Africanaussie

While I was away there was plenty of rain and so things grew, .............and grew, but luckily all the mulch I had laid arrested the weed development to some extent.  The pigeon peas are going wild - I might cut some branches back to allow better access and also to release nitrogen into the soil.  The one to the left has the winged bean entangled in it so that wont be cut back for now.  Why do climbing vines insist of climbing where you don't want them to?  I also thought I might have some beans on that by now......mmm.  I have a suspicion that I have plenty of nitrogen - hence the green growth.  What I need is phosphorous to promote flowering and fruiting.  I can see some smelly chook poo in my future.  The perennial bed is also very full and lush The turmeric is flowering - I am so glad that I moved it out here into this bed where I can enjoy the flowers and then my nose twitched...

Over the weekend I decided that I had to clear the pathway behind the back of the garden.  It started out with the visit to the gardening group on Saturday where I came back with a bunch of cuttings and small plants - yeah!   I got some growing galangal and ginger roots.  The ginger I tried to grow from the supermarket ginger always rots away.  This is the ginger, it grows up to about 2ft high and has very spindly leaves. This is the galangal - it grows very tall, and I planted it just behind the costus, close to the lychee tree.  While digging around there I discovered that the costus is flowering right at the base.  No-one can see the flowers there unless you go bundu-bashing, so if the glalangal takes off that costus will just have to go.   I have seen the costus that I want to grow there, it is lower with little orangy bud type flowers on the tips.  I guess when I pinched this plant, I must have got the plant next to ...