The Golden Gnomes

Before the funeral Les helped pick out some flowers for the church garden memorial bed. We now have a hot pink pelargonium and purple petunias next to the Jesus rock that says 'Well done good and faithful servant' to all that have passed on at st Giles. The triangle garden is also doing well, filling out with hollyhocks, statice, alyssum, lillies, daisies and more petunias. We also have a pop up library (it's the church's old fridge, painted with a new lease of life)  next to the bustop near the roadside beds which librarian Nova is filling with children's books and I'm keeping topped up with garden books, and hopefully more Bibles. People have been taking the Bibles so I always need to check so we can add more. I did a tidy of the church garden on Saturday morning, missing our elder Graeme as I was  deadheading the passion dianthus and guara he planted. Church flowers for Sunday were pink gladioli, pale pink scented geranium and hot pink pelargonium.  Pink daisies and lavender. Plus two vases of original purple and pink bicolour sweet peas. It was good to see Jennifer at church on Sunday and she appreciated all the flowers. Maybe God knew to take Graeme just before Labour Weekend so that we will always remember him at this time of year when all the flowers are in bloom. 

I am terrible at remembering to take photos of my floral arrangements but I guess I'm too busy gardening to consider adding photography to my repertoire. I prefer to use words though.  This coming weekend I'm attending a Permaculture Party, for the 10th anniversary of APW. I can't believe its just been a year since I got my PDC - Permaculture Design Certificate, and I still haven't done much about it. Perhaps next year I will move into a more creative permaculture position, if I'm not lumped with weeding for another year with my work. Because nobody else seems to have the time or patience to actually do it.  Oh the drama and tyranny of perfectionism in an industry where perfection is not always possible. This is what you get from people who don't know how to garden being in charge of gardeners. And control freaks, I can tell you some hair raising stories about these. 

There's this one gardener, who shall remain nameless to protect their guilt, who rushes everyone and  complains loudly nobody is helping them, but then doesn't ask politely if um, maybe someone could be so kind as to lend a hand? Then said grumpy gardener huffs "I can't keep doing this all by myself' yet continues to break their back getting it all done while putting everyone else down because they are in a such a hurry instead of taking their time.  What is the old adage, marry at haste, repent at leisure? This can apply to  certain gardeners too, who try to 'get a jump on spring' and expect their seedlings to grow when they just aren't ready? It's not warm enough yet, for Christ's sake, WAIT! You can't hurry love. Nothing is to be gained by planting seeds too early, nobody can effectively make things grow - there is a time and season for everything. Ecclesiastes tells us 'He has made everything beautiful in it's time'  and I do believe that when you do a rush job, it shows...so be thoughtful and care about everything you do, because nobody wins prizes for being first except Mr/Ms Bossy Boots stomping around in the mud throwing a hissy fit when things don't go their way.  Best Drama Queen/King in a gardening role. And the Golden Gnome goes to....

RIP Graeme

Sad news Graeme our St Giles elder and fellow gardener is no longer with us, he has gone to meet his maker.  He died peacefully at home on Monday morning. His farewell funeral is tomorrow at Morrisons, Universal Drive at 3pm.

Graeme was a keen gardener and always gave me good advice about plants. He had a wonderful productive vege patch and he and his wife Jennifer kept both their house and garden immaculate. They always welcomed me in their home but it was the garden that I most liked to see as Graeme was always growing something new. One time I gave him some broad beans seeds, they were meant to be dwarf  variety but in Graeme's patch they grew to be giants! Must be something in the soil, but I also attribute it to Graeme's green thumbs.

Graeme had an eye for order and beauty as we worked together on the St Giles garden beds. As an enthusiastic gardener he had to restrain me sometimes with his wisdom when I found 21 dianthus for our flower bed and put them all in at once. He rearranged them to be pleasing amongst the hebes that Auckland Transport had planted there, they had left the job half done so I just added some more plants. Graeme was in horror the Auckland Transport had given us hebes, he called them cigarette butt hiding plants and said we needed something more like grasses that won't hide all the rubbish. We couldn't take them out but I was afraid I might have created more work for him by putting too many dianthus there so he took some dianthus away and then put back the weedmat. Then we got some white stone chips mulch and it was Graeme's idea to put twelve memorial rocks there that represented the twelve apostles.

While Graeme knew he was getting on a bit - all those rocks, pebbles and chips were heavy! I reassured him we would continue to look after St Giles garden.  I think that was one less worry from his mind to have some younger people gardening. Les also helped with other garden beds and Graeme was so encouraging and wise in what would be the best thing to do. He  told me, take Les as a helper gardening is good for him rather than going to the library all the time. lol. He said it in jest I suppose because he must have known I was a  librarian that was always getting in trouble.  We got so many compliments from church members and people passing by about the flower bed. I knew I had an ally with Graeme in getting the work done and what would be most pleasing to God.

The only thing that worried me  was when Graeme told me he was going to spray the weeds with Roundup. He was very cavalier about it and said 'she'll be right'  but I just said to him be careful about that as its a toxic chemical. I don't know if exposure to Roundup directly causes cancer but cancer is what got him in the end.  As has happened with so many people today. So just going to say that as a warning to gardeners in particular  to be safe because if Roundup gets into your system your body is not going to like it. I would rather people weed by hand than have to get out and spray or at least, wear gloves and a mask. The most dangerous time is when you are mixing a concentrated  lethal chemical.  Don't let weeds overtake your garden so that you will need to resort to using what to nature is like a hydrogen bomb. The fallout is more than you think.

Despite all this, even if it kills you, and we all are going to die of something in the end, Graeme's  enduring faith is a shining example to us all we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. His love and care for everyone at St Giles was in his regular prayer meetings and guidance for anyone who asked. We all knew we could go to him as he always had time for us being like the Grandad of St Giles church.
 Graeme's last words to us was Romans 8:28 And I am convinced that nothing can ever separate us from God's love. Neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither our fears for today nor our worries about tomorrow--not even the powers of hell can separate us from God's love.

RIP Graeme we love you and miss you but most of all thank you for sharing that God loves us and showing His love to others. Will continue on with St Giles garden in your memory this side of Paradise.  Till we all meet again. 

Plant Geeks

In horticulture, it seems every flower has it's devotees and own fan club. For some, it's roses, for others, it's orchids. There are ones for carnivorous plants, bromeliads, rhododendrons, herbs. Some of my workmates are into plants like gaura or bird of paradise (one even has a tattoo of said plant on his arm)  But for me, it must be the sweet pea.

I met what Monty Don would call a plant geek on Saturday. He is world renowned horticulturalist and plant breeder Dr Keith Hammett. Despite what Monty says, he is charming and we got on very well, because he breeds my favourite flower, the sweet pea. He also breeds clivias, dahlias, primulas, dianthus and amaryllis. Keith, as he likes to be known, opened up his garden  up at Massey for everyone to see his clivias for the National Clivia Festival. Keith is the one who developed a rare yellow variety of clivia that's highly prized in designer gardens. The originals are bright orange, but now there are demands for red ones. He hasn't quite perfected the red ones yet as he wants them to be bigger and more trumpet shaped, but the ones he has bred so far are striking fire engine red, a stand out in any spring garden.

Me being a sweet pea fan, I was able to query his daughter and himself on all things sweet pea, the different colours, their growth habits, when the best time to plant is (May) and just what it is about them that makes them the quintessential English cottage garden plant.  The fluttery petals, the divine scent, or the way it delicately climbs trellis, fences and arches? In England, where Keith was from originally, the sweet pea is highly prized, there are shows entirely devoted to sweet peas, and there is quite a lucrative market for seeds.  It's a valued export item, although it requires a lot of patience to breed all the different colours, that come from the original bi-coloured  species.

Keith's large garden is a haven for clivia which grows en masse in broad swathes under trees around his  park-like property,  there's nothing quite like it. Part of his garden is a nursery and the sweet peas are grown in neat shadehouse tunnels in very uniform rows. I bought four packets of seeds, two solstice (late sowing) sweet peas in red and hot pink, another early sweet pea that changes colour from blue to purple, and mixed dahlia seeds. I also bought two dainty perennial primulas that look like golden and red buttons.

I planted the primulas in the Camellia driveway bed (or the Fat Lady Sings bed, as I call it) and then got to work on removing creeping buttercup and edging my flaming log bed with mondo grass I rescued from a work tidy up. Compost was then applied and I am quite happy with it, so satisfying to remove great big clumps of buttercup! The flaming log bed is so named because it's got logs as edging and flaming  coloured plants like canna india shot, red abutilon,  nasturtium and of course, bright orange clivias.  I plan to add more red and orangy plants there so it looks like it's on fire, like love lies bleeding, red dahlias, and maybe poinsettias. Mum is a fan of red flowers so, will wait till Keith perfects his red clivias I know where to source them now. Thanks to Olga who is always telling us gardeners we have to meet this unashamed plant geek.

The full Monty Don

I have my first immigrant, I call 'Ladybird' who has made her nest in the hardenbergia arch in New Gardenland. Mum says to let her settle in and not to disturb her. Mum doesn't say anything about not wanting an arch anymore, and it seems like I'm not about to move away to Dunedin anytime soon either. The loquat tree has had it's firstfruits, and now they are ripening delicious and sweet, along with the acidic tangelos. I might have to neem the tree again, to guard against whitefly, but otherwise the fruit has been so abundant we have surplus to give away.

Returning to work was not easy after being in holiday mode for a week. However everything at Waitakere is just blooming great. At home I have planted some rhubarb in the Princess Diana bed and moved the diosma there too. I am in despair of any annual flower seedlings coming up because of Martha digging and scratching them out before they have a chance.

I found a book in the library called 'Down to Earth' by Monty Don, who seems a rather likeable Englishman. For some reason he reminds me of Michael Palin, or maybe its the 'Monty' name, except he's not a TV comedian, but a  TV gardener. He even went around the world in 80 gardens, like Michael Palin's Around the World in 80 days. Monty did visit two New Zealand gardens, Ayrlies, and Te Kainga Marire. This was how I came to know about Ayrlies, otherwise I would have had absolutely no idea it existed.  Monty had high praise for Ayrlies, but even higher praise for Te Kainga Marire. I have not been to Te Kainga Marire, which is in Taranaki, now world renowned for being purely native and having plants Monty was invited to jump on like a trampoline. Monty was after the exotic and so was excited to come across a garden that had NZ plants, because if you can imagine, he did not come halfway across the world to see an English garden, he already had one at home!

Well he can come and see my garden if he wants, that does not attempt to be English, even though the front half is clipped buxus I thought I had ripped out all the roses. I blame my brothers, they also need to come and give the hedges a trim as they threaten to blocking the path.  With horror now I see two flower carpets roses creeping back. I don't know how they escaped, but they are there. Anyway, the book was not about his Grand Tour but about his 50 years experience gardening and giving us readers tips. Two thing stood out for me.

Page 157 Trust yourself
'Western horticulture has tended to elevate the specialist above the generalist. This is often unhelpful and inappropriate. Plantsmen and women are geeks. Like all geeks, they cannot imagine anyone not being as interested as they are by their own obsession. They are often charming and one can always learn from them but they are not typical gardeners, so do not be overly influenced or confused by them.'

hmm ok then. I'm wondering who he could be referring to. Botanists? Or Botanic gardeners?  People that have to collect every plant at the garden centre and then end up being an expert on yuccas?  I don't know. Do I bore you to tears with my gardening blog?

And another  thing that my boss might be horrified to hear is Monty writing  on page 95 Wildlife gardening 1.'Avoid tidiness: leave leaves, patches of weeds, overgrown shrubs and climbers, and dead stems on plants. All this provides essential cover and shelter for insects, birds and small mammals like bats'

It could be that people that are always neat and tidy are afraid of bats. Or birds nesting in their trees. Or small animals in general.  Hey we are bigger than them, it's not as if we are hiding tigers, lions and bears in our gardens.

So next thing I must to is write to Mr Don and see if he wants to visit NZ again, he can come over in Summer to see New Gardenland with Ladybird, taste homecooked Chinese food  in exchange for me pottering around at his place in Winter with indoor plants (he hasn't mentioned what he grows inside)  watching him on the telly. I could also write a book as well (working title, 'Stuck in the mud')  about my years of gardening experience. All four of them.

Time flies

Time flies when you are not working.
I decide one day to read an entire book in one go. This is how come I know so much about the Kennedys, who are not even remotely related to me. Former First Lady Michelle Obama planted a kitchen garden, but in the Kennedy garden, they had roses and glitzy cocktail state functions, and they also had burial grounds, with eternal flames and what Americans call pot plants, which John Jr smoked.  The secret servant agents would hide in the bushes trying to stop paparazzi from taking photos of the famous Kennedys, or being shot, but they weren't always successful. Caroline Kennedy co-wrote a book called 'The Right to Privacy' but I'm not sure she was referring to any gardens.

I suppose if you do want to be seen on tv motorcades then its not exactly conducive to gardening, and if you are wealthy you just pay someone else to do it while you jet set off to India, Kenya, Pakistan, Paris, Skorpios, Aspen, Martha's Vineyard or where ever takes your fancy. While I was reading this, my garden grew.

Everything is blooming, I checked at Woodside and my ajugas are all flowering under the figs, making a pretty picture and bringing in the bees.
I sowed six giant Flowerzilla sunflowers in the vege beds.
St Giles church garden got a weed and tidy, I was sad over my broken heart - the heart shaped planter literally broke so I ended up composting the polyanthus and having to rethink the Jesus rock bed.
Then came home and did some new planting here and there.

New arrivals include Pieris 'Temple bells', another lavender, a purple grape 'Schuyler', penstemons, cosmos, parsley, and in big pots, 2 capsicums, an eggplant, and one watermelon.

I looked at job ads and was pretty dispirited to learn that there was not much out there in Gardenland. My most favourite job, I already have, its just...well you know. Its not always roses. Actually when its all roses I wouldn't enjoy it anyway because roses are such a pain. I tried not to think about it, but then I thought about it, and please let me know if this is right or wrong. Should you spray chemical insecticide indoors without gloves and a mask or proper ventilation? So what if its says 'natural' and then you read the back and it says 'do not get on bare skin, has a one day withholding period, harmful to bees and aquatic life, if swallowed contact the poisons centre, do not inhale mist'. Apparently it could be 1% natural pyrethin and 99% chemical and still be marketed as natural in a green eco-friendly (not) can of spray.
I considered this and thought health and safety. My boss then said well what do you do at home? I said I never use sprays I use a fly swat. And venus fly traps.

We could employ some beneficial spiders. Or if he's that concerned about appearances, use plastic plants. I'm not putting me or the oldies at risk spraying their plants that could poison the bugs AND the oldies. So I have come close to quitting, as I don't believe in compromising but then I have to figure out what to do with the rest of my life. Please let it not be another job that calls me to  Keep Up Appearances. I feel like I am catering to soul-less people like Hyacinth Bucket which is why I am totally refusing to judge any flower shows.