Batteries now included

At work e-gardening is heralded as the way of the future...gardening at the touch of a button. Of course, why didn't we think of it before? Well, it was because trimming a hedge using a very long extension cord doesn't really work.

I am quite excited about this development especially with the push mowers that you still need to push...but it's all electric. And very quiet, and no fumes! Just charge up and go. And the weedeaters that can whip weeds both ways. Genius! Also those noisy leafblowers - no more. They will be more like hairdryers and hum silently while hoovering or blowing up dead leaves.

After our gardens are all wi-fi enabled what is there left to do but relax and let Mother Nature do the rest. Or we could then work on our water features. I have seen solar powered pumps that create fountains of water to splash and ripple and cascade creating rainbows for our plants. I would rip out all the plastic irrigation and leave that to the unenlightened industrial farmers. The soothing sound of running water, misty sprays and bubbing springs will bring life to the garden.

Time is marching on and it's now the end of August. Next weekend I hear there's a tulip festival at Eden Garden. Eden Garden boasts 13,000 tulip bulbs which I'm sure look spectacular. There's also APW design project presentations. Since I'm now alumni, I have an invite to go back and see what new permaculturalists are working on. I missed last weekends Orchid Show as was busy at the community garden, planting ajugas under fig trees. Church garden also got a weed and a new pop-up fridge library, so I can put my excess gardening books there.

My latest acquisitions in gardening tomes include - Remarkable Trees of the World, Gardens to visit in the upper North Island, Flower Arranging Country Crafts, Feng Shui in the Garden,  Growing Chinese Vegetables in your own backyard, The Chinese Kitchen Garden, Esther Dean's Gardening Book, The colourful New Zealand garden year-round, Deep-Rooted Widsom and not exactly a gardening tome but one that might help me in a quest to be more tidy - The Magic of Tidying Up.

This in addition to my ITO training of which I have one module signed off. Hooray I can now play with small machine gardening toys without harming anyone.

Behind the scenes at the garden

Some new plants have been added to my garden.

Ajuga 'bugleweed' although its not actually a weed but a groundcover. Christmas lily bulbs. In Ferndale by driveway.
Two ivy geraniums to clamber up the chain link fence in the backyard. One red and one cerise. New Gardenland.
Lemon grass by garage.
Spanish Shawl groundcover in Princess Diana bed and Snowy's bed.

Some weeds like creeping buttercup and oxalis have been taken out. In general the plant population is the same, as the more plants I plant, the less weeds there will be.

Plants shifted around - mexican sage, chyrsanthemum to the garage bed.
Aster to the chain link fence.
Hen and chickens fern to beneath kowhai. Ponga wheki fern to behind daphne.

Cuttings of rosemary are forming a tentative hedge past the wisteria.

So there's progress at home, like the tortoise, plodding along. At work it's a totally different scenario, where we are all racing around like hares trying to finish first. Its not something I'm used to since I'm a firm believer in slow and steady wins the race.

 Carrie Fisher used to say 'instant gratification takes too long'. I blame television. I think it feeds people the illusion that life is always a pretty picture that doesn't require any effort except to turn the TV on.  Like viewing a show garden. It looks good and in full colour all the time. When people look out their windows maybe they expect to see what's always been there. I don't know, I have no control over other people's opinions. It's just the vociferous that always complain. They don't  really care if the plant is plastic. Or the actors are not even real but animated plastic robots.  They just want something to look at.

Am I in garden theatre? If I am, I may be getting performance anxiety. No weeds! Must look busy! Pretend I know what I am doing! Everyone is judging me!  Last night at the Floral Circle meeting we heard Kate Hillier speak. She shared her lineage and pride in her family's nursery, Hilliers, who's claim to fame is 73 consecutive Gold medals at the Chelsea Flower Show, and appointments as official nursery to Her Majesty the Queen. She is now an official at the NZ Flower and Garden Show, which is like the Garden Olympics or World Championships if gardening were a sport, or the Oscars if gardening was on film. It will be back again at the Trusts Stadium in November, and this time there will be an inside the stadium for the floral part as well as outside in the field.

She shared some very interesting anecdotes about the Chelsea Flower Show except I was rather suspicious that Hilliers had won every gold medal for 73 years running. Surely this competiton is rigged, or the plants on steroids  or something? What I found bizarre is, that you aren't allowed to enter or walk into any show garden. if designing one you can't let the public walk in it. They are strictly off limits and only allowed to view it.  I just didn't let on that Karyn and I walked into some gardens after the show had finished, and sat inside the Hobbiton garden, and one of the Balinese style subtropical gardens and watched the ducks float by in the artificial pond. If you can only view a garden from your window then what use is it? You might as well just sit on the couch and watch TV instead.

Feng shui my garden

I am going back to my roots. Now all this running round in circles and zig zags has a method to it, you know, its not madness and it's not that I don't know what I'm doing. It's just I don't live on a farm,  where the plants are in neat rows and you just go from A to B in a systematic fashion like a typewriter. Remember those? You reached the end of the row of type and then pushed back the lever so you could type another row, and the paper moved up. And if you made a mistake you reached for the twink and had to wait until it dried before you typed over it. Well gardening isn't like that. Gardening is three dimensional and is never in straight lines,  not the gardens I'm creating.

 I'm creating a Chinese Kiwi garden and it has to be feng shuied. Feng shui doesn't mean you put in plastic pipe irrigation and set the timer and smooth over everything with a rake after you've rotary hoed and bulldozed everything into submission. Feng shui, meaning wind (feng) and water (shui) is a Chinese design philosophy of placement whether it be plants or furniture or houses, that sets out to be in harmony with nature, the soil beneath your feet whether it be a hill or valley, and the water around you. In Permaculture they make it out to be scientific, and measure sun rise and sun set and contour lines and prevailing winds. Zones are demarcated from the core living area, and as you go further out the zones become more wild. It's all very practical. They talk about swales and keylines and north facing slopes and valuing the marginal.

Feng shui however, is a bit more mystical than that. At times, you may have to appease the dragon otherwise bad luck will follow you. What...dragon? Yes, or, as the Maori call it, the taniwha. The dragons you see, are not happy you decide to live on their territory. If you not careful and decide to destroy their habitat, they can make life very tough for you. Also, qi, which the chinese believe is the very essence of life, needs to be channelled correctly. This means don't create a wind tunnel but endeavour to balance the elements so that the qi can flow gently around you. The shape of the land and the general feeling of peace when you are in a tranquil setting, can be attributed to harmonising the qi. There are five elements that need to be in harmony, as well as ying and yang. Fire, water, earth, wind, wood. If all this sounds a bit 'woo woo' to you, perhaps consider this. When people carve out a huge dam and divert water into straight side ditches or place a concrete six story apartment block into a hillside they are destroying complex soil ecosystems and disrupting burial grounds.

Geomancy, superstition or pseudoscience? Perhaps it's a bit of all three, but I will know when I'm at peace in my garden. So I arrange my plants to not only please the eye but to consider the flow of wind and water on the land, which in Auckland is very specific to the microclimates around this isthmus. See, God didn't make this land flat and featureless like Australia, which is half desert. In Paradise, there are trees and there are rivers. This is Godzone where all we are required to do is dress and keep it, He had already divided the land and given us the plants. When we go about destroying His creation, we upset the balance. Because life began in the garden. So all I am doing is restoring the garden back to His original design, a place where you can walk in the cool of the day. And with plants its all about location, location location, which is pretty much feng shui in a nutshell.

Help!

So much gardening to do, so little time.
Today I got a random call. I don't know how people are getting my number, but once they know I'm a gardener, I have people ringing me up wanting me to work for them. I never used to have this as a librarian. People didn't ring me up and ask me to sort their books or for recommendations. Or read stories to them. Perhaps they figured I was too busy.

But now, I find people are thinking because I'm a gardener they just assume I don't have anything to do except garden for other people. Maybe they think if I am not actually mowing a lawn or weeding I must be going crazy twiddling my thumbs. It could be people have this idea that gardeners just hang about in gardens lying in hammocks but will  instantly come running if there's a garden that needs attention because we can't bear the fact that a garden is not gardened. Well not instantly but I understand the urgency. You've let your garden go. If nobody comes to rescue it soon, your very reputation is at stake. How can you face your maker when there's weeds in your lawn and trees blocking your light, it just won't do will it? Unlike a house that slowly deteriorates little by little, falling to bits and leaking but it will just be like every other damp house in Auckland, but leave a garden or lawn for a week or two in Auckland you will hardly recognise it because everything just grows 'like Topsy'.

However I am very busy every single day with all the gardens I've been assigned to look after plus have several things on my growing waiting list of things to do. Such as--

Install hammock, although slack lines have become all the rage between trees, I prefer hammocks.
Plant Lily of the Valley shrub, or Pieris. I have discovered this is lovely for floral arrangements.
Remove tree prunings from church.
Build up compost bin at church.
Plant church bedding.
Extend my flower border at home.
Find bog salvias.
Plant potatoes in lasagna bed.
Continue carpeting driveway with spanish shawl, or pratia, or the tough creeping ficus that can be driven over.
Find a home for coloured flax and astelias.
Install peace lilies at church. For air conditioning and general oxygenation properties.
Plant another olive tree. I just think I need two because one is the loneliest number.
Pot up more spider plants.
Prune my climbing rose.
Cut back pineapple sage.

In meantime am enjoying my spring blossoms. White Hardenbergia 'free and easy' has frothed all over my arch and Cleopatra Magnolia has burst forth in brilliant magenta on Mt Asher, with primula at her feet. Daffodils are making a cheery yellow appearance. Rosemary also is sprouting delicate blue flowers and hellebore is coming away. I even have pink bergenias. Spring has come forth!

By the way my hammock theory is as yet untested because I am waiting on my trees to grow tall enough so I can hang a hammock beneath them. But I do think there ought to be an emergency number for gardeners you can ring like 111 instead of Police, Ambulance or Fire Department you can also have the option of Garden Department, for example if someone is threatening to cut down your favourite tree and you can call this number to put a stop to this crime, and report rogue lawn mowers and pruning crimes, as well as rescuing vulnerable plants from abuse and neglect. You can also arrange same day emergency flower delivery for weddings, funerals and missed anniversaries. Plus if your plant dying you can ask for a Plant Doctor what is wrong if you suspect a disease or exposure to roundup poisoning, as all roundup and weedkillers ought to be strictly monitored, it's a health and safety hazard you know. If there was a number I could give you I would for a garden helpline. Just not mine because...I am too busy gardening to answer my phone.

Chop chop!

You can't garden, you can only maintain.
You can't think for yourself, just do what the boss says.
Don't think, just do.

What were you thinking? Why didn't you ask me. Why DIDN'T you do this. I want you to think. It's not your garden, you have to do what the client wants. But the client doesn't know what they want. Do what the manager says. But the manager isn't a gardener. Ask for his approval. I have to know. Why don't I know. Tell me, communicate. I can't communicate on the phone, I'm busy gardening. Txt me. I thought you had said you finished the garden. No I said finishing, not finished. You should be finished by now. I'm not finished yet. The finish is the most important thing. No garden is finished. If a garden is finished, I would be dead and buried and you would be the one gardening my grave.

And so it goes.

After losing my sanity for a moment and chopping back overgrown iresine back to sticks, then realising, hmm, maybe it was covering that stump for a reason, who cares about the other plants? Nobody ever comes to this garden anyway. Maybe you can garden where nobody else is looking. Oh nah too late now, I've already done it. It will just have to grow back. Like a weed. Everyone will look at the bare soil and wonder where the plant is. But there's other plants around it that can now breathe. It looks better. No it doesn't. It looks worse. Did you see it before I cut it, plus how was I supposed to get those suckers out?

I thought maybe I had gone too far of the edge, and tidied up too much. Like the time I chucked out all my stuff, forgotten I had given some of it to mum, and she was looking for my old junk I had chucked out that she claimed belonged to her. I never heard the end of it.

The thing is when my boss says 'tidy' its like I cannot hear the word. He says tidy the roses and maybe hibiscus. So I go, look at the roses and see they need pruning and cutting back. Ok so I start doing this, after all he said roses and maybe hibiscus. I spend all this time doing this till the roses have all the deadwood and dead flowers cut out and all their stems are growing towards the light. Then I realise well I don't have time, because he has only given me 30 minutes, to hoe and weed around as well. So I stupidly point this out to him, and then he gets mad at me for not doing it. I said, TIDY the roses, not PRUNE them. Didn't you take a hoe with you. Well yes but I didn't have time as I was pruning the roses. You didn't say to WEED around them.

My boss is just about to either top himself or quit the company and leave me to walk home from the North Shore, but maybe I have to remind him he hired a gardener not a tidier-upper. Plus, how can you tidy a junkyard anyway. If its junk, why would tidying it make it any better? It's like rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic. A futile task. But I suppose everything has to look good while it's sinking.
I just have to adjust to this mindset and realise maybe he doesn't have as long to live as I have.

Nearer my God to thee...

My boss left dead lavender plants that we questioned him can we take these out, but, his reasoning was if we take them out the residents will have nothing to look at. So he left them in for nearly a year and they didn't grow an inch and we were not allowed to touch them.  Well, I'm sorry but I think residents would rather look at plants that are alive than dead ones. Maybe there is a gap, but sometimes I think we coddle residents too much and think they don't know that plants if cut back will grow back but plants that are dead as doornail won't. Besides, aren't we meant to trim lavender when its flowered for the flowers. Not wait till they die!

Its like when Myra threw a fit at me and accused me of chucking out her bulbs and cutting dead leaves off her plants. They grew back. It will grow back. Would you leave split ends in your hair never cut your fingernails till they grow all gnarly that you can't do anything except that they are photographed for the Guiness book of records? No I think not. But then I do WAY too much thinking these days. And doing. Which I call 'gardening'.  I should just stop and take a nap. Yes. My next job. Actually my dream job. Dreaming.

Hope

There is hope yet.
My friend Nick gave me a whole bag of sweet mandarins from his tree which mum tasted and said, wow what kind of mandarin is this? They are really tasty and juicy. We should have one. So I asked Nick and he said it was a mandarin tangerine hybrid sweet kiwi citrus.
I say there is hope because, mum had told me before I was not to plant any more trees. And she even meant fruit trees. But maybe, just maybe, she will make an exception for this one, if ever I can find it? Or alternatively, I could try planting the seeds from the fruit and wait a few years but if it's a hybrid it probably won't grow true to seed. But it might...still end up with tasty fruit.

I planted garlic in hope that it will grow into more cloves. I planted those leucodendron and proteas in hope they will a source of cut flowers. I hoped for a compost bin and now I have one (thanks Eco Matters!) for the church garden plus even offered free compost! Yes. Although hope now seems dashed for the cut flower shrubs since I discovered their mashed remains on the verge on Sunday. But I do hope whoever did this reimburses what they destroyed. Sevenfold.

I hope to get my level 2 small machines module signed off that I can now officially operate a lawn mower, blower and weedeater without hurting anyone. I hope to be able to go on this Taranaki Garden Festival Road trip in November.  I hope to learn more about flower arranging at a workshop this Saturday. I hope all the gardeners will want to come and have lunch together this month after working bee. I hope I will be able to pot up some peace lilies for church. I hope the spanish shawl groundcover I scattered will take root and cover my bare ground.  I hope the elders will say yes to more flowering plants around the church. I hope, I hope.

Gardening is an endeavour that runs on hope. From a small seed in the ground to a giant tree (or sunflower) we gardeners live in hope. From bare soil to a flourishing garden, what you see now will not be the same in three months time. But in the meantime, how does a gardener work. We not only  live in hope but we work or walk by faith knowing what we hope will happen, WILL indeed happen.

Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things unseen, says the Bible. We are saved by hope, but hope that is seen is no hope at all. Who hopes for what we can already see?

I am waiting in hope for a miracle to happen before my eyes. And mum will say yes to growing a new fruit tree in the garden.