Avocado Trees in and a New Garden Bed too!

Logs around tree to stop chooks digging around tree

Many weeks ago I ordered 2 Avocado Trees & 2 Fig Trees. Now I've never bought plants through the mail but they came this week!  and all plants were well when they arrived, Woo Hoo!
I got 1 Bacon Avocado 'B' type & 1 Hass Avocado 'A' type. Avocado's are self fertile but if you plant 'A' & 'B' types you will have the best possible pollination possible. Since ordering these trees I have discovered Wurtz 'A' type which is a dwarf avocardo tree. These can be grown in pots, half wine barrels are perfect size. If I had my time again I would have bought this so prunning wasn't needed.

Today I finished work earlier than I thought I would, so I had some time to relax and loose myself in the rear garden. Oh the bliss.
Now it was a revelation that you could grow Avocado trees in Kallista, i thought they were tropical fruit and never dreamt I could grow them here. Now they are large trees growing 4-8m high and wide. but as with all fruit trees you can prune to size with in reason. The first few years they need to be looked after a bit. They are susceptible to frosts, gladly we have never had a frost here, they also need protection from hot summer winds. I didn't even think about how big they grew when i ordered two. BUT after some walking around the garden over the last few days I 'found' the perfect place to put them!  The only problem I needed to move some of the wood pile behind the shed to make room for them. This position is sheltered from winds and snow (if/when we get it).

Double height tree guard with long bamboo stakes

The trees in pots were submerged in a bucket of water to saturate soil.  Holes where dug for each tree, blood and bone added to the soil then the trees were planted and tree guards put around trees. I decided to put logs around the tree guards so the chooks don't scratch and dig around tree. Two tree guards where taped together to get the height needed to protect the whole tree.
The placement of the avocado trees will provide shade to the chook house and pens when they grow bigger. The wood pile will be gone by the time the trees have grown.
I am enjoying the anticipation of all these fruit trees coming into production over the next two to three years. I really think I'm proving with time, planning and some hard work it is possible a third of an acre can be a productive, sustainable "farm". I love my back garden.
Oh I also planted my 10 Raspberry canes. I had them sitting in a bucket of straw bare rooted, but noticed the buds starting to burst. So I planted them out into a garden bed which last summer had veggies in it. I will build a trellis for them soon with a poly pipe frame to support bird netting. Yes I want the raspberries not the birds!!!  I will post photo's of the canes and trellis system soon.