Africanaussie

The hot and humid wet season seems to suit the tropical flowers much better than  it suites me. I still gaze in awe at the fact that the Anthirium is one of my most carefree plants.   From one plant gifted by a friend years ago when I was first starting my garden, I now have a forest!  I have also passed on multiple plants to other gardeners, so it is a gift that keeps on giving.   There is also a forest of red ginger - so reliable. Way in the back corner are one of my favourite tropical heleconias - the sexy pink lady.  Once each stem has flowered it will die, so I need to get out there and cut back the dead stalks. That way the flowers can be the centre of the show again. Theese beehive gingers seem to be playing peek a boo against the side fence.  They are tucked away behind the fan palms. This has been one of the driest wet seasons I have ever known.  Last week there was a cyclone to the northwest of us and...

I have been avoiding facing up to the weeds out in the veggie patch.  The more you avoid them the more rampant they become so this weekend I made weeding a priority.  As I go through the beds I throw the weeds onto my weed mat paths.  Once done, I simply turn the weed mat over and voila!  the weeds are gone :)  Making weed tea attracts mosquitos in this climate, and yet I dont want to throw anything that comes out of my garden away.  doesnt it look nice  and clean now?  I also moved one of the worm bins into a more accessible area, right here in the asparagus bed.  This one has a bucket on top with fresh yummy veggies to entice the worms to move up.  That will leave the castings in the lower bucket that I can add to plants that need an extra boost.  I think the lime tree might need some boosting.  Not sure what is going on -one of the branches has started dying and there are these white spots all over the dying branch. ...

We are hanging on here, enduring the heat and humidity, while watching an approaching cyclone.

As the heat and humidity increases so the tropical flowers really flout their colours....  this is the time of year when I wonder if I have really planted too many plants too closely together in my small garden.   Actually I know I have, as I am continually giving extras away!  This roheo edge needs to be thinned out yet again...  The ground orchids love this time of year, and I am glad to see the darker pink ones have come up again.  I couldn't resist this plant at the market the other day - the red flowers are slowly starting to open up. I am not sure how big it gets, but just loved the pop of color it provides.  Isn't it strange the way the flowers pop out from between the leaves.  Anyone know what this is? One of my orchids has also started to flower - lots of little flowers that remind me of poached eggs. I guess I am thinking of poached eggs because I have been harvesting lots of yummy asparagus....

This week there have been a few days of sunshine and I noticed my personal solar panels are charged up and I am ready to go!  I do hope that the wet season is finally over.  I clipped and pruned and yanked and finally got rid of the pink bouganvilla.  The flowers were pretty but it was far too aggressive for that little corner.  I know, I know lots of  people warned me!  there is still one peach colored bouganvilla there, but I don't think it is quite as aggressive.  I will be keeping an eye out.    Slowly the flowers will shed the weight of the water of the wet season  their heads will no longer bow down with the weight of the water on their shoulders I don't believe I have shown you the view out from the big gate - the little garden in the center is filling in nicely.  I wont show you a close photo right now though, as a lot of that filling in is with weeds....  OK reall...

I had a four day weekend (I know, I love that fact that we have so many public holidays in Australia :)  I took my MIL to church at my favourite little church in Port Douglas for the Easter service,  You look out at the ocean through big glass windows behind the altar.  It sometimes can be hard to concentrate....  but we were drenched by the time we got home.  this is what happens when I walk outside.... some of the plants are very happy though- the anthirium just loves all the rain.. And so do the ground orchids... and even the pigeon pea are flowering, although they do seem to be dropping off a lot of their leaves which are turning yellow.  I dont know if they do that before the peas form, or if it just because of all the rain and no sunshine. They are such beautiful flowers right now we have had two hours without rain, I have put some washing on the line and hope that this really is the end of the wet season. 

OH I do love to order new plants! I found out that asparagus grows well in this area, so went online and ordered 4 two year corms which should start bearing this year and then got some seeds for some "black" asparagus which will take a couple of years. I have to now make a bed for them since it is going to be a permanent perennial bed. I will pick up some chicken manure pellets on the way home, hubby is not keen on eating vegetables that have been near any other kind of manure. Since he is going to be eating half the vegetables..... he said chicken manure is OK. I also do have some lovely compost. The other seeds I ordered are for angled luffa . This plant, you can eat the young vegetables like zucchini , but if you leave them to dry on the vine will make loofahs ! How cool! Both of these should go into the ground before the wet, so I only have about a month until that starts to happen. I wanted to grow something in the wet - most gardeners here just stop growing anything f...