You can grow food just about anywhere.
You can grow it in a sunny courtyard,
you can grow it on a balcony in some pots
or of course you can grow it where there is now lawn.
This whole garden only a few years ago was a grassed area.
I'm going to show you how easy it is to turn your lawn into your lunch.
Of course, the first step to starting any new garden
is to remove the weeds.
And in this case, it's the lawn.
And so if you had an army, you could get them to help you dig it all out,
but you lose a lot of soil that way,
so I reckon a better option is to smother them.
You can smother the lawn with almost anything.
If it's not particularly vigorous,
something like some thick cardboard or an old tarp will do.
But this is couch grass, which is incredibly hard to kill,
hence the tin.
Now, it does two things - by smothering it,
you take the light away from hitting the leaves, which of course
is the life force of a plant - it can't photosynthesize,
so it starts to die.
And the second thing with the tin is, of course, they're very, very hot,
which also starts to cook them.
Now, the best time to start this
is at the start of the hot season in spring,
which is when this tin went into place.
Of course, putting a layer over the grass to kill it
also kills off some of the biology in the soil.
So before you get replanting, you've got to rebuild that.
First of all, I'm using a fork to open up some cavities
to allow the air and the moisture back in.
Then I'm working my way through the bed
to remove any obvious runners.
As I'm working through the bed,
I'm looking for any of these pale, thick, probably alive runners
and I'm paying particular attention to the edges,
'cause that's where the plants have been moving along
and actually searching for the light so they can live.
So that's the biggest risk for reinfestation.
One of the biggest benefits of using this method
as opposed to digging all of that grass out
is that you don't lose topsoil.
You can see the runners have sort of just come off like string.
And, really, topsoil is the biggest resource you've got in the garden.
Improve it and you've got the perfect place to grow veg.
Any organic matter will improve the soil.
In this case I'm using well-composted horse manure
that I picked up for free.
Gently work it through the soil.
And then, of course, give it a good soak to get ready for sowing.
Just adding a little pathway of woodchips so we can access the bed
without treading on it.
Now it's time for some planting, and I have a really big tip here.
It is "Do not put in a really long-term crop first".
As much as I've done my darnedest,
I have probably left a little bit of couch grass in here
and it's going to regrow.
If you've got a long-term crop,
you're also giving that grass time to re-establish
before you're working back through the bed.
So instead, I'm going to do a series of really quick-turnaround crops.
As I'm harvesting, I'm checking again for weeds
and then I can get long-term bang for my buck.
Firstly, some peas, which are, of course, good for the soil
because they're legumes.
But I also love harvesting their young leaves.
Then a couple of rows of turnips.
They're fantastically fast and really sweet when they're small.
Then it's loads of leaves - mustards, rockets
and of course, a little silverbeet.
And the fastest crop of all - radish.
Then to stop the birds scratching up my new sowings, a little bit of wire.
Don't get me wrong - I love a good lawn.
They're fantastic heatsinks, then there's backyard cricket.
But I do believe that if you've got a spot that's going to waste,
well, you could certainly turn that lawn into your lunch.