The garden evolves

| Chris Riley

Our garden continues to evolve. I’m not one of those people who can have a pristine lawn with concrete bordered gardens. I’ve had houses before that have had  immaculately bordered garden beds, and within a few months of moving in, out come the borders and the shape of the garden starts to change.

We’ve been in this house for two and a half years now. There’s been a lot to do, both inside and out, and I’m pleased to say stage one’s garden evolution is over, and we’re now moving onto stage two.

We went from the ugly orchid sheds that were here when we moved in, to native/cottage gardens, with a temporary gazebo.

The blue cottage garden is taking shape – I’ve waited more than 20 years to plant a blue plumbago and surround it with blue agapanthus – gorgeous when it all flowers together around Christmas time

The next big overhaul has now commenced. We’ve started on a shady fern garden outside our garden room (garage converted to man cave).

Shady fern garden will continue the green theme from the inside to the outside of our garden room/man cave

A Chinese Tallow tree has been planted to provide the shade, and the clothes line that was in that area has been removed. Paul has left a small frame from the clothes line for hanging baskets,  and we’ve placed a couple of potted palms around to get things started. The tallow tree will need a year or two’s growth before it’ll resemble our shady garden in Duncraig. But, hey, once begun, half done! And we’ve definitely begun!

Chinese Tallow has been planted. Now all we have to do is wait for it to grow
Eventually the tree will be strong enough to support hanging baskets – this photo was taken at our Duncraig house where we lived for 13 years (our record in any one house). We’re working towards having something similar again
The newly planted Chinese Tallow is near to our three Frangipanis. These two areas will eventually flow together with palms, ferns,  lush jasmine and hanging baskets.
Temporary gazebo will go. In its place productive vegetable gardens

We’re putting in three raised garden beds for rotational vegetable crops. Also planned is a smaller raised bed for asparagus along the fence line, and another one for strawberries. I think we’ll find some space for a few potted miniature fruit trees, and some blueberries too.

one raised garden bed partially filled with soil and manure – two to go yet. By the week-end we should be ready to start planting

Of course, one can’t have a successfully producing vege garden without a compost heap. I’m still on the look out for a spot to start my composting, and along with a compost heap will be a worm farm. The worm farm will be a bit different than the commercially purchased plastic worm farms. I can’t wait to get that going, and when the worms are successfully providing nourishment for the crops, I’ll be excited to show you the farm. Perhaps I’m a bit weird, but I love composting. Turning the slowly decaying vegetable matter regularly and watching as it turns into sweet smelling, rich loam, and then putting handfuls around struggling plants. To see a struggling plant almost instantly burst with vigour and renewed life when given a compost boost – what’s not to love about that.

Perhaps the best change coming though is a change to our side verandah. We’ve struggled with not having a patio that flows from our main living area, and have been trying to come up with an idea that’d work ever since we bought this house. A month or so ago Paul had a ‘light bulb’ moment. We’ve had the builder out, and yes it’s possible. We’re going to get steal beams engineered that’ll be fixed to, and run from the house, along the underside of the two metre wide verandah and continue another metre out to the fence line. The existing veranda posts will then be removed and moved out to join the engineered metal posts. This will give us a workable area of around 7 x 3 metres to play with, and there won’t be any posts in the way.

The posts are to be moved out to the fence line

It’s this wonderful idea that’s allowed all the other changes to take place. Now our side garden will meet our desire for an outdoor seating area, and our rear garden can be put to productive use. I’m so excited. What a pleasure it’s going to be picking our own sun ripened produce.

Oh, and before I finish this post, here’s a close up of a new water feature. I went walking with the ladies this morning and came home to this lovely surprise.

A lovely surprise to come home to after my walk this morning

Also thought I’d show you my orchid plant, still going strong after Alice presented me with it for mother’s day more than 25 years ago. This year it’s had five blooms so far. A way to go till it exceeds it’s record year of 17 blooms, but I’m working on it.

Still going strong after more than 25 years

22 thoughts on “The garden evolves”

    1. Thanks Kelly. We’ve only lived in this house 2 and 1/2 years and it was a mess when we moved in. It’ll take a while to mature yet. Blue salvia seems to be my go to plant to tie everything together. I’m going to try spray painting the spent flowers on my aggies in a couple of shades blue next season.

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      1. Your Blue Salvia is beautiful! Last year I dried a bunch of the Salvia.I love using Salvia in my crafts. Wishing you an awesome weekend!❤️️☺️❤️️

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  3. I am a fan of compost too. Returning everything back to the earth is a lovely way to complete the food cycle and replenish the earth in a natural way. Good luck with the worms. Can’t wait to see pics of you with handfuls of worms!! Lol! And that is one very neat and tidy man cave. I doubt that my hubby’s is going to look anything like that.

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  4. I am a fan of compost too. Returning everything back to the earth is a lovely way to complete the food cycle and replenish the earth in a natural way. Good luck with the worms. Can’t wait to see pics of you with handfuls of worms!! Lol!

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  5. Thank you for telling me about your garden! Isn’t it amazing how much produce you can get from such a small area? After years of gardening we have determined the raised beds are the easiest & best way to go. I am looking forward to May so we can start planting. Enjoy the rest of the weekend!💕

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    1. Thank you Diane. The fence is brushwood. They’re quite popular here, and we have a lot of peppermint trees (weeping eucalyptus)behind it. They look quite rustic together. You have been a big part of the inspiration for us trying to get some home produce going. Our garden is very small, but we’re managing to fit quite a lot on. Paul is building the third raised bed as I’m typing this…..

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    1. Thanks Marie. We’ve almost got two of the three main garden beds ready for planting, and the third should be ready by tonight. Should be able to get some plants in by the end of the week-end Then we’ll get the asparagus bed ready to start filling with compost and manure. I think the asparagus crowns come into the nurseries around July,so I’ll have till then to get the garden bed filled with good stuff.

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