From last summer...

From last summer...I'm missing the green & the fruit.

I froze the berries and am still eating them in the middle of winter. It's been a while since I last posted. I have some catching up to do.

Digging for Victory

These ones are my talks at the Floriade Victory Garden:
Australian Women's Land Army Learn about the invaluable role played by the Australian Women’s Land Army fighting the war on the Food Front during the Second World War. 1, 15 October

Digging for Victory During the Second World War, as part of the 'Grow your own' campaign, Australian families had to cope with rationing, food shortages and price rises. Find out how they answered the call to produce food, formed Garden Armies and created Victory Gardens. 17 September, 7 October

http://www.floriadeaustralia.com/war-memorial

My Victory Garden is coming along!

http://www.awm.gov.au/blog/2011/08/16/digging-for-victory-for-floriade/

Digging for Victory

For those who are interested in wartime gardening and food production on the Australian homefront during the Second World War. The Australian War Memorial will be creating a Victory Garden out at Floriade this year. The talks on Digging for Victory and Australian Women's Land Army are mine. Check out the Floriade wartime program.
http://www.awm.gov.au/events/floriade/

Autumn garden shots 2011

Hydrangeas & uranium

The hydrangeas are just about finished – they were beautiful this year and kept flowering for months.

I've been looking into creating a Second World War era "Victory Garden" for Floriade this Sept/Oct - in the course of my work yesterday I came across an interesting gardening tip that I read in the Australian Women's Weekly 1943 - to bring back colour to your washed out hydrangeas "if you can get hold of it" use uranium – it "works wonders". Chemicals were a whole new wonder back then and if people could get hold of them over those war years they would use them - luckily for that generation (and the next) such things were in short supply.

Everything looks a bit hot and bothered at present in my garden – it’s a full sun garden and could do with a bit more shade. On the fruit front one of my black grape vines is ripening and my pears won’t be too much longer.

I don't know how I managed to do it but I’ve used more than 10,000 litres of water on the garden in the last month - I emptied my tank which was completely full twice - that doesn't include all the emptying that I did when we had all that rain. I'm using town water now and am much more conservative.

Landscaping the driveway

When the driveway was completed the little brick wall looked out of place. It was taken down and the whole space area under the citrus trees were mulched with lucern.

The area around the urn was extended with thyme plants. Mostly purchased at the local farmers markets and a school fete.

The neightbour's side of the driveway near the road was badly churned. This area was on the neighbour's land and to repair it I layered the area with topsoil and sowed some grass seed.

The left hand side of the driveway was topsoiled and sewed with grass.

more driveway - paving and materials

We chose a herringbone pattern to lay the pavers. It is a large expanse of area and while we didn't want an overpowering pattern we did want something other than a monotonous line of pavers.

I assumed that the pavers would be laid on a cement foundation so did not even check that this would be the case. It wasn't until the men started laying the tiles that I realised they were being placed on a flat bulldozed surface with some gravel laid on top and flattened.

Disturbed by this turn of events and realising it was too late anyway, I began my research. Google told me that Kev's methods were an acceptable practice. There are advantages and disadvantages to both methods of laying pavers.

The advantage of the permeable paving is that it absorbs rain and moisture instead of having it run off onto the road. It is also less expensive.

Concrete is enduring although it does crack and get water pooling above and below it if laid incorrectly. The surface is smoother, flatter and more solid.

Ants are perhaps the real problem with the softer foundations of our new driveway paving. They started building nests about two days after the driveway was completed. According to Kev the only solution to ants is to kill them. This is not going to happen - so I have an unresolved situation with the long term preservation of the driveway.

The driveway was finished six months ago and the ants have settled down to be less of a problem. Perhaps the only issue that I have now is that the tiles are also spreading over time with the weight of the cars. This may also settle down hopefully. Either that or we will have to drive up the driveway in different spots!

Driveways

The front of the house needed a lift and the old uneven cement driveway was a trip hazard - so last winter we decided to install a new driveway. At the local garden centre we picked up the fridge magnet of Kev the paver. Kev gave us a quote and showed us an impressive album containing pictures of his work and with very little other market research we engaged his services.

We chose baked clay pavers called 'peppercorn' which are a cement colour but with a subtle green tinge and brown highlights. These matched the tones of the house, blended in with the garden and are not glaringly bright in the sunlight. Our first choice was burnt red, the same colour that we had chosen for the vegetable garden path. Kev saved us from an overpowering red superhighway by advising against it. There is no doubt about it - I'm thankful for the more muted tones of the peppercorn tiles.

Walnut - Wilson's wonder

All the excess rain over the last few months killed my ‘Wilson’s Wonder’ walnut. I’m still grieving. But I know why – it was how I heaped up the mulch. It led to too much water banking up around the roots. Apparently - according to Google - walnuts hate this. In a drought situation such as we have been having over the last 10 years this way of mulching is fine however, not with the levels of water this year.

The tree was planted in June 2009. It was purchased grown from a seedling. The disadvantage of seeding walnuts are that they are variable - some produce very good nuts, some produce rather poor nuts. This tree produced several nuts in its first season. However, the Cockies ate all of them.

The advantage of growing seedling stock over graft stock is that often the root stock used for grafting is black walnut. The roots of black walnuts have consequences for plants grown in its vicinity.

The Black Walnut produces Juglone in its leaves and roots. Many plants are susceptible to Juglone, for example: rhubarb, tomatoes, blueberries and azaleas. Other trees closely related to black walnut also produce juglone, including butternut, English walnut, pecan, shagbark hickory, and bitternut hickory. However, all produce such limited quantities compared to the black walnut that toxicity to other plants is rarely observed.

Leaves that fall from walnut trees, as well as the husks, can also toxic to other plants, so it is recommended not to include them in general composting. The English walnut in this garden was planted near camellias and a large established pin oak. I could find no reference, however, to camellias being sensitive to juglone nor pin oak. You can remedy some of the build up of toxins by improving the soil around the tree. I have added top soil around the tree for this purpose and planted bulbs under the tree to create a mirco environment. Bulbs are not susceptible to walnut toxins.

Walnuts are suited to deep fertile soil and need a minimum of five metre of distance from other plants and houses. Our walnut tree was initially planted too close to the house, only about two meters from the edge. I dug it up one month later and transplanted it closer to the road about five meters away from the house.

Walnut trees are late to leaf in spring and among the first deciduous trees to lose their foliage in the autumn. The nuts ripen in late autumn and drop from the trees around the time of the first frost.

I didn’t know any of these companion planting issues before I purchased the walnut and on doing the research became attached to it. I won’t purchase a replacement though – they are just too big for a suburban block - particularly when I am reliant on full sun for all my other plants. Walnuts do not respond well for pruning!

High summer

Monique rose, home produce and long lazy afternoons....the plums are from the neighbours - they hang over the fence. I decided to harvest them before the cockatoos got all of them.

Summer berries - harvest

It's hard to keep on top of the harvesting!

Some things haven't ripened at all yet - my tomatoes are still all green and the zucchini is only starting to flower. However, I have more garlic, onions, cucumber, beans and lettuce than I can poke a stick at. I harvested the first of my Dutch cream potatoes this week. I just reached down around the roots of the plant and pulled these out - that was a pretty nice feeling.

Santa Rosa plum espalier and vege patch

The Santa Rosa plum was put in last winter - a year and a half later than the other three espaliers that run across the garden. It replaced a cherry which I dug up and moved to the fence (with great difficulty).

This plum variety is hardy with medium large, crimson to purplish red, lightly freckled plum with yellow flesh slightly suffused with pink especially near the pit. The fruit is firm, sweet, juicy, and aromatic, except near the pit, where it is quite acid.

Currents and berries

The strawberries are nearly finished - in the last few weeks they dried out, got too wet in the constant rain and were also overun by snails.
I like the idea of the big strawberry pot with fruit hanging like a fountain. It's also a great space saver. Unfortunately it isn't all that practical. The pot heats up and the small spaces that hold the strawberries don't seem to hold much water and dry out very quickly.

We have been having record rain in Canberra but the pot still dried out and half the plants died.

You win some - you lose some! The rest of the currants and berries are now staring to ripen. I'm spending a lot of time tying up long thorny tendrils.

Pond

The rain keeps coming! - The pond is loving it. There is a frog hanging around I hope it stays.

The pistachio has nuts!

A pair of one year old pistachios were grown during winter 2009.

Pistachios require a male and a female plant to cross pollinate. They were placed a metre apart.

The pistachio tree can grow high but responds to open centre pruning which will keep it shorter. For open centre pruning select three or four side branches and cut the central stem off above the topmost side branch. The tree will continue upwards and outwards along those side branches. Mine, however have yet to produce side branches big enough to clip the central stem.

The two pistachios were situated at the front of the house, near the neighbour's boundary. Here they will not cast too much shade over areas of the garden or the neighbour's garden.

Making a hedge - Nandina domestica or sacred bamboo

The right side of the driveway is to be lined by a hedge of nandina. There is one large existing plant that has been growing under the neighbour's fence into the backyard. The line will be extended from the backyard under the carport down the driveway to the letterbox.

The young leaves in spring are brightly coloured pink to red before turning green; old leaves turn red or purple again before falling. Flowers of Nandina domestica are white, borne in early summer in conical clusters held well above the foliage. The fruit is a bright red berry ripen in late autumn and often persisting through the winter.

The plant is drought tolerant but responds well to watering and feeding. It grows to 1.8-2.4 m. so makes a great short hedge. The nandina growing in the space between the carport and the fence is bird and insect attracting. There is a blue bee that can be seen below it was photographed while visiting the white nandina flowers .

Spring garden

Canberra gardens definitely go through the four seasons. It's always lovely to see a garden burst into life in the spring. The city is on track to have the highest rainfall in 40 years. Everywhere you turn there are fresh green shoots, bulbs, blossoms and roses. The rain has really been a bonus - I think back to last year when I was struggling to establish plants under water restrictions and drought.

Mystery butterfly

I photographed this butterfly while it was sitting on the wall of my house. I've been using
Michael Braby's The complete field guide to butterflies of Australia to identify my garden visitors. I couldn't identify this one in the book - so it remains a mystery for the moment.