August 2010 Garden News

To start off I have a new web site, my wonderful Daughter in law has bought me a domain name where I can review my favourite garden products. The site can be found at http://www.gardenproductreviews.com/.

This will help keep my brain active otherwise it’s all physical work in the garden. I have already reviewed ‘Sub Tropical gardening’ magazine and ‘Natrakelp’ and intend to do some ‘Fiskars’ products shortly.

My very first day of official retirement was 2 August 2010; it’s a strange feeling not having a job because I have been constantly employed since leaving school at 14, that’s 51 years at work.

The great thing is that I have a passion for plants and gardening, this will keep me active and hopefully healthy in my retirement.

I gave my ‘Smart Sub Tropical Gardening’ presentation to ‘Indooroopilly Garden Club and the ‘Northern Districts Horticultural Society’ both were well received.

I have finished the expanded garden in the back yard and decided to plant it with ‘Cordylines’, I did this for the colour effect.

I also grassed the bare area under the ‘Neem Tree’ with ‘Sweet Smother’ turf; this is supposed to be suitable for shaded areas.

The really big news is that it has rained three times in August with over 100 mills falling. This time last year we were well into the seven month drought.

The garden should look great for this year’s ‘Open Garden’, in fact it should be the best ever with five projects completed, loads of new plantings and enough stored water to see us through any dry spells.

July 2010 garden news

Gardening Australia showed our garden on national Television, we were very happy with the result and all comments have been favourable, it’s a pity that all you get is a little over four minutes, our garden is much more than that, but they say that’s the maximum attention span, anyway you can see the video segment below.

Helen Curran and members of the Sydney ‘Tropical Garden Society’ called in on their way to the Nambour Garden Expo, they stayed for a few hours and enjoyed their visit, it’s always nice to catch up with this crowd as they are very genuine in their love of tropical gardens.

The Nambour Garden Expo was on and we really look forward to this each year, as usual we bought lots of plants and caught up with all our gardening friends whilst browsing the expo.

We decided to put another four solar energy panels on the roof, this now gives us 12 or 2 kilowatt system, we also installed a low energy pool pump 'Viron' which is supposed to be about 75% more efficient than a normal pump. Our next electricity bill will be interesting.

There was a ‘Cordyline Club’ meeting and as usual I bought $10 worth of raffle tickets, it’s rare that I win anything but I had to try, anyway five prizes later I went home with some beautiful cordylines.

I finished all my leave on 30 July, so now I am officially 100%retired, it’s a funny feeling after 51 years in the workforce.

We had gone almost two months without rain and I was dreading another year like last year where we went almost seven months without any rain, well we had 15mills towards the end of the month, so that was quite good.

I refurbished the path areas in the swimming pool area with a very nice’ tropical gold’ pebble, wow, what a difference that has made, freshened up the area really well.

I have started to expand another garden in the back yard, it’s not all that big but has a nice curve to it, hopefully I will be able to find some nice heliconia’s to plant.

Seaweed in the garden

Again I am going to recommend a product which Judy and I use all the time in our garden and believe has helped make our garden and plants so healthy all year round.

We are great believers in the benefit of using Kelp (seaweed) in the garden as a foliar, transplanting and soil conditioner.

NatraKelp has their factory situated in Maroochydore and processes the kelp which has been imported from Tasmania.

We believe this is a very superior product to some you can buy, it comes out of the container like treacle and we mix it at a 10 to one rate which is 100 mills in a watering can.

NatraKelp make liquid seaweed from Tasmanian bull kelp (Durvillea Potatorum) one of the world's richest sources of micro-nutrients, alginic acid, essential amino acids, minerals and other complex organic compounds. They use a natural bacterial fermentation process to liquefy the kelp and maximise the seaweed's high nutrient levels. When we buy new plants or do any transplanting we always water them in with a kelp solution.

With the foliar spray the one we use is an 18-3-10 solution we spray all the plants at least every month,

This is a great plant food which contains nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium - plus the added growing power of liquid seaweed, this product contains a

base of 65% liquid seaweed with a range of NPK formulations (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium) plus chelated trace elements, this mix boosts the health, vigour and yield of all our plants.

NatraKelp soil conditioner is a mix of several different types of seaweed and helps the soil retain moisture this liquid seaweed plant and soil conditioner uses a base of premium seaweed, blended to increase its natural "stickiness" and water-retention qualities in soil. This product not only enhances moisture retention and soil structure at the same time, it promotes healthy plants by delivering a package of essential nutrients.

Our garden is a success partly due to our use of Natrakelp products.

If you want to know more, visit their web site found at: http://www.natrakelp.com.au/index.htm

June Garden 2010

I went to look at a local garden with an Open Garden selector with the view of becoming a selector, I am not sure, I think I may not be open minded enough as I did not think the garden was suitable but the selectors were quite happy with it, I will give it some more thought.

Only one garden presentation this month and thart was to the ‘Golden Wattle’ club, it was a very small and aged club, but they did enjoy my presentation.

I attended a Cordyline Society meeting held at ‘Palms for Brisbane’ nursery and as usual it was a friendly meet and I managed to win a couple of nice cordylines..

I have been asked to review Fiskars products, this came out of the blue and I told them I would be happy to do so.

I have Built a trellises for the’ Jade Vine’ and ‘Thunbergia Mysoris vine’, should be stunning once the vines are established. .

It has been dull month weather wise, not much sun or rain.

Our youngest son warrick moved into new house on half acre just up the road from us so I have been helping him out quite a bit.

Link to Television show

The below link will take you to 'Gardening Australia's' web site. Our segment is called 'Structure in the garden'. Go to the iview link on the green band then click on the episode and you wll see our garden, takes a few minutes to go through all the other stuff.

http://www.abc.net.au/gardening/stories/s2942345.htm

May 2010 Garden News

It’s been a busy month talking to garden clubs, I have visited Russell Island, Clayfield and Albany Creek clubs, as usual the talks went down well, we met some nice people and we were able to sell a few plants.

Sophie turned one this month and we had a very nice party here for her, what a beautiful nature she has.

We have our youngest son and his wife living with us at the moment as they are renovating their old house getting it ready to sell before they move in our estate on half acre. Guess who will be helping them with their garden; they will have much better soil where they are as they are much higher than us.

I have been helping them put paver garden borders in and a paved back patio area, all done to make the home presentable for sale. He has taken my advice and is spending a bit of money on the refurbishment, we are sure he will recoup the money spent plus more when he sells.

We had a surprise visit from gardening Australia who wanted to film a segment on structure in the garden, it was a difficult segment to do as, what is structure? So we talked about trees and under planting. To my mind structure encompasses the rocks, trees, shrubs, colour and even the soil in which the plants grow.

Colin Campbell was the presenter; he is the best gardening commentator in Australia and a real gentleman.

I am busy pruning the four Carambola (five cornered fruit) trees at the moment, I find climbing trees quite difficult these days and spend the night with very painful legs.

I have also spread 50 bales of sugar cane mulch around the garden, only 10 left to go.

April Garden news 2010

You can finally feel autumn in the air, I have to get busy and spread the 60 bales of sugar cane mulch in the garden before the soil gets too cool.

I spoke to about 100 members of the Mount Gravatt Garden Club and Judy tried to sell some plants, very poor response with only five plants sold. I am sure garden clubs are purely a social event and not too much about gardening.

This time of year is pruning time, I cut back the Longan trees quite severely, also trimmed the Jaboticaba’s, the five cornered fruit are next.

I manned the SMART gardening stall for two days during the ABC Garden Expo, there was not a lot of interest shown and overall it was very disappointing, no-one from the expo was interested in the fact that I was runner up in ‘Gardener of the Year’.

We had a bus tour from The Beaudesert garden Club of 55 people, they were a good visit and enjoyed the garden and were interested in buying plants.

My youngest son got married on 24 April and the reception was held in our back garden, it was a great day and everything went well.

Again we have been saved with some good rain in April, all our tanks except the new one are full, what a difference life is when you do not have to spend hours each day watering.

Our neighbour is renewing the side fence on the right side of our garden; it is colour bond and will take a bit of getting used to.

My next job is to complete the retaining wall along the driveway, it’s a big and heavy job but one which has to be done.

The garden is looking nice but lots of the tropical’s have now gone into dormant stage.