Tag: gardening #writerwhogardens

SoS 12/12/20

December 12, 2020

It’s been an horrendous couple of weeks with the seasonal equinoxial gales. We live at 42 degrees south latitude, commonly known as the Roaring Forties, so gardening has been something we’ve done only if we really really have to. Best to stay indoors or find a stretch of the coast under the shelter of cliff.

Our house painter says the winds make him melancholy, the teachers all say the pupils develop a kind of madness; our Jack Russell certainly does. I have a balance issue and so the sound-buffeting and the visual disturbance of trees waving and gyrating can bring on an attack of vertigo. But the gales are abating now and I’m in clean-up mode. Masses of whippy branches from the two willows, cossetting the gardens with as much water as possible and starting to shovel mulch all around after much water, so that summer doesn’t dry everything out.

Here’s my lot for this week:

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SoS 14/11/20

November 14, 2020

I haven’t been able to post for a bit as I had no computer for a week and…

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SoS 23/2/19

February 23, 2019

This summer is so dry. We had slightly mad rain burst about 3 weeks ago and since then, nothing. The only bonus is that the weather is cooler and tonight, it has the chill evening feel of approaching autumn. But the truth is the garden is tired. There are few flowers and very little colour.

The vegetable garden still gives most generously on a daily basis and we continue to eat very well. Not missing meat at all. We have yet to pick Beurre Bosc pears, Sturmer and Granny Smith apples, and quinces.

So what do I have to show in the borders, if anything?

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Six on Saturday 25/11

November 24, 2018

It’s actually Sunday here in Oz and it’s been an awful week weather-wise, so I despaired of having anything to offer. But then I sat and watched Netflix last night  – seasons of Big Dreams Small Spaces with Monty Don.

The Don is my hero  – his quiet honesty, his raging enthusiasm for things he loves, his faceted depths and what appears to be gentle humility. Anyway, suffice to say that when he went to Wales to help two young chaps create their vision in the worst weather – rain, more rain and wind – I thought’ Oh what the hell…’ and went out to take a few pics.

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Six On Saturday 20/10/18

October 20, 2018

I haven’t been part of Six on Saturday for very long but it’s fairly obvious I’m growing a white garden. For many, I daresay white can be boring, but this evening, my husband and I walked in the gate from a dog-walk and the whites and ivories glowed like moonbeams. They provide their own sort of luminescence and in fact for me, it’s a kind of secretive garden at night – pearly light leading me on.

But guess what? I do have colour! Some of the plants have little backstories and it’s that which allows them to take their part in my white garden.

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