Straw (Hay) bale gardening - part 2

In October last year I wrote about trying out a straw bale method of gardening in my town garden.  The neighbours border trees were positively shooting out roots into, and dramatically invading, my shadecloth veggie bed - they obviously loved the water I was providing to the beach sand garden I'm trying to grow veggies in.

Well, as promised, here is a report back.

When we returned from the farm