Grow your own pepitas

It’s easy to turn edible pumpkin seeds into a tasty snack – you just need the right varieties and these tips from Linda Cockburn.

Storing harvests for winter

Linda Cockburn writes about different ways to preserve your summer harvests, such as tomatoes, so you can keep on enjoying the results of all your hard work in winter.

Improve your soil, help the planet

Gardeners have a crucial job to do, storing carbon in their soils. It will help with your harvest, as well as helping stave off the worst effects of the climate crisis.

Taking care of our planet

We can all take effective action to bring about necessary change to help our planet. We can start with supporting our soils.

Which bean is that?

Want to know which heirloom bean is which? We reveal all here!

Tassie Tales 2

After a year’s break, Linda Cockburn once again takes up the story of her family’s self-reliant lifestyle in Tasmania. The roof is just about to go on the sustainable house, the food garden is expanding– and so are the numbers of marauding wildlife.

Strawbales & Sorbets

We catch up with LINDA COCKBURN and family on their quest for a self-sufficient lifestyle on the Apple Isle. Their owner-built house, being made without the use of concrete, PVC or chemical finishes, is progressing well. Linda and partner Trev are using locally-sourced materials such as clay, straw bales and timber – 400-year-old celery top pine otherwise destined for firewood. In their ‘spare time’ they’ve been making camembert cheese, planting raspberries and dealing with wayward ducks.

Thirst-quenching gardens

LINDA COCKBURN believes in not just growing her own food, but growing her own drinks as well. Here are her ideas for some delicious ‘drinks from the garden’ to enjoy.

Tassie Tales

We catch up with LINDA COCKBURN and family on their quest for a self-sufficient lifestyle on the Apple Isle. Their owner-built house – being made without the use of concrete, PVC or chemical finishes – is progressing well.

Natural pest repellents you can make from your garden

Whether it’s mozzies, flies or cockroaches, humans are constantly plagued by insect pests. Here's some simple plant-based repellents.

In their own skins

We explore simple ways to store your harvests over winter.

Backyard beekeeping

Taking on backyard beekeeping has been a steep learning curve for Linda Cockburn, but it's another satisfying step towards self-reliance.