Africanaussie

Well, my holiday is over, and I have been slowly getting settled in.  My poor hubby was overwhelmed by bandicoots and scrub hens the entire time I was gone.   I think all the holes in the fence are now repaired, so the bandicoots are no longer bothering us, and a plastic kite hanging up in the pawpaw tree seems to have scared the scrub hen away. Personally I think they saw I was gone and saw the place as being un-protected!  The boss is back now.... The lady slipper orchid vine is showing off its awesome flowers.  I arrived back to find a lovely little package from Kim at  The little black cow .  I had sent her some cordeline stems and she said they are now sprouting, I hope they bring her lots of tropical colour.  She sent me some goat soap and some gem squash seeds in return.  It is so dry right now that it might be a good time to give the gem squash seeds a  try yet again.  I added lots of compost and planted a row of seeds ag...

This is a  little bit of this and that, so forgive me as I seem to jump from one plant to the other.... firstly my lipstick plant has seeded!  I heard that they could be propagated by cuttings and have started some off quite successfully, and then noticed these long dangling strips where the flowers had died off.  Well now I noticed they had opened up - I am probably going to have hundreds of tiny lipsticks plants growing up around the hanging basket now.  These cosmos sure attract the butterflies, but I want the zinnia to bloom as well - soon the vegetable garden will be bright with color and that should bring on some pollinators.  I am also letting some of the basil flower for the same reason.  The amazon lily flowers intermittently through the year - I still cant figure out when is the "right" season for it to flower.  Celery, bok choy and lettuces are slowly getting a little...

I have noticed that lately the asparagus stalks have been getting thicker and stronger.  I dont know if it is because we are heading into the wet season which is when we are supposed to harvest them.  In more temperate climates, the plant dies down in the winter, but here it has continued to grow and produce, but I have left the shoots which is supposed to build up more strength in the roots.  This weekend I cut back all the older shoots that were starting to collapse at the base. These were planted as two year crowns and at the same time I got a packet of seeds for a purple asparagus.  Out of the whole packet only one plant survived.   It looks very spindly, but I will leave it in the pot a while longer before I transplant it into the ground.   The asparagus tops are full of little seeds - I wonder if they will grow?  I put some into a  couple of pots.  They are very slow growing, but since mine are doing so well I...

When I returned from my five weeks away the veggie garden was a little overgrown.  Cherry tomatoes everywhere, and as I carefully put in some stakes and tied branches back I discovered that the capsicum        plants had been buried underneath them.  Hopefully they will perk up now that they can come up for air.  I don't know why I have such trouble growing the large bulbous capsicums that you see in the store.  Oh yes I do!  They are capsicums on steroids or hormones or something!  My little organic ones are very tasty though!  Supermarket produce can give you such an unreal expectation of what your garden should produce.  Isn't that sad. they should be ashamed of themselves. My lettuces have essentially lain over and gone to sleep..... on long leggy stalks.  Anyway I planted some seeds and we will see what comes up.  Snow peas, lettuce, radish, silverbeet, green beans, gemsquash, amaranth.  Our ...

I keep hoping that the wet season is going to end soon, and over the weekend I tipped out a whole barrel of compost onto the vegetable garden, straightened up the eges, and planted some seeds.  Now I have a nice straight weed free path!  I cut back some of the branches of the pigeon peas (that should spread some nitrogen right into the soil.)  I planted gemsquash seeds on top of the mounds of compost, and then between the stems of the pigeon peas I planted some cucumber seeds.  I am hoping they will grow up the stems and after harvesting the pigeon peas I can cut the final leaves back to allow the sunlight in, while leaving the uprights as living stakes..  at the moment it is still a bit hot, so the light shade should be good for the litttle seedlings. I also have a couple of pawpaw trees that have sprung up in the very front, but I will leave them until I see if either of them are female - they dont like to be transplanted.  My eggplant seem to be a...