With a little help from my friends...

Since our working bee was rained out on Saturday it was moved to Sunday. Jacqui came with me to the recycling depot to find a letterbox for Woodside to leave messages and mail in, that we had seen in another community garden in Melbourne. We thought it was a great idea so that's going to happen in our garden. Jacqui also spotted an easel which would be perfect as a stand alone sign to put notices on at the garden entrance.

I managed to grab some ponga logs for 50 cents each and a picnic table for $40. Miraculously, it fit in my funcargo and we managed to get it out again. Thank you Jacqui. It is now in the backyard.
The ponga logs are in my fernery and planted with spider plants. I'm not sure if this works but I am trying planting them in pockets, and also as uprights to lean my fruit salad plant against.

I planted the grevillea which is a juniper hybrid. It won't stay in its pot after all trailing off the bird bath as its actually a ground cover, so I planted it in the ground. I put kalanchoes in a pot on the bird bath stand instead. My kakabeak is being munched and I think that, despite the gorgeous red flowers that look like lobster claws its not a reliable plant for me and I am going to have to forgo this native in favour of grevillea which also has gorgeous red spider looking flowers but does not get munched to a stick. So what if it's Australian? Who knows kakabeak may actually do better in Australia perhaps the munching bugs and caterpillars don't live there!

My ceanothus has buds and so does my cistus rock rose. In a few weeks I may see many more blossoms. Pink flamingo Chinese Toon is also showing small signs of leafing out. My snowpeas are sprouting as are my sweet peas which have put in lots of climbing growth.

I have mulched the fernery with seaweed and moss magic mulch. Pink cyclamen in pots have also been added for a bit of colour, they were in the sale pallet at Mitre 10 and I couldn't resist them. They came with ceramic pots so I can move them indoors if I want and they would still look good.

Pink cabbage tree is still in its pot and I haven't really decided where it shall grow permanently yet. I have not seen them grow to the huge heights normal cabbage trees grow so am a bit unsure where to put it.

Big Sis came back from London bearing gifts so now I have yet another pair of gardening gloves, garden repair moisturiser for my hands and the BBC Gardener's World magazine. Which, strangely, has advertisements for adult nappies. I don't know if that means British gardeners are a incontinent lot or if it just means its hard to stay dry in England but I'm rather embarrassed for them. In NZ Gardener magazine all the advertisements are garden related that I can see and subtly enticing you to buy gumboots, garden mix, gloves and hoses. Except for the one on the back page of this month's mag which is for a Danske Mobler stressless chair.  Hammock yes, but a blonde model kicking off her high heels reclining in this green coloured recliner,  which looks right in the middle of a shopping mall...how is that related to gardening??

must plant plants...

to be planted

mint
comfrey
grevillea in a bigger pot
pink cabbage tree, where?

to be obtained

ponga logs
letterboxes for woodside
mini picnic table
arches

to be decided

vege plot for woodside, which seeds?
hanging baskets for church
heavenly bamboo or heavenly blue lithospermum?
rosemary and herbs in pots for kitchen garden
nasturtiums and strawberries
plaque for garden seat

to be read pile

'The Good Life' by Sarah O'Neill
'Common Lives' by Virginia Pawsey and Janice Marriot

to visit

Mincher Garden Albany, Coatsvile

to win

skip full of $1000 worth of Mitre 10 stuff
NZ gardener of the year competition
Yates vege garden competition
Waiheke Garden Safari
lotto...???

Nearly Spring

The weeks are flying by but it's really not the official growing season until Labour Day, everyone reckons. That's the day everyone labours to put their tomatoes in. They have begun appearing in the garden centres, but it's still too cold for them to be planted out. I read that tomatoes are actually perennial vines so once they have fruited, just chop them down, don't pull them out and they will resprout in spring.
Unfortunately I never really have good luck with tomatoes in my backyard and they go all scraggly when I neglect them. They are better off at Woodside where they get the star treatment. Apparently one secret is dairy milk powder. Although I've heard cat food does the trick...

So what's been happening chez moi?
I bought two willow trellises for my choko vines to grow on as well as passionfruit. I don't hold much hope out for the passionfruits as they just didn't really seem to thrive where I've put them, but I've cut them back hard and who knows, maybe they will decide to grow again. Choko however is one of the most vigorous vines you can get and thrive on neglect, so maybe it will be less effort.

Fluffy's bed is now mulched with prunings and it seems the lemon tree will thrive there. Manuka is flowering. Kakabeak is flowering too, with showy red flowers albeit small. I don't know how long it will last though as I need to pay attention to it and water but not too much as snails and leaf miners will chomp it to a stick. I've read that Kakabeak likes really windy conditions as that blows the pests away. So Wellingtonians, take note.

My fruit salad plants I've rerarranged beside the house which I hope maybe they will clamber up the wall. My climbing fig seems to want to scramble on the ground and resists the brick wall which it is meant to decorate.

Flowers making an appearance include snowflakes, daffodils, bluebells, and forget-me-not.  I've put in more aloe and really fingers crossed my chinese toon will herald spring with dramatic pink foliage. The peach tree is budding and won't really blossom until next few weeks I suppose but I've seen some come up early in other gardens.

I'm planning another garden trip this time to lovely, romantic Mincher up near Coatesville, Albany in late October. It's time to be inspired.

Paradise found!

I am back from Paradise World aka Rarotonga, Cook Islands.

My plants survived, well most of them.
Chickens dug up one parsley, one sage and one carex, but I just put them back.

I must tell you about the coconut palms as they are called over there the 'tree of life'. Unfortunately they do not grow well here in Auckland, but in the Cook Islands, they are like manna from God. The record for the fastest coconut tree climb is 7 seconds. (For a medium sized tree). A new coconut from which fresh juice can be drunk is called 'nu'. Then older ones you can have milk or make cream. The husks can be burned to repel mozzies. The leaves are used to make all sorts of things from hats to baskets to fans, watches, (on island time), the coconut shell  bras... a coconut tree can reach fruiting in five years. To open one, you need a sharp stick or tap it with a knife it can crack open.

Of course you may know this already but really they are nutty about coconuts there.
The place I was staying unfortunately had no hammocks which I must make a suggestion that they put some in although I did see some elsewhere.

Other plants of interest were hibiscus which gives you fresh flower every day to wear, gardenia (also known as tiare, or cape jasmine) for fresh leis, purple ivy as an interesting ground cover, and frangipani. There are cordylines but they are not like our cabbage trees being slimmer and different colours. But Coconut is King.

I wish I could have stayed longer to check out their botanic garden but there was a very lush garden at the Rarotongan spa entrance with a beautiful water feature with purple water lilies, fruit salad plants, bromeliads, ferns and coconut palms that I recall impressed me.
My stay was at the Edgewater where we had a garden room, which overlooked the gardens which you can see in these photos....

New Additions

More planting frenzy...some new plants on the block (NPOTB) are..


Native fuchsia in a pot
Paper Daisy in a hanging basket
Yarrow
More Parsley
Welsh bunching onions
Spring Onions
Chives

I think that will do for now as running out of planting spots for everything. I did go up to Palmers Planet the other day but bought nothing, all the plants looked a bit sad and it seemed like it isn't really worth going all that way anymore, when Kings has a better selection (and can be cheaper). I notice that, when heading to Kings, more people go there for lunch than actually browse the plants. It seems to be the 'in' place to go, but I don't lunch there unless I'm with someone. I'd rather spend my money on plants. I once invited a friend up to Palmers at their Botanica cafe and ordered kale chips, which were nice, but pricy. But she was so bored as I went round the garden centre exclaiming over all the plants, that I decided maybe she wasn't such a good friend to go with.

Some people are plants people and some just don't know the difference between a plant and a weed. Or the weed is something they don't know the use for. But I have learned to not mention my gardening to people who aren't plants people as they just don't understand. I think they have visions of me weeding their plots for them when they can't be bothered.

I have also noticed people who aren't book people also don't have a clue. Books, aren't they boring! All they can think of is getting rid of them so they can chat on their phones. They will never understand the difference between a good book and a bad one.  Or a mouldy one that could give you asthma and a fresh clean one. I have tried educating them on where you can find good books but some people are set in their ways and just not interested.  I used to hear people boast 'I have not actually read a book in years' and they are proud of the fact that their literary appreciation only extends to advertising laden magazines.

Sigh.

The Quiet Queen

I have just done a dvd tour of the Queen's garden at Buckingham Palace. Some interesting facts - she holds five garden parties every year, rain or shine. Her gardeners spray her rose bushes with garlic for pesticide as she doesn't like to use chemical sprays. The Queen has honeybees in hives on an island in a lake in her garden, and they flock to the herbaceous border and produce honey which she gives as gifts. She also provides nesting boxes for birds over winter, canada geese, owls and flamingoes are some of the wildfowl found in her garden. Queen Charlotte kept a menagerie when she lived there. One King tried to plant mulberries so he could start a silk industry, but the mulberries were the wrong kind. So they eat the fruit instead, which is made into jelly and served at palace suppers. But you know what the secret ingredient is to the bountiful royal produce? Horse manure.
Prince William was also the first royal to host a game of footy on his Granny's lawn.  He warned others not to break any windows.

I am thinking if I don't have a chance to visit her son's garden at Highgrove perhaps I might be invited to a garden party? It takes five months to plan for these parties and not a blade of grass is out of place - the Queen does her walkabouts and inspects everything. I recently saw Poi E the movie, how the Patea Maori Club were invited to perform at the Royal Command Performance in London. They couldn't afford to go and even the NZ Govt wouldn't sponsor them (despite reaching number one on the pop charts for four weeks and appearing on 'Blue Peter'.) So Dalvanius Prime mortgaged his house.

I could mortgage my house? Oh wait, I don't have a house.
Nevermind. Maybe I will just watch the garden on tv. It has time-lapse photography so I can imagine what it looks like through autumn, winter, spring and summer.

I have just found out there's something called the Quiet Garden Movement. Its a charity based in the UK for people to open their gardens so people can have quiet prayer time and go and be close to God. The garden can be on a private property or a hospital or a church or retreat. I think its a lovely idea.
Joanne and I planted up the garden bed outside church which now has Diosma 'breath of heaven' and poppies along with Joyful Bliss lavender. I am thinking if they become available, Grape hyacinth muscari 'Heavenly Blue' would be also good for that bed.  Then all we need is a seat so people can sit and enjoy the colour and  fragrance.

My back border is now planted up with rain lilies, parsley, and carex 'frosted curls'. I am in a frenzy of planting before I go away on holiday to Raro where I intend to relax in a hammock and sip coconuts with hibiscus and gardenia in my hair.

Spring prep

Yesterday I did a planting blitz and put in a Kakabeak (clianthus) in the rock garden along with a Ceanothus blue sapphire, to have natives beside the house. Lambs ears and snow in summer complete the ground covering.

There are now a few clumps of red hot pokers in my flaming bush bonfire bed.

Also I moved the Chinese Toon pink flamingo to the backyard by the rose border. It has no leaves yet but when it does it is spectacular, and it needs more room as was getting squashed by the arch.

I bought a bag of mulch which I will spread by the lemon tree, which isn now accompanied by a yellow Chinese Lantern. (Abutilon)

I noticed the white ornamental kale was completely eaten by bugs but they didn't touch the purple ones.  Salvia has remained unscathed but it seems the chickens like to eat the lobelias? I scattered a packet of snow peas seeds by the fence along with a packet of salvia blue bedder in case..well you never know. My scattergun approach might work.

I moved the birds nest fern further back to where its more shady as it was getting a bit sun scalded and it now has a pink hellebore as a ground companion. The doodias I moved to the front as they don't mind a bit of sun.

All this rearranging seems a bit like tetris to me or a giant jigsaw puzzle, which plant goes where? But once they are all in the right spots the picture becomes clearer. Also, like a jigsaw puzzle there are still some gaps that need to be filled, but slowly and surely its coming along. Perhaps I can start a new trend for 'Jigsaw puzzle' gardening like the person who invented 'Square Foot Gardening' and write books on it.

Mum found a gardening book for me  called  'Trees and Shrubs for Flowers' by  Glyn Church that had wonderful photographs by Pat Greenfield.  She said she picked it up from the side of the road, along with some cookbooks. I never would have thought Mum showed much interest in what I was doing but then she mentioned she liked strawflowers because they dry well. Well I am going to have to find them but I haven't seen them in the shops and my attempts at trying to grow them from seed have come to nothing.

Well I better go out there and mulch before the sun gets too hot and evaporates all the dew.