Eureka! and Hooray to Helpers

Remember I asked you lot a few days ago what this plant is?

Well I've finally cracked it!  It's Fool's Watercress or as our American cousin like to call it, European Marshwort (apium nodiflorum).  It was no coincidence that we found it in a damp ditch, that's where it likes to be.  In Italian it has various common names, mostly more descriptive than the English names: Crescione (big cress), sedanino d'aqua (little water celery) or erba canella (cinnamon herb).  the latter two names really describe the flavour of this plant.  They do say it makes an excellent addition to a salad, however they should only be picked from near clean waterways and should be thoroughly washed as they might harbour parasites harmful to humans.  Another unexpected addition to the book, it's getting longer and longer!

Meanwhile back at the farm... we've had two cycling Americans all the way from Arizona helping us out.  They've been really hard working and, like us, have a keen interest in permaculture.  They've been bravely beating back the encroaching jungle, helped us plant out stuff, made us a lasagne bed, shifted leaf litter and topsoil from the woods below our 18 terraces and dragged it all to the top and they've dug a new compost toilet.  It's all been mighty impressive!

Here a few pictures of Becky and Nick in action.  First Nick dug a really deep hole for the compost toilet:

Then all that earth went in bucket 2 or 3 terraces down:

...to cover a previously prepared lasagne bed, i.e. layers of different types of organic material on top of some cardboard to keep the weeds down and add organic material to the soil:

...and did you notice?  They were still smiling!

Anyway on a final note our cat seedlings have done particularly well this year: