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

[ecomama]

HI gardening peeps!

What's everyone getting up to in the garden?

Have you got any NEW plantings to adventure with?

The weather is WARMING up so it's good to get the heavy duty chores out of the way before the heat sets in relentlessly lol...

Yesterday I was bonfiring and clearing lantana with family and heard my back fence neighbour calling out to us... UGH... I haven't seen them for 10 years lol!
Now the lantana is gone from the back fence we can see their 2 storey house!
What a surprising convo we had.... we thought she was going to go cranky about the lantana and the fire! no.... not at all, quite the OPPOSITE in fact. What a relief!

She wanted to CONFESS to planting lantana in her garden years ago (OH SO THERE'S the culprit lol) I said omg why? with laughter... she said "I have NO IDEA but sorry"... forgiven ofcourse.

Anyway I had to step up on to a tree stump to talk with her (being a slope etc) and she has THE MOST manicured little back yard! SO BEAUTIFUL!

Then I spotted them.

Gorgeous Hippeastrums in FULL BLOOM, I said how beautiful they looked and how I wished I had some like I used to have in a previous house where, believe it or not, we were neighbours there too! A few doors up but neighbours.

SHE OFFERED me as many as she could divide next year, wow!

They'll be PERFECT for my Balinese garden.

Looks like we found another lemon tree sapling AND a mulberry tree sapling too.
So happy. I can leave those there for the future cabin's back yard if that's the case.
I'll ask my gardener next week.

We also found CHIA growing too lol, in amongst all the weeds. They're loving life exactly where they are, so they're staying for now.

I think I have about 1 tonne of ashes after our HUGE bonfire yesterday. It's got burned tree stumps and long logs burned into charcoal and is about 4m x 3m wide.
Not quite sure what to do with it all but disperse it as best I can throughout the gardens.

Happy gardening everyone, it's a BEAUTIFUL day here!

EM

I put it "out there" for free plants and they're coming!

[Matchy69]

I am going to plant some Rosellas in the garden today.I make apparently the best Rosella jam going.A few years ago I was given a garbage bags full of Rosellas so I made about 60 jars of jam out of it.I was selling it in a craft shop and one day a lady came in and took the 12 jars I just put on the shelf and she said it was the best Rosella jam she has ever tasted and was going to send some to her family around Australia.And she asked me do you know who makes it and I said I do and she said I was very talented.I sold all my 60 jars in a couple of weeks when I thought I wouldn't sell it all.

[ecomama]

Hey Matchy!!!

I love seeing your come up on posts.

How are you doing my friend?

ROSELLAS wow!

Man, the BEST Rosella Jam Maker Award goes to you!
Sounds delicious!

Do you have to have any specific type of soil to grow them in?
Do they need much care?

I was thinking of a couple of things I'd like to plant and I never thought of Rosella plants.
There's a Native Nursery about 20 mins away, I could see if they have one when I choose a spot.

I'm saving one spot for a Pomegranate tree. We are grounding some things.... ie burying them from my grandchildren's births underneath the tree. We all chose that type of tree to plant there in that special spot.

EM

[Matchy69]

Hi Em I am still in a bit of discomfort and if I over do things I know about it like I probably will today.I go back to the hospital next Friday so I will see what they say then.
Rosellas will grow in a variety of soils that got good drainage and best in full sun.My soils lovely black soil that the farms grow their crops in.I put plenty of organic matter in when I plant.They like a fertiliser high in nitrogen.

[ecomama]

Thanks for that info Matchy!

When anyone says "full sun" lol, we have to interpret that to mean partial sun where we live.
Summer's a complete killer here for gardens.

Okay so range of soils, good!
We have PLENTY of Weed Tea as nitrogen rich fertiliser. Only ONE cup in a 9L watering can or else.... the rain caused it to overflow and it killed a bunch of weeds lol!

Next Friday hey? I really hope you get a good report on your health. I'm Praying for you every day Matchy.

I overdid it yesterday but if I don't keep active today then I won't be able to move at all tomorrow lol.
I'm getting more Epsom salts for my baths. Apparently it helps release the lactic acid build up in our muscles from over exertion. I'm going with that anyway!

If we get that Rosella tree, I'll be bugging you for the jam recipe! Unless you are patenting it ofcourse lol!

Love EM

[quirkywords]

I am starting a garden from scratch and wanted to sow some herb groubd cover like chamomile and would welcome any suggestions of what to do and suitable useful frgrant herbs to p,ant that grow quickly with poor soil and cold climate!!

EM thanks for a great thread

[Matchy69]

Hi quirky I use mint as a ground cover in my gardens and tolerates cold and the heat and really does take over.I love making drinks out of it and mint tea.I have two different varieties growing here

[Matchy69]

Em just a note on the Rosellas where I use to live their was a lot of native Hibiscus growing along the creek and they were in part shade growing more on the edge of the canopy.

[Birdy77]

Dear EM and all you lovely gardening people 😃

EM, could your mystery tree be a Boxelder Maple? Acer Negundo? Your descroption reminded me of one that i know, fluffy flowers that hang in droplets in the spring, messy on the ground.

Just a thought 😘

birdy

[blondguy]

Hi EM Birdy RX Matchy Quirky and everyone

Just seeing if anyone has any ideas for a plant that will grow over a retaining wall?

Have a great weekend everyone and thankyou EM for the thread topic too 🙂

my kindest...Paul