I am establishing a vegie garden, but have some very mature (20m)
Eucalypts near by. I am worried for two reasons: The Eucalypts will
send their roots over and take all the water they can get, and fill my
vegie patch with roots; and secondly having manures and other soil
improvements will hurt the eucalypts which have evolved in the
impoverished Australian soils.

How close can I grow a vegie patch to these impressive trees?

"Timbo" <tcarlton [at] homemail.com.au> wrote in message
news:78eb97a0.0504260532.55e2bee0 [at] posting.google.com...
> I am establishing a vegie garden, but have some very mature (20m)
> Eucalypts near by. I am worried for two reasons: The Eucalypts will
> send their roots over and take all the water they can get, and fill my
> vegie patch with roots; and secondly having manures and other soil
> improvements will hurt the eucalypts which have evolved in the
> impoverished Australian soils.
>
> How close can I grow a vegie patch to these impressive trees?

The other consideration is the trees shading the veges. I would try to keep
the veges 10m away, you can test (well you won't have much choice) if the
roots have already travelled that far when you dig over the vege patch.

You might get away with being somewhat closer as:
- a mature tree will have deep roots and most veges are quite shallow,
- you can increase watering on that side,
- not all eucalypts will be harmed by the extra nutrients.

However if there are major roots within the proposed vege area then you are
likely to have problems.

Where are you? What species are the trees? How far away can you move the
veges?

David