One Year Anniversary

Its hard to believe that we have been living here permanently for just over a year now. We arrived at the property late on the 26th of July, just a breath ahead of the movers. Needless to say chaos ruled, particularly since we had to move all our stuff with the trailer as the semi could not make it up the grass driveway. Thankfully out little girl slept through that episode.

The food producing plants on the property at this time was rather poor (as can be seen from the first photo). Basically we had some pawpaw and strawberry plants bearing fruit. Sure we had a lemon tree, a Hickson mandarin tree, a Navalena orange tree, and a fig tree, but it was either out of season or there was no fruit (due to the age of the citrus trees or poor site selection in the case of lemon tree).

Over the course of the year we have made some serious inroads into increasing our food production capabilities quite significantly. I initially focused most of my efforts towards creating veggie beds. This was soon followed by additional fruit producing plants, such as the two banana areas.

At present we are self sufficient in lettuce, potatoes, snow peas, silver beet, mandarins, sweet potatoes, passionfruit, pumpkins, tomatoes, rhubarb, Asian greens, eggs, and a number of herbs. In fact, there is plenty of excess for some of the items allowing us to sell it to other members of the Samford Local Growers group.

It is also worth mentioning that there is a small quantity of produce such as oranges and raspberries. But certainly not enough to be deemed as self-sufficient at this stage. And if our chooks leave the strawberries alone, who knows maybe there will be enough excess for some strawberry jam.

During the past year, we have planted out a significant portion of the citrus orchard, although there is still more planting space. In a couple of years we will have excess citrus fruit, which is a problem I am looking forward to having. Our banana trees should produce heaps of produce this coming season. We have four different varieties, so I am keen to do a taste test comparison.

There are also heaps of other fruits, gingers, and other delights (such as Yacon or Jerusalem artichoke) which I am looking forward to. I have certainly learned that there is nothing as sweet as the taste of sustainable harvest, not to mention tasting new types of delicious harvest for the first time.

Hickson Mandarins

June is an exciting time here. Not because I celebrate my birthday, rather it is when our Hickson mandarin's fruit is ready for picking.

Hickson mandarins are an Australian mandarin originating in Roma Queensland. They are believed to be a limb sport from an Ellendale mandarin tree owned by Mr. Hickson (hence the name). Hicksons are a medium to large-size mandarin and have an orange to slightly reddish colour with between 10 and 15 seeds per fruit. They have a high juice content and a great flavour. They are easy to peel and break into segments.

Another benefit with Hickson mandarins is that they have a very long post-harvest life. This is not a huge consideration for the home grower, unless of course you want to harvest your fruit before any Sulphur Crested Cockatoos start to sample your goods.


The fruit from our tree is quite large. The tree was planted in late 2007 and has been around for two fruiting seasons. In this its second year, it has produced around 50 fruits. We attempted to remove all fruit for the first year, however a few fruits managed to stay on much to our subsequent delight. However it is best to remove all fruit during the first year.

Last night at the Sub-tropical Fruit Club of Queensland bi-monthly meeting, we got to taste a number of different mandarins, including Fremont and Imperial, as well as Tangelo Minneola. I was able to bring home a number of samples to compare against the Hickson mandarin. In terms of sweetness, the Fremont comes out on top, just. The Hickson is a close second. The Hickson is also about as easy to peel as an Imperial, but without as much of the pithy white stuff. However in terms of size the Hickson is a clear winner (in the picture with the three segments, the top one is the Hickson, the middle is the Imperial, and the bottom one is the Fremont) . So overall, the Hickson is certainly a mandarin worth growing in your home garden.