JULY 2010 - A cold winter - but the wattles are on the way!

An early Cootamundra

JULY
First weekend in July and it’s been frosty, foggy and rainy and VERY cold. At least there aren’t too many jobs that need doing in the garden so I can sit inside with a clear conscience

A lot of the plants and events I talk about in this blog entry are recorded in the album of photos for June/July. This can be seen at by clicking here.

CORELLAS
The crazy corellas have invaded the area and are swooping and screeching all over the town and surrounding farmland. Corellas don't travel in a flock - they're more like an unruly mob. They dive and dodge, they veer and swoop, screeching all the time like a pack of demented witches. Their favourite trick is to do a kamikaze dive to the ground and pull out at the last minute with a triumphant cackle of maniacal laughter. They're totally crazy, and brilliant to watch! I've put a video of the Corellas on the next entry in this blog. You'll LOVE it!
The farmers, however, are NOT happy as these pesky birds get into their newly planted paddocks and wreak havoc. A couple of shotgun blasts echoed around the hills yesterday and sent the corellas on their way – at least for a short time.

BAKED POTATOES
It was very cold and still on Sunday afternoon but our first day for a while without rain so Geoff decided to light the half 44 gallon ‘fireplace’ and get rid of some fallen branches that had been collecting over the past months. Apart from cleaning the place up a bit, it was lovely spot to prop on a couple of stools and gaze into the fire – discussing the world, the weather and what needs doing around the place. He ended up with such lovely coals that we decided to wrap a couple of potatoes in foil for our dinner. Now there’s something you can’t do in the city – and they were absolutely delicious!

COLD AND RAIN AND GOLDEN WATTLES
The first three weeks of July stayed cold and wet, with a VERY heavy rain and hailstorm around the second Wednesday so there wasn’t much garden action. Despite the cold, the Cootamundra wattles began to show their bright yellow balls which has just got to make the spirits rise a little. Now, by the last week of the month, we’re surrounded by golden trees: Cootamundras (A. baileyana), Black Wattles (A. decurrans), and getting closer to blossoming are a number of Dog Tooth Wattles (A. cultriformis). A very new Queensland Wattle (A. podalyriifolia) is just starting to produce flowers for the first time. It’s had quite a struggle because it’s right under the old, well-established Black Wattles and is fighting with an enormous root system to get a little nourishment. Sounds a bit silly, probably, but I’m trying to establish a few new trees because those old ones won’t last forever.

RESCUING THE SIDE FENCE
That point was proved only a couple of days ago when we discovered that one of the old ones had split right at ground level and a large trunk was resting on the fence between us and our next-door neighbour; it hadn’t quite fallen but was well on the way. An urgent call to our tree-man resulted in about four hours work – getting rid of the dangerous trunk and doing some cutting back maintenance on all the big branches that were hanging over the fence and getting very heavy with too much growth. Of course we had him mulch all the prunings and we now have an enormous pile of fresh mulch for the garden. It will need to mature for a while before we use it but that’s all right; we are just getting to the end of our previous huge pile from a couple of years ago.

PEPINOS
Who ever heard of pepinos? Well, I hadn't until my niece gave me a couple of cuttings about 18 months ago. I carefully nurtured them in pots until they'd developed a good root system, then put them out into the garden in Spring 2009. They grew and they grew!!

Their proper name is Solanum muricatum; they're a bit like a melon and I understand they're a native of Chile or Argentina. Eventually, in July, there were dozens ready to pick. There was only one problem - nobody really liked them! They are VERY juicy but seem to me to have a very watery taste. Quite sweet but - well, I don't think I'll be growing them again. Such a pity with something that's so easy to grow! I've put some photos of the plants with fruit on the Picasa album for June/July.

LAST DAY OF JULY
Still cold and still raining but when the sun comes through there's a little bit of heat in it and we can feel that spring is on the way. Some of the birds are even starting to build their nests. And at around four o'clock, when the sun peeps out below the clouds, we get the most beautiful long shadows across the grass.

There's a willow in the middle of the block that I really thought I'd get rid of because we wanted an all-Australian garden but it's so lovely in all seasons - when it's bare, when it has tiny new leaves and in the summer when it's shady - that I just can't kill it. It's also useful for hanging the tyre swing on! There are more picturesof the shadows and the willow on the Picasa link.

Till next month, don't forget: Gardens are good for you!
Gillian

JUNE 2010 - The start of a Blogging Journey in an Australian Garden

The Bush Garden

WHY BLOG?

My husband, Geoff, and I have been in Camperdown for a little over seven years and came to a garden which had a lot of grass (and Cape Weed!) as well as shrubs and flowers that were mostly imported. Since this was in the middle of largely cleared dairying country I decided to plant lots and lots of Australian Native plants to encourage birds and insects to our one acre block.

This has been largely successful although, due to the long drought, there HAVE been quite a number of plants lost along the way. Now that we have been getting heaps and heaps of rain over the last few months, the growth and flowering has been very exciting and I'm so happy with the way the garden is looking, I want to share it with anyone who has an interest in gardening in general and Australian Natives in particular.

For photos of all the plants I write about, I've established a Picasa album. The first album is for April and May - just before I started this blog. You can see it by clicking here.

Then, for later photos, referring to June and July, you can click  here.

Now, let's begin ...

EARLY JUNE
Winter came in with a sudden burst of still days with brilliant sunshine on 2nd and 3rd June so I was dragged out into the garden again. How could I resist?
The ‘Winpara Gem’ Grevillea (G. thelemanniana x G. olivacea) seems to require pruning every season now because it’s grown so much bigger than I had anticipated and, if I don’t prune it, we lose the view of our beautiful, drooping Silver Princess. So that was a very pleasant and relatively easy job for today. It also nudged me into oiling and sharpening my secateurs!
Just wandering around the garden in this sunshine is absolute bliss! The bees are working overtime in all the Banksias, Hakeas and the Kunzea baxterii and as for the big, old, well-established Rosemary bush – there’s hardly a flower without two or three bees fighting for a place.

GERMINATING AUSTRALIAN SEEDS
I’ve decided to put a plastic roof over my seed-beds (well, that’s what I call them. They’re only old ice-cream containers and various sized pots) to protect them through the nights and early mornings. There’s no hot-house and I think they need just a little TLC now that winter’s actually here. I probably should have waited till spring to plant some of the seeds but as I didn’t and I have quite a lot of exciting germination happening, I don’t want to lose them – and I want them to keep growing!

PINK HEATH
Geoff and I have been driving through Cooriemungle Flora Reserve and also the Otway Ranges recently and in both areas I saw all the beautiful pink (and white) heaths just beginning their flowering. Its proper name is Epacris impressa – our Victorian Floral Emblem, of course – and I was reminded that I didn’t have one. Easily remedied and I have now planted a very nice specimen which came already loaded with lots of dark pink buds. Can’t wait to see its full display.

FROGS (AND FOGS!)
Heavy fogs and gentle incessant rain followed the warm days – couldn’t be better for a gardener! We have at least six frogs that start up their chorus as soon as there’s a hint of rain. I just hope they’re finding each other and adding to the frog population. For the last few drought years we’ve only heard one lone frog on very rare occasions so we’re delighted to hear them.

LEMON SCENTED GUM
Gentle rain was superseded by HEAVY rain and gales! As usual, a few branches were blown off various aging trees and, sadly, a couple from the beautiful Lemon Scented Gum (E. citriodora). It seems, on examination, that ‘something’ gets into the joints of the tree so they bleed inside. Then, when those winds come, the damaged branch is ripped off because there’s only a small amount of healthy wood left. I’ve put a couple of pics on the Picasa web site.(see link above)

30th June. (A final June entry on the last day.)

VEGETABLES:
I’ve managed to clean up a few jobs in the vegy garden. The asparagus ferns had all dried off so they’ve been cut down and the bed fertilised thoroughly. According to my reading, asparagus needs lots of feeding so it’s had a sprinkle of Rapid Raiser, a covering of beautiful, rich compost from our oldest, well-decayed heap, a few buckets of horse manure soaked in water and all has been topped off with a layer of pea-straw to keep it warm. I’ve laid some wire over the whole bed to keep those pesky blackbirds away from scratching out all my beautiful worms so, after all that, I’m expecting heaps and heaps of big, fat asparagus by about September/October.
I’ve planted a small bed of silver beet, hoping it will actually grow a bit during the cold winter months and I’m still digging up some big, beautiful parsnips. They’ve been ready for weeks and weeks but they seem to keep very well in the ground so I only dig them up when I plan to use them.

COMPOST SUCCESS
I’m VERY happy with how the compost has been going this year. I have three bays – one is the current heap where I put all kitchen waste and occasionally grass clippings, the second one is busily ‘cooking’ and the third one, if all goes according to plan, is the one ready to use on the garden. Until recently, I’ve covered each heap with plastic or shade cloth and they always took forever to mature. Now, having read the instructions PROPERLY, I am using pieces of carpet and the results are brilliant. The carpet obviously keeps things a lot warmer and damper, which helps the composting process, and it’s all working so much better. Now, instead of heaps of slaters crawling around a semi-dry heap, I find big fat worms and damp, black, earth. I used to use carpet, way back in the past but, over the years, seemed to have forgotten about it and just used whatever came to hand. Talk about a slow learner!