A year in my garden #5...- (plus the rest)...

General

 

No Gardening this weekend (see below) But I did get a chance to wander around the garden seeing what’s what…That the worst of winter, still to come, doesn’t seem to have registered with the plants as the pictures show – we still have flowers in the garden and those not flowering are getting ready to do so …..EVEN a camellia that had never flowered since we’ve been here, flowered this winter… Small pink flowers lasting barely more than a day ..>I didn’t even get the chance to take a photo ….:O0  

 

This azalia is at the front of the garden .. Now almost in shade the whole day ..

 

Grumpy Old Fart

McD and I work in 'services' professions so tend to be a lot more critical of service we receive in shops, cafe's etc ... But we seem to be spiraling downwards as far as getting reasonable service is concerned ...Shop Staff too busy chatting with friends than serving customers .... McD went into SubWays the other day to have some youngster practically pushing her out of the way as she used a cloth to clean the glass frontage.... To hinder someone trying to buy in a shop !! They have no idea do they .... And to do that to McD - real dumb .............  

 

The garden seat now collecting a covering of moss and lichen on it... I like it as it shows how clean the air is and looks good (to me) ...but will mean a shortened life for the seat itself.

 

Vegetable Garden

 

 

 

Well here is the plan ..The end goal of our vegetable garden.. Of course this doesn’t take into the fact the whole garden is on a slant both north to south and west to east … Plus the fact that the garden is far from rectangular….being narrower at the north end than the south ..Plus the fact that it’s sunken already into the earth with a concrete wall and fence to the north boundary and a clay bank and fence to the west ….

 

 

 

So why are we planting here of all places ???

 

We’ve nowhere else to put it really ……

 

 

 

I’ve already told McD we are to move in two years So I can start it all again – but properly this time :O)  “Oh that will be fun dear” she muttered gratingly through her clenched teeth ………

 

Even in our Winter a climber Rose wants to flower (Note the black spot as we don't spray beside the veggie patch) 

 

The weekend has not been good for gardening …We are now in the grips of winter. It’s cold … Damned cold …Plus we have a 120K gale blowing right off the Antarctic and driving  iced  rain directly at the house ….. And it’s been raining for 24hrs now – Chaos on the roads …And that will just get worse by tomorrow morning …….

 

The white Magnolia prepares to flower

 

It’s effin cold ……..

 

And now we’ve lost Cable connections – which means no internet, TV etc, phones  ……..

 

The Rhododendron prepares to flower

 

 

The only thing I do like it the cool cool clean air that now surrounds us …makes you want to keep on breathing in ………………. 

 

The small flowers of the native Coprosma Robusta will lead to red berries in late spring 

 

So apart from a brisk ½ hour wander about the garden Saturday morning to see what’s what and grab a few photo’s that’s all we’ve done ………Trouble is – we are running out of time to get these raised borders in place……. To complete them all there is a good 8-10 weekends work ahead  ..>depressing isn’t it ….

 

I thought this might be the earliest kowhai flowers this year but found a tree flowering beside the local supermarket....

 

And of course then there’s the rest of the garden to look after ….. Not a hope eh with us going to work in the dark and leaving work in the dark as well ……. So only one thing to do and that was to get a gardener in to keep the rest of the garden going ….. So we hired Jim to come round once a fortnight to weed the yard and front borders…However he is the wrong side of 70 and I'm concerned at his health. I  Just know we are going to come home and find him flat across a border one day having expired from the cold and effort …..

 

the fuscias seem to be happier in the winter shade than the summer sun ...

 

Worse still for all his talk he knows little about the plants we have …. Lilly bulbs we bought at $4-5 a pop left on top of the ground …the same for the Dahlia tubers …All left to the exposure of the recent frosts …… I’ve not looked at them closely but if they all rot now I’m hundreds of dollars out of pocket ……

 

 

 

But still we are too soft to fire him …of course where he has worked is clean and free of weeds … And,  HE might be ME in a few years time ….But at least I will know what to do with bulbs and tubers costing a small fortune …………………………………….

 

 

I hope this means lots of fruit this year ....

Perhaps I read too Much ........................

General

I guess this week was as dark a week as last week really except that the week ended with the days slightly longer than shorter. We did however get to feel a true winter, with cold winds and rain and our first real frost hitting us. North and south of Wellington, across the country snow fell - to the delight of the children or child at hearts but few others... I am not a snow fan ..Love seeing it from afar....Hate living in it......

We're Screwed

I've been listening and reading items on gloal warming and the ever increasing prices for food and the worsening famine around Ethiopia and Sudan ....To see rice fields now being planted with "Bio-Fuel" crops and increased pressure on 3rd world farmers to clear more jungle to survive is sadening and desperate for the world. I read about the logging of the jungle in eastern africa. Bad enough in it's own right, but that they use the rivers to transport the logs ...Many logs are lost to the river. These tree length logs then wash up on the beaches of easten africa and become impassable obstacles for the breeding turtles trying to lay eggs in the sand above the tide line ....They can't do it and so either return to the sea or lay their eggs where they have no chance of hatching. Turtles across the planet face similar pressures and problems ... Humans living beside the beaches such as in the mediterranean ensure the turtles can never again land there .......

Ever thought how good it would have been for your Children, Grandchildren or Great Grandchildren to have been able to see these great turtles, and even for them to have had the opportunity to see them in their own environment ?? It's not going to happen ..................

Isn't there something desperately wrong with us (the world) when we put the need to feed ourselves below everything else .....

The increased pressure on remaining food farmland to produce more and more then leads us to genetic engineering.. The reality is - can we (the world) really survive without it ? I read now that they are developing corn and wheat crops that are resistant to weed killers. Weed killers such as "round-up". It's called Roundup for a very good reason - it's used to kill every plant it comes in contact with .....So there goes the corn fields with poppies etc growing amongst them that I remember when living in England ... I bet that doesn't happen anymore now ... It (weedkiller) also in the UK for example kills plants such as 'fat hen'. So what ? It is the most common plant that feeds the native birds ....Pheasants, sparrows, partriges, my beloved Skylarks, field/wood mice and so on ....Fewer mice, sparrows and we lose more of the birds of prey such as the Kestral.....

Does it matter though that we lose these creatures ?? It does to me...But I'm not starving ... But this food won't get to relieve the famine will it when we are looking to grow more and more Bio fuels for ourselves ....

Of course in the US this genetically modified weed-killer resistant crops won't have quite the same species destruction...why? Because they have a sufficient land mass to reserve huge parkland for the wildlife to exist and squeeze into. So no - not the extinction of species (though it's still happening from other things )... Sure the farmland will be 'Green Concrete' as the paper described it - barren of all other wildlife except for the intended crops growing there...........Most of which will be grown for Bio Fuels anyway.

New Zealand will have the same issues as the UK if it allows GE crops in. We already grow crops for bio fuels...How long before GE cops are here ? Not long ....Not long at all .....

A year in my garden #4- (plus the rest)...

In General - Our darkest week 

This week was our darkest week .... Winter Solstice already.. Today being the shortest day ... 6 months of increasing light will help lift the spirits and bring the vegetables to healthy maturity ... We had 60f (16c)temperature today with a warm sun and blue skies. Not bad for the start of the middle of winter ...

 

 This Pea Straw is warm as toast

June can often be like this ... Cold nights, light frosts some nights in the valley but none around the house / garden thanks to being on a hill and more air movement ... July we will undoubtedly have some frosts ... But always light ..We are fortunate that here in the Wellington surrounds the climate is so moderate... Further south and the frosts and the snows are much more common ....   

Then it will be August the cold rainy month - The month I hate here most of all ..... But then thats it ..September heralds spring and this year, a gardners spring fever will hit us and a rush of seed planting will begin.....    

But at the moment and in this week especially I am getting up in the dark, walking the dogs with MCD in the dark and driving to work in the dark .....Some days I even forget to look out of my widow at work .. .And then its leaving and driving home in the dark... very depressing .... very very depressing...... 

 

Work

Work hit an all-time low over the last 2 weeks .. Some terse conversations with the CTO , my manager, resulted in me telling him to prepare his succession planning for me very quickly......I have a holiday coming up 1st two weeks of August and then I'm getting my CV out to the agencies .... 

Too much to go into detail here but I'm far from happy ...

 

Our Next Holiday

For the first 2 weeks in August,  at the beginning of the last month of the winter, McD and I are to holiday in Hong Kong, visiting Brunei as well for a 2 day stopover... not a shopping holiday this time but a photographic opportunity exporing the islands and outskirts of Hong kong and Macau. We want to try and capture what is the last of the old world Hong  Kong territories before it's too late....I'm very excited :O) McD is in her element looking at our options and networking with travellers who recently visited these places .... .

 

But the time of year is not the best - it being the typhoon season over there ...Very hot and humid and potentially extremely wet and windy ......But that could also produce some good pictures so we will just go with the flow and see what happens ... We are to do as little organised tours as possible as well ... This time it's our adventure and our chance to get pictures at places not already marked as a 'kodak moment' , millions of which are on flickr ..Many looking great ...but just another version of a hundred others ....

Of course we could also be imprisoned in the hotel for 2 weeks  waiting for the big winds to pass us by ...But then we will drink G&Ts and relax and people watch or read a good book and how much better than work that will be anyway :O)

I wish we had longer in Brunei ...Well actually longer to go from Brunei into the Borneo jungle .......Next time maybe .... We are planning a boat trip along a river there to see the probiscus monkeys ..... and the stilt village on the river itself ....  

Rats

All over now - but in clearing the gorse at the top of the bank to make our vegetable garden we disturbed more rats than we had imagined...mickey the cat brought nearly a dozen into the house over a period of a few small weeks to show us .. One still alive but with its back broken ... And then, when Stepdaughter visited she heard a scuffling in the ceiling ...... Too much ...... So we engaged a nice pest control chap who set poison and traps and we bagged some more of these long tailed pointy nosed, long sharp pointy teethed devils ..... the pest control chap told us there was a 'good sized nest' in the attic.....

A few weeks later I found out a sentence you do not want to hear from a much experienced pest contoller ...."oooh Hell, That was a big one" !!!   Dead in the trap thankfully ..I was invited to come and see the fresh kill .... "ooooh Hell- That was a big one" !! I could only repeat........    

 

Vegetable garden gardens !! :O)

 

 We plan to put 3 raised beds along here ............

Right on schedule - to day we completed our 2nd  raised bed in the vegetable garden. Or is it a potager garden ?? Or is it a Kitchen Garden ?? .. are they different ??.  

So any way - right on schedule - after a full days work humping soil up the steps bucket load by bucket load (we are getting so fit), we planted heritage heirloom garlic cloves...On the shortest day of the year as it should be for planting garlic.... The Winter Solstice

Afterwards we stripped naked and with birch twigs in our hands we danced with free abandon around the newly erected fertility pole paying homage to our Druidian ways ............. 

Do you believe me ?? I hope you don't :O)

 

 

A year in my vegetable garden - part 3 (Plus the rest)

Thanks for the notes .. One question was on the fate of my PoroPoro.. Ths small tree is a native to new zealand is a member of the potato/tomato/nightshade family Solanum ...It can grow to around 12 feet high and has a beautiful purple to very light pastel purple flower. It has drupe type fruit which is poisonous when green but edible when the fruit turns orange ...

The flowers of our tree were almost white ...It grew by itself no doubt deposited by the local birdlife at the side of a set of steps from one level of the garden to the next ...As we left it to its own devices it sought out more light towards the far side of the steps forming a low archaway across them ... I liked it there ...It reminded me of the pictures I'd seen of Zen gardens where a low archway to the garden forced those who enter it to bow in reverence to natures gift inside ....

It had a mass of flowers this past summer followed by large fruit that I had my eye on to make jam (as the old settlers had done 2 hundred year ago) but as they ripened they caught the eye of one of our worst illegal aliens - the german wasps, who devoured them or spoiled them long before I could harvest some for myself .

The workmen saw the tree as a weed and a nuisance and despite it not being part of their brief for the day nor even near their work it was cut down and sadly that was that ....

However, there is a seedling thought to be from the same plant growing in our circular dahlia bed... I will transplant it soon ...But not to the steps of its parent ...............

++++++++++++++++++++++++

Well we finally did it .. Our 1st raised bed has been planted.. It took another two days of hard labour moving soil in buckets up the hill to fill it. Barrow load after barrow load carted up from ground level to 1st level... So much work ....

But how much fitter we are now. The step machine in the gym now being but a toy..."Try doing that with a 20-30 kilo bucket of wet soil!!" I shall mockingly deride the pale faced gym bunnies when next there ........

We've made a lot of mistakes though in building the frame ..Mainly because of having to build it in situ ..But also because of us not wanting to buy any extra tools. The old bow saw wasn't good for cutting thick macrocarpa wood to the right angles we needed... I've vowed to redo the side nearest the entrance as it "offends my eye" .... But the Broccoli cares not ........

As we finally laid the last bucket full into the bed and forked it all over flat we took time to sit at the top of our garden with a mug of tea and look over our veggie patch and past the house to the valley below ... It was very relaxing, very pleasant..

Another vowe to get a proper seat up there soon was made. I think we will be up there quite often from now on :O)

I asked McD to do the inaugural planting of the first plant. Broccoli. She has worked like a pack horse these past few weeks...We tried to get some brussel sprouts but the garden centre had "run out" with no new stock arriving soon.......From spring - well Mid-August onwards we start sowing seed instead of going to the garden centre. I have a heap of "heirloom" seed that I am looking forward to trying ..Blood red carrots, striped beetroot, black (or nearly black) tomatoes..... But for now the centre provided us with broccoli, cabbage, celery,spinach and leeks.

Our First Broccoli

A vegetable garden also with the first sighting of a snail "EEEEEEEK" What the SAM is that !!!!!!! An aerial flight for you voracious vegetable eater...Over into the neighbours garden and never return again.......... "Thats the downside of buying from garden centres" I rasped as I planned death and destruction of all things slimy nearby.

It's there look !!!

It was with a great sense of achievement that we had finally planted our 1st bed and we could now say with not a little pride that "Yes we have a vegetable garden". I was also more than a little amused that Mcd now calls them "her plants" What a difference a little ownership will make in getting them to harvest time. :O)

Tadaar !!!

How quickly we gardeners become the "too" people .... Too hot, too cold, too wet, too dry, too shaded, too sunny, too windy, too calm ....etc etc

Of course the work doesn't stop there.. With another 3 beds in the pipeline. But these will require little digging into the hillside and will be much easier to build.

Stupid Humans .......

And as we planted our last plant the clouds thickened and the first few raindrops cooled the air around us and God in his infinate wisdom had it rain heavily for the next 10 hours straight much to McDs concern.."is it out of order to set up the umbrellas for them ?" .....