 6X2.5 metre piece of expensive garden equipment bowling majestically through the brassicas on the first strong winds of autumn...

In the photo you can see the baling twine that will be used to secure the end baton.

Once the tunnel is pegged down the polyfilm goes on (or you can put the film on first if you like -- it's easier to move the structure without the film...but it's easier to move the structure with the film once its on). 

I'm using the 3.5 (or 4?) metre wide polyfilm from Mitre10 Huonville, which I bought last year.

To secure the film to the base, I'm using the green Jumbo clips from veggiepatch.com. First I tried tucking the plastic inside the tunnel and clipping from the inside, but this creates problems with condensation pooling, as well as being difficult to get at, and I've found clipping on the outside far better (although less neat). Three clips to a bay, plus one to clip the middle of the end to the baton.....

The ends are the part of the hoop I'm least happy with. I pull the polyfilm tight and furl it 'round a 2.5 metre baton, which I tie at the corners of the tunnel with baling twine (that's the pretty pink bows in the photo). A Jumbo clip in the middle finishes the job (the clip is lost in the photo, but you can see the soaker hose poking out, which is used to water the plants in the tunnel -- good idea to lay this out before placing the tunnel!).

To move the tunnel, untie the twine, move the furled baton and remove the pegs. With one person to each end, my wife and I move our tunnels without too much fuss.

My approximate costings on one tunnel (keeping in mind I order 2 or3  tunnels at once with bulk discounts):

3x6.5 metre, 25mm extra light galv. pipe   $90
14x(25x25) thru butt tee                                  $60
15metres 1.5 inch rural pipe                            $40
9 metres poly film                                               $100
26 green clips (inc. delivery)                             $50
Delivery Nubco-Cygnet(Johnny Clifford)     $10
Total                                                                          $380 

I'm hoping the structures will last a good 10 years. Plastic may have to be replaced every 3-5 years, maybe longer if you are planning to use netting or shade cloth over summer (as I am).

I'm also going to cover one with wire to make a chook tractor. I'll let you know how it goes!

PS. Questions/ comments/ advice welcome...