Finally a New Post!

Sheeesh, I didn't realise I hadn't posted in here since March!

Later tonight I'll try upload some pics as there has been some activity over in the new entertaining area over the last couple of weeks.

Shade Structure
I have half a shade structure! Finally decided not to go with a Bali Hut as I thought it was too imposing, and 'hard' a structure, for the small area. So I've gone with shade sails. Many thanks are due to my mum for supplying the funds!!!

At this stage the posts have been installed. The actual sail should arrive in the next two weeks.

Tree Pruning
My beloved liquidamber has been pruned, rather severely. This was in preparation for the shade sail as well as being something I have considered having done for a while, but didn't have the funds to do.

They had to bring in a cherry picker to do the job; alas I wasn't here to see it and take pics.

Hope to post some pics later this evening!

Replenishing The Vege Patch

Now that the weather has cooled down I can get back out into the garden, and oh boy, does it ever need some attention - the vege patch particularly.

Today I ripped out the tomatoes, lettuce, celery and about three hours of weeds.

My bad - the weeds had flowered and I could see their seeds scattered all over the ground :( means there are going to be a lot more weeds coming back :( My own fault, I didn't keep them under control.

Tomorrow I will dig the area over and plant the pea seedlings and bean seeds I bought today.

I have good results from beans in the past, so I'm looking forward to them.

With the peas I generally find they get powdery mildew (or whatever the equivalent for peas is) pretty quickly, so I'll try get them to grow and fruit fast.

I just love picking fresh peas and beans and eating them fresh off the plants, can't wait!

Hiatus

Apologies for the hiatus. It's been hot and not weather to be even thinking about gardening.

I hope to start updating again in a few days time.

Plants Beginning with S

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - Q, R & S

Tonight uploaded the few S plants that I have:

Strawberry patch (the slaters get most of them!)
Strelizia - also known as the Bird of Paradise (see below)
Sweet Pea - first time I've grown these was last year, beautiful colours.

Plants Beginning with Q, R & S

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - Q, R, S

Tonight added the R plants:

Rocket (a herb)
Rose (Eiffel Tower, and a sun-burnt red one name unknown)
Rununcula

The rununcula pics are my favourite. This particular one is really dark burgundy, almost brownish. I love the architecture of the petals.



Do you like it?

Plants Beginning with P

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - MNOP

Uploaded the P plants tonight:

Pansy
Petunia
Philodendron Monstera Deliciosa
Poppies

You'll need to click through to the next page to see them all (link is near the top right of the album page).

I really like a lot of these pics, but if I had to choose a favourite it would be this one:

Plants Beginning with O

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - MNO & P

Tonight added two O plants:-

Orchid - Cymbidium, green
Orchid - Slipper.

The slipper orchid flowers were so shiny. It hasn't flowered again since I was given it but the plant seems to be doing fine, so I'll just wait:

Current To Do List

Cut out the top of the avocado tree
I am waiting until Thunderbolt is here to do thisas I don't like using the chainsaw when I'm alone. This is something I do about every two years, to stop the tree from getting too tall and out of control.
Sadly there are fruit on the branches I'll be cutting out, but there's quite a lot of fruit on the lower branches too. I know it means less fruit at the next flowering but it has been producing more fruit than I can eat, so that's ok (the friends and family might be a bit miffed at not getting freebies though!)

Mow Lawn
Again and again and again - it's like housework this one, always needs re-doing.

Work Out
What to do with the 'nothing' part of the entertaining area. Having the funds to build the pond is a long way off. I keep thinking that I could plant things there in the interim. Have to be careful about this with plant choice and where the retic goes in case the pond actually does ever eventuate.

Rear Garden Replanting
Still have one section of this that could be done. Likely to be lots of tree roots (the tallow), but the bed is only small and already has day lillies in it, so it should be do-able.

Vege Patch
The good bit - keep picking produce!
Probably should fertilise it again, and re-stake the tomatoes.

Plants Beginning with M and N

Ladytreemakers Photo Album - MNO & P

Oh, I also added the Chinese Tallow to the 'C' album.

At the moment there is just M and N plants in here, more will be added later.

Mango - tree and fruit, I like that new growth on the tree (ie leaves) is dark red.
Nasturtium
Native Violet - another of my most favourite flowers (so much so here's the pic below)
Nectarine - in blossom, and with fruit.

Native Violet:



New and Additional Blog
I like this plant so much that I've used a slice of the above pic as the banner on a new garden blog I've started. It's over here if you're interested. It isn't just a copy of this one, but eventually I may meld the two.

Yes I know, I need another blog like a hole in my head, but there is the possibility in the future of receiving money for blogging, so I thought I'd give it a go. I have no money in my current budget for gardening needs, so if I get some extra I'll try put it the gardens' way.

Plants Beginning with I, J, K and L

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - IJKL

Had to put L in with this lot to make the 10 folders stretch for the whole alphabet.

Added:
Lavender
Leucospernum (often mistaken for a protea)
Lilyorchid
Liquidamber

Plants Beginning with I, J and K

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - IJK

Added:
Iris (white, bud only)
Jonquil
King Protea (can't believe I grew this!)

AArrgghh

Now - when I'm almost half way through - I find out my on-line image host (where the A to Z of plants lives) only allows me to make 10 folders.

I'm not complaining about the retriction, just that there was no way to find that out before I started making them grrrrrr

I'll combine them so there will be two letters in each folder, will take me a while to go back to each post and update the links though :(

Oh well, I needed something to do didn't I?

Water Lily

Realised I didn't post a pic of the water lily that finally did its thing and flowered (after 6 years!).

I didn't get a pic of the flower open :( it was white with a yellow centre, and only lasted a few days. The sly thing was opening during the day when I was at work then closing by the time I got home, so I had thought it hadn't opened yet!

Here tis:

Crinum Pics

Here are the pics of the Crinum in flower - the plant has split itself into two as well, flower on one, bud on the other plant:



Closeup view of the flower:

Plants Beginning with H

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - H

Added the H folder to the plant photo album:

Hippeastrum (pink and white)
Hyacinth

Plants Beginning with G

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - G

Added the G plants:

Gardenia (flower pic and also pics showing how harsh a pruning these can take)
Gerbra
Gladioli

Crinum

When I was at the zoo the other day I noticed all their Crinums were in flower, so figured mine wasn't going to muster up the effort to do likewise.

I was wrong! It has split itself into two plants AND each plant has a bud!!!!!!!!!!

Pics will be forthcoming."

Update on Entertaining Area

Over --------------->> there in the sidebar is a section of links to posts about the development of my entertaining area.

The plants have been in for a year now, so I thought some updated pics were in order.

The paving has become stained due to the bore water. The path of white-ish stones has become stained from various things that drop from the tree - mostly it's the dead flowers from the tree that cause the staining; looks like I should have gone for a dark stone instead of light colour.

Cuphea in front of Dietes, Gardenia behind with Philodendron (ferns under Philo):



Dietes and Cordylines:



Up the path:



Top area:



Fernery:


Long Shot:
November 05-


December 05-

Plants Beginning with E

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album -

Added one sole entry to E:

Eiffel Tower Rose
(so called as it is long-stemmed)

Plants Beginning with D

ladytreemaker 's Online Photo Album - D

OK, so I've had a few days off, but am back to updating the photo album of plants. Just now added the D plants:

Daffodil
Daisy
Dietes Bicolour
Dietes Iriodes
Day Lily - yellow and organge ruffled.