New growth

 Last Saturday Karyn called for help in planting her weeping cherry tree in her front yard. Poor hubby Pierre was off sick and needed rest, but the cherry tree needed to get in the ground, lest it blow over in the grow bag and break another branch. 

Karyn technically doesn't actually have a front yard at all just a driveway (and two garages) with a tiny triangle of planting ground near the stairs that lead up to her front door. She had already pulled out the immense spiky yucca that was there before, but some of its roots had been left behind, which were as tough as cable wire. 

We dug and cut everything out, chucked in scoria, a whole sack of gypsum, compost, sand, planted the tree and then scattered bark mulch on top. It was already 2 metres high and weeping though bare, and although it looked like a skeleton of a tree I could see it had 'good bones'. Pierre's special tree. Karyn said he chose it himself and he will do the underplanting. 

My good deed done, I returned back to my garden this week to divide my houseplants ...now I have several peace lilies, calatheas, and african violets more than I had before. 

My other Karen friend from garden club decided on an impromptu day trip down to Wairere Nursery in Gordonton to buy some replacement roses  - 'Hayley Westenra'. Jane, Sid's widow tagged along with us. She said Sid grew up in Taranaki and that is where he wants to be buried with his family in one of the beautiful garden cemeteries there. I thought of the  Taranaki garden festival I still have not seen in October.  Will I get to go this year? It's a five hour drive...

Wairere Nursery seems to have everything for a large scale country garden - and also boasts a show garden you can walk around in, featuring cloud topiary, a meandering stream, slopes of hellebores, and clipped citrus. I think it will be gorgeous in spring when everything is in full bloom. Woodland Estate nearby is also worth having a wander round in. It boasts 100 year old oaks, plane trees, wisteria, a cricket oval, a cafe, another stream with arched bridges, and thousands upon thousands of spring bulbs and hellebores, peeking underneath magnolia, dogwoods and camellias.  Very 'English' looking woodland. It was the former homestead of the founder of Anchor Butter. One can imagine what it was like back in the day when the trees were just saplings and the land stretched as far as the eye could see all to be turned into dairy farm. 

Garden Club trips planned  include one in Beachaven, the Kelston Orchid Show, and maybe the Cambridge Garden Festival. Unfortunately, going to Waiheke for the Jassy Dean Garden Safari seems out of the question, considering the cost of hiring transport, the ferry, motel stay and tickets to enter all the gardens. You'd think it would be actually cheaper since its on our doorstep but no. 

Today I emptied one compost bin to mulch my tiger lilies, and harvested some more yacon. I also cleared a weedy patch in the corner near the old chicken coop. The eerlicheer are coming out, and the freesias are budding. It's going to be a glorious spring, only a few more weeks! 

 

Planting Day

 Well it was a good planting day after all, the sun managed to shine for the time us Riverparkers got stuck in, along with some local board members angling for votes, and the dedicated NZ Biosecurity and Auckland Park Rangers team. 

I noticed the politicians were more into chatting than actual planting though, but I ignored them and got on with the job. Mum came a bit later and helped with the mulching, where the team cleared two huge piles on the verges with four wheel barrows. 

David had around 700 native plants ranging from manuka, harakeke, kowhai, kumarahou, titoki, kahikatea, kawakawa, maitai, mahoe, carex and several others I can't recall off the top of my head. Unfortunately no kauri is being planted since the rangers are still dealing with kauri dieback disease. Those of us who stuck around and braved the light showers to clear the mulch all then had a feed of sausages on the bbq. 

On Thursday, finally at looong last my tiger lily bulbs have arrived, three tiger lilies and three tiger babies. I planted one tiger baby in a pot, two in the front yard, and the three tiger lilies in the back yard near the loquat and under the cabbage tree. They were already sprouting by the time I got them and they said they needed to be planted IMMEDIATELY, so I wasted no time. 

Thankfully we no longer have any marauding chickens around to dig them all up. 

Garden club member Karen and I are planning a flora foraging expedition in spring to use up all our petals to create pretty pictures and mandalas on club night. However, sometimes I think beauty is in the eye of the beholder for floral art. I've come across a lot of philistines who don't appreciate creativity. Oh it looks like a mess. But isn't the point of art to make a mess so you can create something beautiful? 

I just wondered if people have this idea that every single thing has to look perfect ALL the time and disregard the fun of just creating it. JUST FOR FUN. I think people are too judgemental about beauty cos they obviously think they can just buy it with no effort on their part to create it and I'm totally sick of that attitude. Gardens are never made by singing "oh how beautiful" and  sitting around in the shade. 

Right on Rudyard Kipling!

Midwinter Break

 It's now school holidays and I'm indoors while the rain and cold lashes my plants. Mum often rushes around putting the indoor plants outside so they can have rain, but this time I've just kept them inside to stay dry. 

Te Whakatipu Kakano (Raising from Seed) the Bilingual Whanau at school have helped plant hundreds of native plants at Taikato - Riverpark Reserve, on the margins not far from the playground. They did it last Tuesday morning when it was wet and muddy - kudos to them! 

A couple of hundred more plants have been planted by the boat landing ramp further around the reserve. And then we're gearing up for even more planting this Saturday. So please come along if you are in the area and want to get your hands/gloves dirty and make our creek beautiful again.

I did some more planting at school, now the primulas are accompanied by lambs ears, and I plan to sow sweet peas near the climbing rose under the birch tree near the library. Two children snapped up some sprouting chokos, which I also found planted there. Kings Plant Barn gave broad beans, bee pollinating mix and sunflower seeds for me to give away as prizes. The broad beans have been snapped up already. Ranui Community Garden has also given me different packets of seeds they've saved. 

I'm still waiting on the tiger lilies - when will they get here?? 

Last time I checked Vincent still hadn't planted his tulips (chilling in the fridge) or his mondo grass. Mum had been trying to farm me out as garden slave for him claiming he needs help. No he just needs to get his A into G and do it himself. Ha! The thought that I would do someone else's private garden? Next thing she'll be shipping me off to work in some dire permaculture plantation run by rich white men.

Ok I was just kidding about the permaculture plantation bit, but the permies owners don't really FEED their workers do they, or give them any housing? They are just expected to live in their cars or yurts the whole time. Because to have a homestead well, only you are meant to own it all right and employ underlings to help you with the labour....when they could just ask school children to do it. 

Of course, I expect the children to have at least had a free school lunch out of all this exertion. (Note, if you help out at the planting day, I heard there was free sausages). 

This reminds me of the time Kings College employed us gardeners at Bark to plant up their stream because they couldn't get their students to do it. And no they did not give us lunch in their school cafeteria. They only did that when we had a roadshow about the new lawnmowers they had splashed out on to mow all their sports fields. 

Something as simple as feeding your workers so they have energy/reward for hard days work seems a bit lost on most organisations in New Zealand I must say. Or maybe this happens the world over. What do I know? 

Anyway, apart from labour considerations, what other things have been happening. Well, I've managed to harvest a few yacons - so will try yacon smoothie at some stage. And I've moved the cannas now to by the garage. Plus our jonquils have come out, so I've been cutting them. Some daikon radishes that were sown in the community garden have sprouted, and at home, snow peas, though many have now got eaten by birds or was it snails, so I might have to sow more and set traps. Tangelos are ripening.

My new thing to do is to paint Monet's waterlilies and bridge scene by numbers. Garden Planet has been wrapped up for a while. I heard Jacqui was asking whether I was still writing this blog, because she had been a bit lax on writing the Woodside one.  Weren't you doing it everyday? She asked. 

I was like what? Everyday?? If I did write it everyday I would not have any time to do any actual gardening! 

However I must mention that she and Mike are now feeding me mandarins so, I am supposing she would like some labour in return and maybe I could write a few posts on the blog. Huh. I will think about it. 

Happy Matariki

 I spent Matariki sleeping in then painting my sunflowers  (thanks Vincent Van Gogh) to brighten my room. Other flowers are making an appearance. I pulled out a strip of mondo grass to be replaced by a line of 24 mixed polyanthus, on special from Mitre 10. The mondos are now gone to Epsom and brother Vincent is going to use them for his garden. I also managed to snag 24 mixed primulas, and found I had nowhere to plant those so...the school garden next to the library became the happy recipient of those. 

At Woodside I've now put in three rows of daikon radish. 

Still no word about the tiger lilies...

David from number 50 has now organised a planting day for us Riverparkers behind number 21. He's got about 750 native  plants for us to plant, plus mulch to go in on  July 16.  He's also been trapping possums and rats. 

Our crescent is going to be the best ever with rejuvenated forest and riparian planting, and having all the moth plants, woolly nightshade, privet and elephant grass removed! 

Karyn's been recovering from a bout of the flu. I hope she's ok to record what may be our last Garden Planet episode for a while. 

Starry Starry Night

 New Gardenland is having it's Juneteenth with a bit of a clear out and fresh plantings. Loretta gave me a lovely hot pink cyclamen which now has it's home beneath the cabbage tree, and JoAnne gave me half of her very long asparagus fern indoor plant which now is hanging in the school library. It's keeping company with a few more spider plants and orchid cactus. I hope mum won't miss them, they looked a bit forlorn on the ground but I'm hoping they'll be much happier hanging indoors. 

I also cleared out some of the rose geranium by the garage to give the mexican sage room to grow, and cut the lemon grass down. JoAnnes pink maguerite daisy cuttings now have a chance. I also moved the frangipani from the side of the house into a pot on the deck. It lost all its leaves but should be a bit warmer on higher ground.

Otherwise my garden is getting filled up and soon there just won't be any room for more plants...though cousin Winnie had now taken away the old rabbit hutch so there IS a spot behind the garage...that is, if the rabbit hutch proves big enough, I've heard that SPCA demands that rabbits be kept in a space twice the size of Winnie's own bedroom.  You'll need to ask cousin Winnie about the story with the rabbits. We've never had a rabbit resident in the garden so I have no idea why we had a rabbit hutch in the first place. 

And hooray I must report our new letterbox is now installed, painted gleaming white with a 'No circulars' sign,  sitting on its post and functioning. We got the Western Leader for the first time delivered right into its mouth and not chucked on the ground like the NZ Herald is every morning. 

At Woodside I planted the rest of the bulbs Olga had donated to the garden, of ranunculus and anemone so please watch those tyres closely. I confess I have now splurged on tiger lily bulbs and still waiting for them to be despatched, I know I can squeeze them in New Gardenland somewhere despite what I wrote before.

To tide me over the winter I am going to try my hand at a Vincent Van Gogh paint by numbers sunflower painting. I've already done Starry Starry Night, so I'm sure sunflowers can't be too hard. In two weeks time it will be our first every Matariki holiday, so very looking forward to it, as apparently its all about gardening anyway!

Keep ears tuned though as Karyn and I recorded a new Garden Planet episode - Karyn's garden is getting a makeover and I'm racking my brains coming up with a simple design/planting plan for her new garden. She just needs that one special tree that is going to give her shade and make everyone happy without anyone threatening to cut it down. 

S.T.A.M.P out Moth Plant

 There's been some garden activism going on lately, with picket lines and protests on Facebook. I never knew because I'm on a Facebook break, but people have got together to form groups against certain plants, like the group called S.T.A.M.P  which stands for Society Totally Against Moth Plant. 

This anti-moth plant group has been making the rounds of Garden Clubs lately, to spread the message, in an attempt to eradicate the threat of tiny moth plants springing up all over our gardens and smothering us to death, with their choko - like fruits which burst open like dandelion clocks or swan plant feathers, raining destruction on anywhere they can get a foothold - like the back of my neighbours' garage. Which is right next to our garden, and has been climbing up and on the side and over the roof, to become a huge green cloak of potential seed bombs. 

So I gave Graham, one of the volunteers and speakers, a call, and he came to the rescue to help rid New Gardenland of this evil threat. He dropped by on Saturday in his overall and long gloves PPE - the moth plant exudes a sticky white sap that doesn't come off and can give you a rash, a hessian sack, a poison gel and a long fruit pruner to remove the moth plant fruit bombs. 

He cut the vine off at its root, and then spread some sticky poison gel on it - I'm sorry I can't remember the name, but I trust that it's not just super glue (which by the way, does not work) and then pulled off a sackful of moth plant fruit bombs off the garage roof. He said they just will get smothered in landfill. Well I hope so, but then I wondered if all the fruits going to landfill will explode and the moth plants will sprout and then cover the landfill so it will become a moth plant dump island...

However I can't bear thinking about that one. Have we made the problem worse?  I thought they would be incinerated in a holocaust to destroy them but no it seems they are just getting a christian burial instead. If I recall the transfer station sends all its landfill north outside of Auckland to Dome Valley or south to some no mans land between South Auckland and Hamilton. I'm sorry Huntly. 

In addition to moth plant, they may be getting all our - ginger, agapanthus, wandering jew, phoenix palms, wild asparagus, morning glory, jasmine, wattle, loquats, privet, taiwanese cherry, woolly nightshade, arum lilies, crocosmia, pampas grass, mexican daisies, oxalis and bear breeches.

It's enough to establish a garden just full of those plants. It will be easy to establish, just plant and go. 

In return I'm proposing a swap for these plants - tiger lilies, oriental lilies, daffodils, tulips, blue bells, freesias, watsonia, babiana, gladioli, kumara, spanish shawl, dichondra, donkey's tails, woolly thyme, scented geranium, and pink manuka.

Anyone with these plants? Please send them to me. We may be descending on Rogers Garden Centre with a wheelbarrow very soon. 

Dark Days

 After a floriliferous birthday..we're back to rainy days where the garden has gone indoors.

Birthday Flowers...

Mother's Day flowers...

I paid a visit to Fab Garden Mama's boutique and bought an Elephants Ear philendron for the library.  Fab Garden Mama says she's getting married in December! 

Otherwise not much gardening being done, I'm trying to get the kids interested in making dried flower bookmarks but so far not much has been happening as I'd had to cancel a few days due to a bad head cold. But it seems Sis got the indoor gardening bug and has been updating me on the progress of her pilea like it's her first child...every time it grows a new leaf, I get pictures. When it got spots, she was a bit worried, but, I assured her that some plants do have spots on their leaves and it's not anything to worry about...it's just natural variegation. 

Karyn and I have been trying to put together a wrap up show for Garden Planet but actually getting together to record has been eluding us. Not helping is the moving of Planet FM premises (the old house has been demolished!) . It has been so long that I have not been able to talk about much gardening at all. And Karyn says her own garden had to be taken apart thanks to her home's deck renovations. While at the community garden, our raised beds need new wood as half of them have fallen apart. We are going to use the bulb money for fresh wood. So if it seems like our gardens has gone into hibernation, well maybe its a Sabbath year for all of us.