Water, weeds, wind, roses...
Water, weeds, wind, roses, and beautiful summer sunshine - these are some of the ingredients of the Moosey January garden. There are just a few more days left in January to stir the gardening pot!
Compassion Rose
Sunday 29th January
I love mass plantings of Renga Renga! These rock lilies grow happily in the driest of dry, dry shade - and have the generosity to create seedlings for further planting. Right now I am busy increasing my Renga Renga drifts by the Hen House - I have a bucket of newly broken-up plants, in water, waiting to be planted. Have I ever complained about the Renga Renga look? I hope not, for, unlike my swathes of scruffy iris confusa, Renga Renga really 'does the biz'!
So after animal feeding and dog-bicycling I'm headed back into the Hen House garden to lovingly install all the extra Renga Renga plants, curving around the edge of the path. It takes time to be a budget mass-planter, if you know what I mean, but this New Zealand native makes one feel thrifty and sensible, without having to wait ten years. Nice feeling!
World Garden Tour
Talking about thrifty and sensible, the plane bookings for my Scary Grand World Garden Tour are to be finalised and booked - tomorrow. Apart from puzzled non-gardening partner (who read about my travel plans in my journal - oops, I'm sure I'd told him!) none of my friends or relations are surprised with this radical, random plan.
Weeding in London?
I will take a dictaphone, journal notebooks, and my camera, and try really hard to be a responsible world garden reporter. Actually, I thought a London 'weeding' could be the jewel in the crown - hee hee... Enough! Rusty and the cats are all waiting for breakfast. The fridge-opening talents of the Big Moosey Mother Animal are required.
Feeding Time in the Moosey Kitchen
Much Later...
To get to the Moosey Hen House one can travel through the Pond Paddock archway, past the pond and through the Wattle Woods. One comes out at Rooster Bridge, surrounded by giant Gunnera, ferns, and of course the sounds of burbling water. There, nestled in the Pittosporums underneath the big gum trees, is the sadly henless, extremely rustic Moosey Hen House. Standing on the bridge one would be able to see a yellow plastic bucket full of Renga Renga, a bag of old potting mix, and hear a handy hose going nearby.
Naturally, one might see various gardening jobs en route to the Hen House, and decide to stop and sort things out then and there. Dropped leaves from the Cordyline making a mess in the Hosta garden, the small pond garden full of sprouting tree suckers, that sort of thing. Then on the way through the Wattle Woods, why not spend a little time raking? Oops - a spiky flax has got too big for the path - why not totally re-route the path? Let it wind between two Hebes and around the back of the gum tree. Excellent idea! Clear the surface, shift the stones, rake the surrounding soil to make things look even - done!
Yellow Wave Flax :- This flax hybrid pops up in a lot of my garden borders.
And why not widen the side garden so the two Yellow Wave flaxes don't get chopped up by the lawn mower? Great idea! Get the shovel, dig furiously - there are still some small shoots of the ground-cover Hypericum (invasive, removed) visible, Dig them out! Heave! Pull!
So there was much digging, raking, weeding, clearing, and altering of paths - five hours work, keeping sensibly in the shade, and never quite making it to the Hen House! Oops! The Renga Renga will have to wait until tomorrow!
Most Valuable Pet Competition
Aargh! Every time I mention Rooster Bridge the Moosey ex-poultry score points in the MVP (Most Valuable Pet Competition). How long is this silly contest going to run? Who is voting for big old Ginger, and Lucky Puss? Family - are you out there? I am pleased to report that the cats, kittens and dog have finished their course of ringworm treatment, and we are all extremely healthy. Beige Puss and Fluff-Fluff are now totally at ease in most of the house gardens, and Tiger has reinvented herself as a (big, fat) kitten-companion. Rusty needs a points deduction for gross dog-behaviour - depositing a large, dead rabbit on the grass under the Pond Paddock archway, resulting in girlie screams and old-lady wobbles...
The Weigh-In
Monday 30th January
Aargh! Tomorrow's Hen House gardener has slept in, leaping out of sleepy confusion to feed animals and wave to departing non-gardening partner - no gardening preparation done as yet. That's the half hour spent in bed planning and plotting, pre-first-cup-of-tea. By mid-first-cup-of-tea the gardening day usually has some shape and substance, and by the time the tea is drunk it should be blooming merrily. Maybe the Elusive Manly Garden Help will arrive later and shock me into action (in other words, ask pertinent questions as to which garden tasks I'd like done, the answers to which I haven't a clue about).
Oh well - perhaps a bicycle ride with Rusty around the longest country block in the West Melton world will wake up the mind. Then I could take the new kittens for a walk/tree-climbing photography shoot... And then I could drive off and meet my gardening friend somewhere for a chatty coffee... We could swap gardening magazines and compare our world travel plans(she's going to Vienna later this year).
Later...
Right. It's been a very hot day. After dog-exercise I trimmed the shrubs by the Laundry Garden - the good natured Hypericum which seems to regrow and flower no matter what I do to it, and a rather horrible spiky tree. Then I went off via the travel agent to the Botanic Gardens in town, with thoughts of practising on my home turf, before being let loose with dictaphone and camera in the famous gardens of the world! Well, make no mistake - I am still not very good at it!
Tuesday 31st January
Eek! It's lunchtime and I've done no gardening yet. I have to clear up my tree-pruning rubbish, and put the hoses on. I should have started hours ago!
Later...
I weeded the vegetable garden, dug up some spuds and carrots, and yes - I cleaned up the tree rubbish. The wind has changed direction to southerly - perhaps it will rain! Overnight rain would be nice.