Garden Year 2027 Diary: See Inside Before You Buy

You can now look inside GardenBuddy.au Garden Year 2027 before you buy it. The product page has a Look inside the book button that opens the sample pages right there, every one stamped SAMPLE across the middle in big green letters. We picked the pages we would want to see before spending money on a diary: a month opener, a week spread, the seed tray log, one crop page and the year in review at the back.

Why a paper book, from a team that builds an app

Fair question. GardenBuddy.au is an app first, so why print 282 pages of A5? Because the app lives on a phone, and a phone is jsut the wrong tool at the potting bench. Hands full of seed raising mix, a tray under one arm, and the screen has gone dark again. A pencil line is quicker then unlocking a phone with wet fingers.

We made the book to sit on the bench next to the seed trays, collect a bit of dirt, and still be readable in December when you want to know what you sowed in August.

Each month, then each week

Every month opens with a page like this one for January. Average max and min, typical rain, the four moon phases with their dates, which stretch of the month suits leafy greens, fruiting crops or root crops, and sunrise to sunset for Brisbane. On 1 January 2027 that is 04:55 to 18:46, in case you were wondering how early is too early to be out with the hose.

Sample page 10 of Garden Year 2027, January at a glance, with average temperatures, typical rainfall, moon phases, a moon planting table by date and Brisbane sunrise and sunset times — January opens with the weather to expect, the moon and a moon planting guide by date. Sample page 10.

Then the weeks, one to a spread. Each day gets a line for rain in mm, the max, the min and a watered box, with room underneath for what you actually did. The week of 4–10 January is marked dark of the moon, soil work, compost and weeding.

Our advice is to not try to fill in all of it. Rain and what you planted is plenty. We reckon the most of the value comes from those two lines.

Sample page 14 of Garden Year 2027, the week of 4 to 10 January, with a row per day for rain, maximum and minimum temperature, a watered tick box and ruled lines for notes — A week to a spread. Rain, max, min and a watered box for each day, plus lines for what you did. Sample page 14.

Seed trays, tray by tray

This is the page we reckon gets the most pencil. Date sown, tray number, crop and variety, how many pots, the day they came up and the day they went out. Underneath is a second table for seedlings you bought, because we think a punnet from the nursery deserves a record too.

Six weeks later, when half a tray of capsicum has still not come up, you have the date and the tray number in front of you and can work out whether it was the seed, the weather, or you.

Sample page 22 of Garden Year 2027, January seed trays and seedlings, a table with columns for date sown, tray, crop and variety, pots, up and planted out, plus a smaller table for seedlings bought — January seed trays and seedlings. One row per crop per sowing. Sample page 22.

A page for every crop, 104 of them

Every crop in the Subtropical planting calendar has its own page, and our tomato page shows the pattern. A month strip for when to sow in trays, transplant or sow direct, and when it should be ready to pick. Then sun, water, spacing, soil, varieties, friends, what to keep away from and what to watch for, which for tomato in our zone starts with Queensland fruit fly. About 11 weeks from planting to first pick, it says at the top.

Below that sits your own tomato record for 2027. Scan the code on the page and it takes you to full guide online, with this week’s supermarket price where we have one. That code is where the paper and the app meet.

Sample page 223 of Garden Year 2027, the tomato crop page, with a month by month planting strip, growing notes, pests and diseases to watch for, a personal tomato record table and a scannable code — One of 104 crop pages. Scan the code for the full guide and this week’s price. Sample page 223.

The page at the back we like best

Year in review. At the end of 2027 you copy the totals from the crop pages into one table: crop, kilos or units, price, and what it was worth in dollars. The price is the shop price printed on the crop page, or what you paid. Add up the last column and you have a number that is hard to get any other way, what the garden actually put on the table in money terms.

There is also a page for what did best and what did not. That one is the honest page. Our guess is it ends up with more words in it than the kilos table does.

Sample page 278 of Garden Year 2027, year in review, kilos by crop, a ruled table with columns for crop, kilograms or units, price and worth in dollars — Kilos by crop. Copy the totals across, multiply by the price, and the last column is what your garden was worth. Sample page 278.

Paper and app, both

The book comes with 12 months of GardenBuddy.au Starter, because we did not want to make you choose. The app is good at things that change, like prices and weather. The paper is good at things that should not change once you have written them down.

The five pages above are only a taste. The full flip through, including the whole year on one chart and our moon planting page, is on the product page. If the viewer below does not load for you, open the Garden Year 2027 product page and use the button there.