Chainsaw safety awareness week

 I don't have a chainsaw...or an axe, but in my experience I have been on the chopping block a few times. 

I feel for plants, particularly trees who are suddenly axed/cut down by humans. Tall poppy syndrome is something that most of us have experienced and it's usually the highly intelligent, clever ones that get cut for growing toward the light - something we naturally do. 

I have a few tips for this. As any gardener knows, it's all about location, location, location. Where you plant matters. If you are going to be growing plants that like the sun in the shade, they are going to stretch their stems any way they know how, to get to the light. Why not do that plant a favour, and place them where they are happy, in the full sun? 

Likewise our shade lovers, will shrivel and yellow in the direct sun and prefer to be covered, so shelter them like a mother hen. Tough bendy plants like manukas can handle a bit of wind so give them the space and room to grow and they will reward you with brilliant shapes.

Sometimes a plant will set seed and no matter what obstacle is in their path, once they've found their turangawaewae, they are going to grow. Your job, as a gardener, is to facilitate this potential and make sure that your plants are growing where they are happiest, won't be fighting each other, and are in harmony with the other plants. Sometimes it CAN be like herding cats at school. There may be times when you have to send a plant to the Principal's office to sort out. Or the sickbay. 

But what you don't want to do is destroy a plant just because it blocks your view. Judicious pruning, grafting or taking cuttings can solve a lot of problems, and weed removal is ongoing, until you learn some new uses for weeds. After all a weed is just a plant in the wrong place.

Perennials need dividing before they become congested like traffic in Auckland. Get your animals to help you, too. They'll eat the plants you may not find so palatable. And you can always eat the snails if you have too many. Otherwise recruit in the ducks. Mum would love a duck, especially a peking duck.

Mum is terrified of trees that grow close to the house and anything she cannot control. I now understand why the Japanese bonsai everything. I once said to her if she doesn't like trees she can just move to Australia where they don't have many, and live in the desert or Coober Pedy. 

You aren't supposed to say such things to your own mother, but then, there seems to be no limits on what a mother can say to her daughter. That's why I am glad mum doesn't have access to a chainsaw. 

I hugged my trees when they were threatened with treeicide, even the cabbage tree that mum tried to topple just grew back in defiance. I would like to take a moment to remember all the trees that were axed and hold a little memorial service for them, as we don't know what we've got until it's gone. 

Mother's Day

 My home was turned into a florist shop over the Mothers Day/Birthday weekend. And karaoke night club...Nina gave me flowers, Loretta, an anti-stress colouring book with felts, Rita, lavender potpourri, and numerous other special and much treasured gifts - even a wacky desk dude from Cushla's girls. 

I am not sure what to do about the desk dude...but I have to do something about the $10 Kings Plant Barn voucher that needs to spent in a fortnight from my birthday. So I am writing it down here so I remember...Although I cannot think what more could I buy from Kings when every nook and cranny seems to be filled up now. Maybe I will treat someone else? 

Garden Club night was all about Makutu Link which is a new reserve out in Bethell's wetland that has a boardwalk and native plant restoration and predator free status for the endangered bitterns and ducks that make their home there. It was on one of the garden rambles that Louise and I missed out on so am hoping that one fine day we'll get to explore the area a bit more. 

Otherwise garden wise I'm not doing much more than sow peas and wait for spring. Flowers were few and far between, the only pickings for club night from my garden were from mexican sage. However thanks to my Mothers Day bounty of cut flowers that had been hothoused (Nobody can grow tulips in Auckland at this time of year) I managed to make a placing in the floral arrangement that was themed 'keep Mum' --basically flowers in a teapot. 

But no I'm not about to become a full-time florist anytime soon. I'm always getting advice from old ladies saying why don't I do (their) gardening again and I'm like are you nuts at this time of year I am not getting all muddy so you can keep your garden tidy while I do all the work and you take all the credit for paying me. 

I just say that in my head, not out loud. 

Who knows, I may be back on Garden Planet, I hear Karyns taking time out at school (Massey Primary) to look after their garden, which are raised beds underneath the shadiest pohutakawa trees, as if raised beds needed to be in the shade. Obviously nobody sought to consult an actual gardener about the site of their school garden. It was the same at Ranui, their gardens were also in the shade, underneath woolly nightshade...or in expensive vege pods that were too high for the juniors to reach. At Sunderland there were two folorn empty beds growing weeds just outside of the library and I'm like get Garden to Table in already! Then the kids would have something to do that didn't involve video gaming or playing tiggy/hide n' seek/chasey in the library. 

But I forgot...school is meant to be boring. 

Born free

 As free as the wind blows...as free as the grass grows...

The wind and rain/feng shui around my place has been a bit chaotic of late, but I'm happy to report that no longer will I be inhabiting a damp, moldy office under the stairs as part of a leaky building that is disguised as a school...when I do my assessments of sites, permaculture tells me it's in a good zone or not. 

I'm out of it now, but maybe the next person will have an easier ride of it than I did. Maybe I was just there to set it all up so someone else could take the credit. Nevermind. They can have all the plants is all. 

The birds nest ferns, the cymbidiums, the spider plants, the begonias, donkey tails, the hoya , zygocactus, mother in law tongue, prayer plant and Bob the praying mantis. I took home the streptocarpus and the african violet. 

I felt a bit dispirited, how could I let someone micromanage me like that? I went outside, of which was once former Japanese garden and climbed up on the playground and cried. The ground had been astroturfed and turned into an urban jungle, and the students sat their exams quietly plotting to take over the world when they got out and grew up. 

The school was next to the pharmaceutical company, and not far from my former landscaping company, and overlooked the creek where Maurice Gee wrote his gruesome Loomis stories. So much for Eco-city. It had been turned into an exam factory/diploma mill. I wasn't even sure that examinations were a good thing for young hopefuls.  Why couldn't they just have a fun quiz night instead? Instead, it just made me feel like a failure and a drop out. I had done the wrong thing again, disobeyed  a teacher, and gone my own way. 

The ground was shaky beneath my feet. I went home and sat for a while. I ended up back at Mitre 10, buying raffle items. One staff member said she might come to Garden Club night. So I made at least one friend there. Wasn't that what school was for, making friends? Apparently not. 

Once again, I was the brainy one nobody liked cos she was so brainy. I took my MLIS home again and waited for inspiration to strike, like the axe at the root of a tree. 

Not forgotten

 The bulbs were put in before the rains came, all except for the tulips which are still chilling in the fridge. This year I have eerlicheer, mixed daffodils, freesias, dutch iris and grape muscari. 

I heard sad news that my writing and gardening friend Beth has passed away, she was concerned about her plants but they are still thriving and all her friends from all over had been looking after them. I still have one manuka that dad didn't cut down, a fern, the busy lizzie/balsam, a monstera, and several geraniums, plus succulents and 'flaming katies' Beth had passed on to me. She loved her plants and wanted them all to go to good homes, and was very generous sometimes to a fault. I was forever fielding plant requests for her. I have several peace lilies now that flowered for the first time after I divided them that all came from Beths plants she had nurtured in her little log-box house. I remember Mummy Cat especially liked meeting Beth although she was not a crazy cat lady, she did have a special thing for plants. She was always young at heart and seemed to me she was one of those 'keenagers' the kind of lady who though my parents age,  never quite grew up and retained her child-like sense of wonder. But then when do we ever grow up? I'm still going to school! 

 I will treasure her witness and friendship for the time I got to spend with her, and of course the plants. She was like a bird always flying here and there but depositing seeds everywhere she went. 

 May she rest in peace till we meet again in Heaven, where I'm sure she has her own conservatory surrounded by plants. 

Lest We Forget

 ANZAC Day was spent in the garden. I wasn't particularly up at dawn that day, and there were no poppies, just some fighter jets zooming overhead but I did have a field day planting and planting and planting.  I did it especially because if I don't do it I will forget and the plants from Rogers will languish in their pots. I can't be one of those gardeners that just buys plants all the time and leaves them in pots all over the place with the tags still on them and not actually create a garden with them. A certain brother does this...I'm not mentioning any names of course. 

So almost all the plants have found homes though I had to do a lot of rearranging - just like in a library, and some weeding, so the weed pile is quite high but I made sure it was behind the garage where nobody can see and so dad doesn't come and chuck all weeds in the reserve in his attempt at 'keeping the lawn swept' and get in trouble with my neighbour, David, who is planting natives in the reserve.

Three penstemons are left to find homes and I can't decide where they ought to go. I'm kind of wanting to remove the cream dietes that have attracted those sticky brown moths  when they flower but I know it will be a HUGE job to remove them. Removing clumps of aristea was bad enough even though they actually have a better flower, to make room for bearded iris under the Cleopatra magnolia. Watsonia I've flung to the back of the borders because it really does flower extremely tall. 

Blue Pansies I won from raffle are now by the driveway, along with more gazania clumps, and the lambs ears I have totally spread all over Snowy's bed. All along underneath the apple trees I have planted ajuga after clearing most of the creeping buttercup (big job) as it seems to do well there. Blue pratia is now in Fat Lady Sings bed, polyanthus has moved to by the house, gasterias potted up, rain lillies now by the azalea. Lavender Sidonie is now by the olive and with lambs ears. Mondo grass has been removed and am considering planting it under the Japanese maple, and removing those spider plants. Granny bonnet is now by the other baby grannies. Spider plant removal seems a thing now - no rafters to have hanging baskets!

 I wish I didn't have a dead flat site with buxus hedges because its all very mathematical and boring and 'edgy' but I can't do anything about that unless..I start removing all the buxus, by cutting them all down to stumps and just leave the tall ones by the fence and making the corner ones into topiary instead of big boring box rectangles. Here's a big plant in the shape of a box! I'm like I really have enough of Minecraft obsessed boys at school I don't want to make my eyes any squarer. We already live in a brick house why do the plants have to be shaped like bricks as well? 

That is all, and in case I forgot anything, I'll just have to post about it tomorrow. I was trying to fit it all in today because tomorrow is the first day back of Term 2 and after that I won't have much time for gardening - the cold snap is already on its way...

 

Roger's Garden Centre

 I finally made the trip to Rogers, thanks to Bev, who knew the way and was happy to take me. So Thursday morning we set off and entered the plant lovers paradise that was Rogers personal domain and business. It was a clear day, no rain, and I had a list of plants I was hoping to buy. We wandered around for a bit and then snagged a pink wheelbarrow to put our purchases in. There is barely enough room to walk for the wheelbarrows so its easier to look first and then carry your plants to a wheelbarrow which won't block anyone else. This is why everyone recommends to NEVER go in the weekend. 

This is not your average garden centre. Its more of a wholesaler, or maybe the plant lovers equivalent of Cost-Co. There are no fancy signs or changing displays or deals - what you see is what you get. But you will get it at least half the price that you'd pay for at a regular garden centre. It's absolutely crammed with plants.

Roger was at the till with a helper calling out the prices so he could enter them in. No barcodes at this garden centre. Thankfully he DID have an eftpos machine. 

Unfortunately, I am not allowed any shrubs or trees and Rogers has more of those than the annuals and perennials I am after, though he still had plenty of what was there. 

I managed to purchase -

3 penstemons

3 blue pratias

lavender 'sidonie'

punnet of mixed polyanthus

variegated oregano

blue salvia

Roger told me that lavender 'sidonie' was Australian and smells more like sage. It stinks he said, bluntly. I took a sniffle, the label said 'highly fragrant' but he was right it didn't smell lavendery but more herby. However I didn't take it back because I was more attracted to its unusual feathery leaves than its scent. That was the only advice he gave me - his cat wasn't there this time guarding the money.

Then he had a long chat with Bev who was next in line. Bev had once managed a garden centre that got taken over by Bunnings. So they talked shop and old colleagues. Bev said Roger once worked at the Wholesale Tree Company before he set up his own business, and he kept his overheads low because he ran it all without any extra full time staff (though he had someone call out the prices) and sold just plants, while other garden centres had teams at the checkout, giftware, cafes, compost and garden tools.

Bev said when she had took over for Bunnings they had stripped out the old garden centre from Hardware House that had a beautiful aviary and fountains and big palm trees display and it had to be run as just a hardware store that sold widgets. I said what a shame and she said they didn't care about plants and she was the only staff member who knew anything about them. 

Bev said she was quite a bad gardener in that she was totally obsessed with plants and wanted them all. But they also out grow their allotted space and she needs to edit them quite a bit. I said that she was like a parent who complained about their children having to look after them and then complain they grew too big and had to leave home. Maybe you can love plants TOO much? 

I pondered this but decided that plant love was really part of the human condition for without plants providing us with oxygen maybe we would all die. I never understood the whole 'carbon credit' thing. Since when was carbon emissions in the air now touted as bad? People can't stop breathing or respiring. Why aren't people measuring the amount of oxygen being produced by plants photosynthesising the carbon dioxide and transpiring? Shouldn't there be oxygen credits instead of carbon credits? 

I'll just leave that for the scientists to figure out as its beyond me. 

Sister Act

 Whenever my sister comes over its a whirlwind of family feasting and visits, so garden time takes a back seat. However that didn't mean I couldn't sneak some gardens in my sister's itinerary while she was here. Starting with an easter egg hunt in the garden, to visiting an old whaling museum and garden property with ancient pohutakawa trees, to the old Kemp mission house up North next to the oldest stone store in Kerikeri, to finding a bargain priced hoya in a citrus nursery.. and the arrival of spring bulbs shipment, there was plenty of plant related holiday time fun. Maybe it's to make up for me being away for two weeks from school where my indoor plants may languish in the dark of the library that only has two outside windows - will they still be alive by the time I get back?

I am not sure, whether the dark and lack of florescent light will kill them or maybe they'll just have two weeks hibernation. It's currently feijoa season and we are still picking up feijoas every day from the ground. We laugh whenever we see them for sale at the shops for $8.99 a kilo. But apparently non-Aucklanders are willing to pay that much for our surplus. 

In the Far North (why 'far'? It's not that far...) the main plants I see from the road are toi toi and bamboo thickets, and ugly pinus radiata. I think I saw...ONE kauri tree. Our magnificent Kauri forests are no more, though Transport NZ still insists on naming the region 'Kauri Coast'. What Kauri? The only ones left are chopped up in the Tree Museum or made into chopping boards and wooden spoons and epoxy covered clocks at the Kauri workshop. I am feeling quite dismayed that our national treasure, that had once made fine waka and furniture and houses for Aucklanders has not been replanted and wilding pines have taken over instead, like gnarly overgrown Christmas Trees. But not even NZ Christmas Trees because Pohutakawa COULD grow on those steep hillsides and stop all the landslides but for some strange reason, a fast growing and cheap American import was chosen instead. 

The other native that could grow up North is the lovely and shapely manuka, beloved by our imported honey bees, but it seems unloved in favour of gorse and grass. I managed to pay a visit to the Hundertwasser museum again and got out on to the rooftop, which had been planted up in all manner of native plants, and while more urban spaces are getting the green treatment, it's coming at great expense. I'm beginning to wonder why the Brits thought it was a great idea to turn NZ into a giant dairy/sheep farm especially in places that were so ill-suited for pastoral agriculture. I suppose since all the whales had got killed they just had to try something else. 

So much for my musings. I often try not to care about things too much because it's not as if I am Prime Minister and run the country and can do anything about it. For some strange reason, every time someone sees a sign that says 'volunteer gardener wanted' somewhere they immediately think that I should do the job for nothing as if it would make me the happiest person in the world. Despite the fact I already have my OWN garden to tend to, and I cannot literally be in three places at once at opposite ends of the country. Instead signs like that make me sad that nobody is looking after the garden, maybe the gardener died or moved away or was just told they weren't allowed to garden anymore, or they had bills to pay and volunteer gardening just doesn't pay them. 

I really think the Labour and Green Party, and the National Party should all merge into one and be renamed the National Garden Party. Labour would provide the hands, the Greens, the know-how, and National the funds to show off the gardens. And every year they would have a garden party festival and invite other countries to our gardens and be 'number one' on the 'world stage' of garden parties and win all the medals in the Gardening Olympics for the amazing gardens we have. Could work. 

Oh I forgot I am not the Prime Minister. I do know who is the boss in our family though and whenever she visits I am often reminded of the fact. She's going back soon though because her pilea plant is outgrowing its pot.