Who else likes gardening?

[ecomama]

Hi everyone

I hope you're staying well today.

Who else likes gardening? I would love to connect with people here who are happy to share their gardening adventures.

For me I know that gardening helped heal my soul during tough times. I hope it will again.
Then with other things going on, it became a jungle.
I'm part way into rediscovering it again and doing A LOT of hard yakka atm, when I am motivated.

I have new dreams and ideas to put into the many bare places, as I remove thickets of lantana etc. This will all be on a tight budget and I'm ok with that.

I want to create a peaceful place where I can be.
I would like to grow food again (tell 'er she's dreamin' atm lol).
I would like to re-establish my worm farms and compost heaps.
Autumn is such a beautiful time of the year in the garden.

I'm 'alone' in my gardening journey and would love to share and hear about other's gardening antics. Hopefully we can troubleshoot any issues in our gardens and talk about any healing we're feeling too. There's a lot of knowledge we can share. I hope this thread can brighten your day!

Love Ecomama

Please

[Matchy69]

Hi Em isn't mother nature interesting and can not make any sense for us at times.I think the lot of rain we had in autumn has had an effect on plants trucking them in thinking it's growing season but why not all of the same tree responded in the same way?I think plants are like people and some just want to be different.

I read an article on marcotting papaya trees in the Philippines which was really interesting and never thought of that method of propagating them.Always learning something new about gardening

Happy gardening,

Mark.

[ecomama]

Hey Mark and happy BB Gardeners!

Yes it is funny watching the crazy antics of my trees atm. The crepe myrtles have finally dumped almost ALL their leaves in a short time, very unlike previous years.
Half my nectarine tree is blossoming. The other half totally bare.

I've never heard of marcotting???

I DO know that human's mucked up the reproduction habits of bananas!
They used to be able to grow from seed, but after generations of us humans noseying in, they now have to give pups to multiply.

We have to be careful!

Mark you'd be so proud of me lol.
I've all but cleared a 20 x 10 square metre pile of branches!

I now have a very neat pile of logs in ONE place.
We've decided to build a fire pit area where the cabin will be one day (hopefully).
Dry pave the area and build come make shift seating around it, in a pentagon shape.
A local man makes huge fire put bowls, so I'll get one of those later.

Last weekend I had a huge bonfire to burn 3 stumps and alot of the brush around.

Happily what goes around comes back to us at times!
I've been giving my raw macadamias to one of Alexa's neighbours who's family has struggled due to Covid. Now she has a job with my Accountant lol! And I got a discount this year TWICE.

She has another 11 litre bucket of nuts coming her way. OMG SO MANY nuts!

My gardeners "great idea" was not so great (again). I really need to go with my own instincts and NOT let him do some stuff.
He insisted on putting some of the lantana cuttings in the old pool and NOW it's growing lantana - yep. Grrr.

I'm keeping him out for a while due to finances AND the extra work he's created.
About 5 day's extra work because he decided to cut up the lantana into tiny pieces grrr.
I had to use a heavy duty metal rake to drag them all out of the long grass!

The BLACK soil underneath is beautiful though! hahaha.

We have 3 more stumps to dig out plus 5 two storey high dead pines with no branches on them.

Our old neighbours left, sadly. Their "kids" put so many fence palings on MY side of the fence, so I burnt them all lol. The new neighbours will want a new fence asap no doubt which is not fun money wise for me.

I'm slowly digging up more rubbish, getting rid of it slowly too.

Native violets are my "lawn" near my house lol. It's easy to see baby lantana seedlings poking up from that. The violets are really sweet too!

My surprise passionfruit is happy too. I used a pyramid trellis for it to climb up. Nice!

Happy gardening!
Love EM

[Matchy69]

Hi Em sorry I haven't been on for awhile.zi have been ill with Pneumonia slowly recovering.

Bananas are an interesting plant being the largest herb and the trunks being made of leaf.Still can find bananas with seeds in the wild.The commercially grown ones have infertile seeds in them.The little black dots in them are the seeds.The craziness of trying to produce fruits without seed in every fruit has taken over unfortunately.

Lantana is the worst thing to get rid of and your gardener definately made you more work.

Its always nice to get rid of piles of branches.it looks like you have achieved something.

The most I have done in the garden is pick some citrus and cabbages and pruned two of my grapes.Still have two to prune and been striking cuttings of them.I will try and do some more in the garden when I feel better.

Happy Gardening ,

Mark.

[Boudica]

Hello Gardeners All,

As usual EM your garden adventures seem epic, and of a scale I could only dream about 🙂 Mark it is good to see you are up and about 🙂

I have not really noted any unusual phenomena in my garden this year aside from two deciduous trees of the same species, one turned yellow, the other red. I guess the one that is red got a bit colder? All leafless now though.

The fire pit area sounds grand, nothing beats a fire to draw people in.

I saw wild bananas in the forests in fiji, they were small red ones, that the bats like to eat. They are not as palatable to humans though.

I love violets, but they don't grow well here, they remind me of my great grandmother's place which was populated by citrus trees, violets, geraniums and raked white gravel. I have passionfruit vines coming up all over from the birds, but all growing in the wrong places at the moment, I want to leave just one for the flowers though.

I have been a bity gloomy, so I though I would fight it with flowers, and have gone crazy buying lots of really bright colourful flower seedlings, which I have planted anywhere I have sufficient sunshine. I do not really grow lots of gaudy flowers but I am very much in the mood for them right now (purple pansies, burnt orange chrysanthemums, yellow flowering kalanchoe, red hot pokers). I have ordered 10 different kinds of seeds for when the weather warms up too, so my garden will be absurdly colourful this year. My mother kind of grimaced when she saw the crazy bright combination of things I am planting, but it will give me a smile nevertheless when I walk in the house!

My flax lillies (dianella) are just going crazy. I divide them each year. I started of with 1 clump, now I have about 40, even after giving 15 to a neighbour. I am planting them on footpaths etc now. The native insects seem to like them. I was told the local Indigenous folk (Kaurna) used to pull the leaves and chew on the white base to alleviate colds (have not tried this myself yet).

Does anyone grow bush foods in their garden? I have lilypilly but not much else. I would like to try to grow a quandong I think. mmm quandong pie 🙂

[Matchy69]

Hi Boudica great to see you want to get into growing some native fruit bush Tucker.I have grown a lot of the years and had a smorgasbord of bush Tucker on the creek I lived near and was always down there picking sandpaper figs and Burdikin plums to make jam.

At the moment I only have a native Gympie lime( a very thorny little lime native to the the Gympie region) Currant Bush (Carissa ovata)has lots of sharp spines on it sprawling shrub with a sweet berry like fruit.The sap can be used for a liniment for rheumatism.And I have Black Apple (Pouteria Australia) a very tall tree that gets a black plum like fruit.

Quandongs (Santalum acuminatum) is a great bush Tucker and great for jams and sauces.Comes from more drier arid regions of Australia.

Happy gardening,

Mark.

[Katyonthehamsterwheel]

Hi all

Well l'm new to this thread and not much of a gardener! But oh yum, quandong jam! My dad used to make that when I was young and I'd die for some, I think 🙂 Never seen it available to buy...

I've put in some peas. They're just in pots with some plastic mesh to climb on. But the snails are attacking them. Any ideas that are dog/cat/other friendly? If I'm successful with the peas I might have a go at seeing what else I can grow. I'm enjoying watching the peas grow already 🙂

[Jstar49]

Hi Katy,

yiu could try bordering your pea plants with finely crushed egg shells. Can dry out in a slow oven then squash with a jam jar or mortar and pestle.
I’m not sure if beer traps work for snails, they do for slugs. But Mark will know for sure!

hey Mark, I’m sorry to hear you’ve been sick. Pneumonia -that must hurt! I had a dose of the worst flu I’ve ever had, that was bad enough.
I harvested a couple cabbages today also. The birds have had a go at them so I hung a couple cds up- hopefully that will keep them away from the rest.
I planted some peas also- not sure if they’re coming up, I didn’t water much.
Em it sounds like your hard work is showing in your garden! I’m so happy for you! You deserve it my friend.
cheers

J*

[Matchy69]

Hi Katy and Jstar yes eggshells are great or you can even use wood chips to prevent snails getting to your plants.Yes beer traps will work for both slugs and snails.Full a small container with beer burried in the ground leaving about an inch above ground.The snails will drown in them.Its the yeast I the beer that attracts them and the snails can smell from 100m away.Encouraging birds and having chooks or ducks are good for keeping the population down.

Happy gardening,

Mark

[Boudica]

Hello Peeps,

Mark, I like the sound of your bush tucker, I haven't tried sandpaper figs, or burdekin plums, but sound delicious. As I live in a dryish coastal area the types of plants I can grow are quite different. I have grown iceplant and ruby saltbush in the past too, which are edible bushfoods too, but I think I would have to be dying of starvation before I wanted to eat either of those! The best quandong pies I have found, came from the cafe up in Quorn in the Flinders Rangers, so I always stop if I go through there. The pies are really expensive to buy in the city.

Katy, I have the same problem at the moment. My son and I planted snow peas (as we love to eat these), but they have been obliterated by slugs and snails. They have also been eating the flower petals from my chrysanthemums, leaving depressing mangy bobbly heads. I have used the beer before, but not for a while, and know it works, but you'll have to keep it up consistently for a while if your population is anything like mine!

J*, I hadn't heard of crushed eggshells for snails, maybe I will give that a try on select plants. My neighbour also suggested surrounding plants with coffee grounds, but this only seems to work while dry, once it rains you have to replace. I like coffee, but I don't drink enough to supply my whole garden! Some cafes give away grounds though.

[Paw Prints]

Hello all,

I've remember from a gardening show the idea of using copper bands / strips works to stop slugs & snails as they don't like crossing it... I haven't tried it but I've seen them for sale in garden places.

Paws