A sea folly and other things

| Chris Riley

I’ve developed a bit of fondness for succulents. Whilst I was researching them last year I came upon a Succulent fairy garden built into broken terracotta pots. I decided to have a go at building one, only instead of a fairy garden I would follow my general decor theme of eclectic/coastal. Here’s what developed.

We already had the knarley old fisherman/lighthouse keeper statue (hard to see, but he’s to the left of the top white pot). We found his little home-made pottery cottage on line, and the light house, fish, and other coastal bits we picked up here and there. The big broken pot came courtesy of Bunnings. It was all a bit of fun. I’m not sure how long I’ll keep it, I guess for as long as it doesn’t look scraggly.

Here’s a few other things from around our garden.

A potted almond tree with three almond trees grafted onto the same trunk for self pollination. This is only the second season and already it’s bearing nuts.

A spiral succulent – mine is the one on the left. They have to get quite big to spiral properly. The one on the right shows how I’m hoping it will look as it matures. It’s been in about a year, and is just starting to get the spiral effect going.

Don’t ask what this tidy little creeper is behind one of our water features. It’s in a place that suffers from too much heat in the summer, and too much shade in the winter, so it’s hard to find things that will grow there. This one is from Bunnings, and doesn’t bear up well to close inspection. Our seating area is a few metres away, not close enough to spot the trashy reality easily. Perhaps I’ll just think of it as another folly.

And last but not least, my bed of asparagus. This was planted after reading a fabulously inspiring book called, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. If you haven’t read it, I would recommend highly. This is the second season since I planted the asparagus, so I have to wait one more year before I start to pick any. Then I should get more than ten years out of it – a definite indication of permanency.

And won’t it just be a pleasure to be picking our own home grown asparagus.

10 thoughts on “A sea folly and other things”

  1. Oh Chris, you’ve given me inspiration. I see some beautiful Broome rocks in there too. Over the years I’ve collected rocks from all over and they go into a small courtyard. Weeding out there is now a delight as I try to guess where the specimens are from.

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    1. We came back with quite a pile of Broome rocks this year. I’ve put the bigger ones in my big succulent garden. I thought it was heaps, but in the garden it looks like hardly any. Guess I’m just going to have pillage the beaches a little bit more!

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  3. I say, Chris – that spiral cactus is a bloody bee-yooty !! I now have to source one down here, for a friend who is developing a succulent spot, too ..

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