From the garden rounds today...

🍁 Autumn encroaches, not so much in the weather which mostly has been glorious. But the plants know. The bees know. The butterflies know. I am grieving my Summer garden already.

🐝 The borage has finished its long flowering, and the bees mostly follow their departure. Both the borage and the bees have been delightful for the 2nd half of summer. SO MANY bees I often had my head in amongst them as I watched them endlessly.

🐞 Also, the other day I saw a Two-banded Wasp Hoverfly. Very exciting. VERY exciting.

🦋 and not so many Wanderer butterflies now. But budleja has finished their flowering now, and so depart the most graceful of butterflies.

🏡 It was the most beautiful and diverse Summer vegetable garden ever, and I will miss it. 😢

💮 But on to Autumn. I have planted a lantana in a huge pot with a couple of other plants (one bee-attracting white flowers, one pink one from another pot that I accidentally brok the other day). I am ready for lantana flowering season (@nessaUndreza@ox.social)

🌳 The quinces are coming along fiiiiiine, and I am so please. I don't know how to tell when they are ripe - it will be a bit of guesswork.

🍅 And oh, the tomatoes, zukes and eggplants keep on giving. I never knew I could eat so many and not get sick of them. I was going to juice some tomatoes and freeze the juice (good for soup) but then I saw a fav baked tomato sauce (divine) and a tomato, eggplant and gochujang dish.

#FromTheGarden #gardeningAU #gardening #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

🧵/2
From the garden rounds today

💮 The diosma has some tiny pink flowers on it. When it flowers it looks gorgeous.

🧡 The oval cumquat is just about to flower! I am so glad. It had flowers in early Jan but none set. Weird that it is flowering again, but I have come to expect that from my cumquat plants (ie weird flowering times).

🌱 The MORINGA aka drumstick tree is still doing well despite being planted just before the extreme heat wave. 💃 🎈 :toot:

😿 The mallee tree across the road that lost a large branch in Spring when it was flowering, looks like it is dying. Lots of die-back, leaf loss.... And I still have a dried small branch with flowers from the tree in spring, adorning one of the tables... It will be sad to lose that tree - and the birds that love it.

🍚 The aroma of basmati rice cooking - making a pilaf tonight featuring a lot of the produce picked from the garden this morning. Lots of peas, herbs, tomatoes, greens, zukes and other.

#gardeningAU #gardening #FromTheGarden #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

@feather1952 PS, my garden is lovely in the micro and I get a lot of joy from that. In the macro, not so much. Most of it is still untouched from the almost dirty-dusty blank canvas I inherited, plus it is large and what is there doesn't get as much attention as it would love. I make sure the veg garden is producing and that there is a wide variety of small life there. The rest waits for my time - even tho I constantly send it love and patience from my heart.

Weeds are starting to grow now we are heading into Autumn! 😭

#BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

From the garden rounds this morning

🦉 There is a new bird visiting our garden, with a gorgeous loud, shrill'ish cry. I can't quite catch it yet to try and identify it.

🦉 The owl was back last night 😍

🦉 The magpies are carolling with happiness this morning.

🥕 It is veggie picking day - when I look around the veg garden for overlooked, ready for picking veggies. As well as picking some for the next few days or so. Tons of eggplants this morning, spring onions, tomatoes, basil, tarragon, tulsi, sweet mace. Zucchini, parsley, chillies, salad greens and lettuces, greek oregano, peas, makrut lime. Possibly more hidden at the bottom of the basket - it is taken up mostly with eggplants.

🕸️ (Mention of 🕷️ - you might want to skip the rest.) My kitchen window looks at next door's front door. Even with a high fence I had erected, I can still see the top third of their door and verandah #hilly There are often small webs that I can see on the verandah and recently 1 gum leaf was hanging on a thread, dangling down, tousled by the wind like a Japanese wind chime.

Recently a spider decided to display its best work with an enormous and magnificent circular web across the front of their verandah. What made it so exceptional was the strong winds meant that lots of leaves got caught in the web, as well as what looked like cat fur that outlined parts of it.

Honestly it was the best piece of modern art I have seen for a long time. #exhibition

#gardeningAU #gardening #FromTheGarden #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

@NessaUndreza I checked the 3 lots of Harlequins/4 O'Clocks this morning - 2 are closed (front and West side, 1 lot have open flowers (back garden). To be fair, the ones at the front have been knocked around a lot by the heat. Here are ones from the back.

There is a lot of yellow in the flowers this year - last year not so much.

#GardeningAU #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds #FromTheGarden

@feather1952

Thank you Heather. I see the beauty in it, but it is a work in progress, begun from nothing and a few hardy plants. I focus on the veg garden and do the rest when I have time. The soil is not that conducive to good growth and I have to contend with gum trees in the garden. But it is truly #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds in my eyes.

I am opposite to you - I love gardening in the warm months and dislike it in Winter.

There are some melons also called paddy melons that are poisonous. The prickly ones are not edible. You have to know your paddies!! 🤣🤣

@caity

@tasdevilsrgr8 - it is always #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds at my place. Others might not see the beauty, but I do.

Yes, bog sage can be difficult to grow well - this year it is doing really well and that might have been the very wet winter that we had.

The other type is larger, paler and less ruffled. These are the ones I have a particular affection for. The female flowers fold themselves around a developing eggplant and cradle it until it gradually emerges from the bottom of the flower.

I couldn't photograph one well on the bush.

So I've identified the male ones, and will pick one tomorrow to show you a better pic.

They are both globe type eggplants, btw.

( @Mallulady )

#FromTheGarden #gardeningAU #gardening #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

After the garden roundup this morning I noticed that I have 2 different flowers on the eggplants!

Here is one - the smaller of the 2 flower types, and the more deeply lavender in colour.

The flowers usually hang down but 2 on this plant are supported by leaves.

#FromTheGarden #gardeningAU #gardening #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

In the garden roundup this morning - everything is looking good, ready for the heat coming this week.

The up-potted plants are all doing well.

I watched 2 spiders, in different places, that are sitting in webs in a part of the garden I am currently not walking/working in.

The small dwarf bright pink oleander in the front garden is covered with flowers, and sits underneath a dark blue flowering plumbego. Gorgeous!

Eggplants grow and mature faster than tomatoes, at least in my garden.

I've said it before, and will say it again - eggplant flowers are simply gorgeous.

#FromTheGarden #gardeningAU #gardening #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

@MelMScow

Thank you - It definitely is wondrous. But not beautiful, yet. It was pretty much a blank slate a few years ago, with a few hardy things here and there. I do what I can, and prioritise the food-growing aspect. A lot of it is still bare earth, waiting for inspiration. I call it #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

You find beauty and wonder if you look for it, where ever you are.

I love that we can still potter in the garden at 9pm. I pruned most of the the bougainvillea shoots (oh those thorns!) and potted up an oleander after watering and adjusting netting/shadecloth.

I am beginning to think about which fruit trees to plant next spring. I can never make up my mind. Decisions, decisions. Whether to go for edible (I love home grown apricots, avocado, ...) or beauty (feijoa, crab apple, prunus plum)

There will be a pomegranate.

#BeautyAmongstTheWeeds #FromTheGarden #gardeningAu

@zutalorz

Thank you! I call it #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

Most times there are more weeds than plants, and a lot of work to do - far too much for me to keep up with. It is not a showcase garden by any means.

Here I just focus on the good things in the garden.

Pottering around in the garden, arranging the shelves I got from Buy Nothing yesterday. Weeding around the citrus pots. Being grateful that Brahmi pops up every year even tho it gets covered with weeds over winter.

Set up some soaker hoses in the veg garden for efficient watering.

Something is nibbling the tops of the tomato plants, strawberry plants and surprisingly the Greek Oregano (but not the ordinary oregano or the marjoram). Just the tops. I think it is the possums. So I am considering my options with netting and also I have some frames that I can criss-cross garden twine around. In the past I've learnt that Possums are not keen on negotiating barriers. It'll be a job for this week.

Peas are popping up everywhere!

Nasturtiums went berserk over winter and the yard was covered in bright red, yellow and orange flowers! Stunning. Now to pull them out of the orange tree....

#FromTheGarden #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds #gardening

@t4ms

Happy New Year!

I am about to spend an hour in the garden before it gets too hot. Lots of work to do. Today i am going to get the thyme and sage pruned (oh the aromas), some fennel flower cut for drying, and weeding, always weeding.

#BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

Golden diosmas pruned, the 40yr old rosemary pruned, the younger rosemary bushes too. The front yard is perfumed pleasantly.

#gardening #FromTheGarden #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds

Another chilli picked this morning. Two plants have weathered the winter, which is a bonus, and are flowering well. I still have lots from last year in the freezer and wasn't going to plant any this year.

More removing of flowering stalks of red and green "greens" - 3m tall! They are now mulching another part of the garden and no doubt new plants will pop up there.

The Comfrey is HUGE and flowering - a gorgeous edition to the garden and never fails to emerge each year. Borage plants are popping up so I've removed the straggly ones.

Eggplant plants have survived the winter and growing well - these plants are the toughest of the tough - this is their third year. Globe shaped, and long, thin ones.

The round cumquats are flowering.

#FromTheGarden #BeautyAmongstTheWeeds #gardening #vegetableGarden