June 2011 Garden New's

June was a fairly quiet month in the garden, mainly trimming and pruning jobs.

 The biggest job was trimming the four Carambola trees. I really took the saw to them this year as I want to keep their size down in future as I am not getting any younger and I don’t want to have to climb to high to trim them in future.

I will be doing the same with the Custard Apples in August.

I gave my ‘Passion for Plants’ presentation to Stafford Garden Club and ‘Smart Sub Tropical Gardening’ to the Redlands Horticultural Society, both were well received.

We have a very busy couple few weeks coming up with four bus tours and five presentations. It’s a bit disappointing to have the bus tours visit us in mid winter as our garden is a summer garden, but if they see it now they may want to come back for the ‘Open Garden’.

I have started a bathroom renovation and have ripped out all fixtures, tiles and concrete floor, all ready for the tiler to come and do his bit, it’s been a big dirty and heavy job and I am pleased my part is finished.

Very little rain during June so we have had to do quite a lot of watering also it has been one of the coldest winters for some time and the tropical plants are starting to show the signs of cold.

I had a delivery of ‘sweet smother’ turf and laid it in those areas which now receive too much shade for couch to grow.

Judy is having a big clean out of her Neo bromeliads as she has far too many and there were still a few bales of sugar cane mulch to spread.

My eldest son Scott and his partner Eliza gave us a Grand Son this month, a healthy 3.9 kilo boy named Luke Robert

May 2011 Garden News.

It’s been a very busy month. Judy had her second knee replacement done in the beginning of the month so she has been out of action since then, the operation seems to have been successful as the pain level is now below than prior to operation.

While Judy was in hospital I gave presentations to ‘Springdale’ and ‘Elanora Garden clubs, I won’t be going back to the latter as they failed to cover my petrol costs.

When I give my presentations I can spend a whole day away and travel up to 100 kilometres, all I expect are my expenses, no more, if they can’t do that then they don’t deserve a speaker.

I also gave a presentation to ‘Russell Island’ garden club; it’s a little club on one of the Bay Islands that does not get any speakers so it’s good to help them out this way.

Our Grand-Daughter ‘Sophie’ had her second Birthday on the 16^th.

 Scott and Eliza should have another addition to their family on 4 June if all goes well.

I have of course been doing a lot of housework this month but have still found time to spread more sugar cane mulch and cut back some fruit trees.

The garden is still looking good; it’s grown so much this summer with rain almost every week.

We are looking forward to the Nambour Garden Expo and are going to have a bit of a break for three days at Mooloolaba.

I found this at our local markets and having a bit of fun with the 'body'.

  

April 2011 Garden News

What a busy gardening month it has been and poor Judy has really struggled with her crook knee.

Judy goes into Hospital early May for her second knee replacement, ‘bloody rheumatoid’.

The month started off with a trip to Logan Village Garden Club for a presentation, then to the Plant Society at New Farm for the same presentation.

I thought about going to the ABC Garden Expo but after the last few which were mediocre I decided to give it a miss.

Next came bus trips from Logan City and Kilcoy Garden Clubs, these were both good as they stayed long enough to see all the garden.

Scott, Eliza and Sophie went to Townsville for the Australian Disabled Water Ski titles and he returned home with four GOLD medals, we are very proud of Scott’s achievements.

To end the month I gave a presentation to Eagleby Garden Club, it was great as I has spoken there a few years ago prior to setting up my power point display, they treated us like celebrities, and it was nice to be appreciated.

In the garden things are starting to slow down as winter approaches. I have started to trim some of the trees and basically just carried out maintenance on the garden plus of course some new plantings.

Now is of course the time to mulch the garden, I started off with 50 bales of sugar cane mulch but soon ran out, just waiting for the next delivery.

One thing that struck me is that since retiring I need to keep a personal diary something I never did while working.

How to make a water feature out of a pot

Water features are always an interesting and attractive addition to your garden.

They are easy to set up once you have chosen the pot that suits you and your garden.

Don’t worry if the pot has holes in it as they can easily be filled with strong filler.

Obviously you must have a large enough clay pot that will keep the water cool enough during our hot summer so the fish do not boil.

My smallest pot contains about 150 litres of water.

The first job is to hose out the inside to get rid of any loose particles.

Then the pot must be sealed, my preference is for water based bitumen paint, I give the pot two coats within two days then leave to dry for a minimum of 10 to 14 days.

There are a number of sealers you can use, just visit your local hardware store for a selection.

Use tap water not rain water as tap water contains more mineral content, then use a chlorine neutralizer and a pond conditioner, I use a product from a pet store called ‘blackwater’, basically it ages water..

I then place a besser block on the base with the holes free for fish to shelter and place the water plant pot on this.

Cover the dirt in the pot with loose gravel as this will stop the dirt from making the water cloudy.

Do not use organic soil, use pure dirt.

Put your fish in and a bit of waterweed and you have a beautiful feature in your garden.

I collect my fish from a local creek and they are very hardy and learn to live on mosquito larvae and any other insect that falls into the pot.

You will probably need to clean out the pot every couple of years so there’s not a lot of maintenance.

If you are in Queensland depending on height of pot you may need to make it cane toad proof.
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March garden news 2011

It has been a very busy month in the garden. The garden has had to be in virtually ‘open garden’ condition for the whole month as we have had a stream of visitors through.

First to visit were Aspley Garden Club unfortunately they were running late and left within half an hour, this was extremely disappointing as they did not have enough time to see the garden. We provided morning tea which was probably a mistake as a lot of them did not get out from under the back patio, the visit left me very frustrated.

On the following Sunday the Gold Coast Bromeliad Society visited, stayed for the afternoon and really enjoyed the garden. Then on the following Saturday Judy and I drove down to the Gold Coast to give a presentation to their club. My presentation was exceptionally well received and we were very impressed with this club’s organisation. It was also good to see John and Jenny Catlin at the meeting.

A bus load from Indooroopilly/Kenmore Garden Club visited and thank goodness they stayed for the whole morning and were able to enjoy every bit of the garden, we also provided tea and coffee, they bought some homemade cake with them. This was a visit we enjoyed.

So much to do in the garden as it had to be in tip top condition seeing how we have had three bus tours through this month and with all the rain we have had everything is growing very fast and there’s lots of trimming and pruning to be done.

I finally took all the horizontal beams down from the shade houses as they were cca treated and were poisoning the plants, it was a very difficult job but well worth doing.

This is so true.

I had 25 square metres of ‘Sweet Smother’ grass delivered to be laid in a couple of shady areas, the previous load of this grass has been a real success.

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My youtube videos

This is the link to videos I have put on youtube.
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Garden news for February 2011

Another great month weather wise as just enough (140 mills) fell during the month, what a relief it is not to have to spend hours each day watering.

I gave my new presentation( A passion for Plants) to 'Glebe Garden Club on what was probably the hottest day of summer, it must of been 50c inside the hall.

Judy and I had two very bad weeks where we caught a virus and just could not do anything other than rest and get to know the porcelain bowl extremely well; we have both recovered and are back in the garden.

We were let down by the Open Garden Co-ordinater who promised us she would visit on 21^st, but she never came and did not let us know. After nine years and always good numbers of visitors we have NEVER had a Co-ordinator visit our garden and yet they are the ones who are supposed to promote your garden. Good job I do a lot of the promotion myself I say.
On 22^nd we had visitors from ‘Tambourine Mountain Garden Club’ and what a nice lot of people they were, they enjoyed the garden and we enjoyed having them.

On 28^th we hosted a bus trip from ‘Green Park Garden Club’, this was a  little different from previous club as quite a few were just content to sit under the back patio, I think a lot of  the members were just on a social outing. No one gave us any feedback unless asked, and only then did they said how great the garden was.

I took out some heliconias that have never flowered and had been told they never will and a few other plants that were past their use by date.

Next month we will go up to the Sunshine Coast and restock from Maureen Simons nursery, looking at more beehive gingers, torch gingers, costus and heliconias.

Maureen is writing a book on gingers, heliconias and costus, it will be an identification guide and a guide to growing. I will be most defiantly getting a copy as I consider her to be the expert on tropical plants in this part of the country. For anyone that is interested her web site is as follows:  http://www.towenmounttropicals.com.au/grow.html

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