Kat Jenkins in Kat's Garden, pointing at a sunflower that's taller than she is.

Welcome to my garden

My name is Kat, and my garden is a place of joy, weird experiments, good food, and the occasional accident.

We're on 15ha of farmland and native bush near Kaeo, in the sunny Far North of Aotearoa-New Zealand.

I've been writing about our life here most Sundays since 2019. Take a look around and make yourself at home.

Kat pruning an apple tree with a pair of loppers.

Pruning fruit trees

31st May 2026

Everything you need to know about pruning stone and pip fruit trees: equipment, technique, tree shapes, and the golden rules.

New around here?

In six years I've written a lot of things that sometimes get buried in the pile. These posts are good entryways into who we are, and what we're doing here.

We've finally arrived

The first post from our brand-new lifestyle block. I arrived with a dream. I'm still working to attain it.

Labelled photo of paddock locations, including the wetland, compound, and possum poo rock

What's in a name?

Naming parts of the property. Which paddock is which, and why is it called Possum Poo Rock?

Serendipity

The history of this land, and the unique connection Richard and I both have to it.

My happy place

The garden it took years to build, slowly. An epic and ongoing battle against kikuyu grass.

Learning to farm

The path I've taken to learn the skills I needed to have any clue about what I'm even doing here.

Chickens looking a little confused at a sunflower.

The pursuit of self-sufficiency

The truth about how close we've got (or will get) to the ultimate goal.

What are you up to on Sunday?

Each Sunday I publish a new post about our life here.

Subscribers are first to know when new content goes live, and get an extra sneak-peek at the plans and schemes we're working on.

Follow along

The most recent posts. Life is varied, so week-to-week the subjects can vary wildly. Often, we don't even know what the next week will hold.

See what I've been writing most recently.

Green banana flour

An experiment in making a prodigious banana harvest last longer. More useful than expected, with some caveats

Our fifth herd of cows the morning after arriving at The Outpost.

Surprise cows

We weren’t expecting them, but surprise! We have a new herd of cows.

Marilyn Fulton, Kat Jenkins, Shirley Fulton, and Tot Retter, circa 1985. This photo has been AI-restored.

My mother's mother's mothers

How the women who came before me have shaped my life at The Outpost today. The story of my matrilineal line.

A selfie of Kat and the 1.5 kilogram kumara she harvested in 2026.

Harvesting the kūmara

After ignoring our māra kūmara for several months, we dug it up!

A brown cow with white horns stands in the rain above a small waterfall of flowing water.

Preparing for a cyclone

A look into what we do to prepare when the warning comes.

An old WW1 photo featuring 6 men and captioned 'Rangiotu Camp F.B. Hughes'.

Albert ('Snowie') Charles Schaeffer (WW1 23/903)

Albert “Snowie” Charles Schaeffer served in World War 1, and returned home, broken.

Five mixed cattle look at the camera on a hilly paddock.

The price of beef

A frank look at what we do with our cows.

Common kitchen foods you can grow fresh food from

Growing food from kitchen scraps

You don’t need to buy seeds to start growing food. Your weekly grocery shop is full of ways to get your garden pumping.

A stainless steel bowl containing washed peanuts.

Poor peanut performance

Turns out, peanuts don’t much love being ignored for the entire growing season.

The dangers of weeding

Gardening isn’t all butterflies and rainbows. And even when it is, that isn’t always a good thing.

Paprika fruit on a charcoal barbeque with smoke drifting over them.

Smoking paprika

A bumper paprika crop means it’s time to make one of my best decisions so far and smoke it.

A monarch butterfly perches in a blooming sunflower.

Snapshots

A few things that are happening, or will be happening.

A solitary red and yellow tulip blooms amongst spring bulb leaves.

Lifting the spring bulbs

It’s time to refresh and re-plant the spring bulbs.

View of the full garden with a loose rooster in front of it.

A real look at the garden

An honest look around my garden beds and how they are doing right now.

The Safe H2O truck backed up to our tank.

Cleaning the water tank with Safe H2O

When we noticed our tap water was acidic, we decided to get the tank cleaned. Here’s how it went.

Shadow of a man in a hat and a woman against rocks.

On grief

A poorly-timed accident sends me spinning.

More things I've been liking

Some things that have made 2025 bearable.

The 2025 garlic harvest laid out on a garden path immediately after puling it up.

Garlic harvest 2025

Results from my much-smaller 2025 garlic crop.

A black cow with a mostly-white face and black nose stands in a paddock of long green grass and looks towards the camera.

Spare cow

In the face of a mystery, we find ourselves examining our morals.

Garden planning with GardenBox 3D

Creating a map of my garden using GardenBox 3D, and how I’m using it to plan my upcoming gardening adventures.

Māra kūmara

This year I’ve re-introduced kūmara into my garden.

Coconut lemon slice (new and improved)

One of my Gran’s best recipes. Now tastier, lower in sugar, and higher in protein.

Outpost Buildings chicken coop and some chickens.

Outpost Buildings chicken coop review

We’ve had our Outpost Buildings chicken coop for 8 years. How has it held up?

Sage flowering between calendula and rosemary.

Companion planting

An introduction to the real scientific principles behind the idea of companion planting.

Ponga paths

The next stage in the evolution of my wee garden.

Summer garden plans

The plans I’ve got for my garden over the summer of 2025-26.

A blonde gnome flashes what's below her blue robe in a weedy garden beside some rocks. Behind her is roughly a dozen eggs.

Gnome makeover

Time to give my gnomes a glow-up!

A kaka peers out of the foliage of a totara tree.

Pest management

The pest-control is getting an upgrade around here.