Recovery in the garden

It is now a week since those pesky little bugs invaded my garden and I am sure there are a few of you who are wondering just what sort of devastation is left behind. The pictures I will include in this post will show you that all is well. The dahlias and ground plants have made an amazing recovery - they are still producing flower buds and fresh leaves so I knew that I would not have to wait for very long before I saw an improvement. The crepe myrtle tree had a few little buds that avoided the jaws of the voracious beetles and have provided a faint tinge of colour to the almost stripped tree. This is what it looks like today.

I just wish that I could show you how wonderful it looked before the insects arrived. It was a mass of colour and you couldn't see many of the leaves. Never mind. at least the bugs did not arrive as early as they did a few years ago (they do not swarm like this every year, I have been living here 30 years and this is the third time they have come) That time the flowers had only just appeared and the tree was about a third of the size it is now. This time around we had enjoyed the flowers for about a week and it was when they were at their peak that the bugs arrived.
The dahlias - well I have pulled off the eaten leaves and cut off the dead heads so there is no evidence of their trauma left at all.

Two tubers of these dahlias were given to me by my next door neighbour four years ago and I have lifted them and planted them out each year after giving them time to rest and now I have hundreds of them - if you can see the slope of the path in the background of the top one of these two pictures (click on the photo to make it easier to see) you may be able to see plants beside the post and tree and bush - I have planted even more tubers down that edge of our block. They were planted much later so they will be flowering after these ones in the foreground have finished.
What happened to the rose?

The rose was pruned below the damaged area - it is on the right of this picture, at the front, it has since had two new flowers and you may be able to see the red new growth appearing just above my signature. So the rose has recovered too.
I did despair of my flowering gum. It certainly looked as if the bugs had climbed right inside the cups that hold the flowers and eaten everything - but one branch managed to escape the invaders - incredibly the swarm was in a distinct strip across the garden and some plants were totally unaffected while others were ruined (or so I thought.). Here is the surviving flowering branch of my gum tree (Eucalyptus).

So, with a lighter heart I wander around my garden - there is still the odd beetle to be seen but I am not one to use sprays and the birds and lizards and frogs and things are working hard to keep the garden looking good. We have recently added a huge white crane to the birds that check out my flowering part of the garden and I would imagine that he would eat plenty of bugs and nasties! He would stand as high as the shoulders of my seven year old granddaughter! What a magnificent creature!
AJ

Heartbreak in my garden

This morning when I was having breakfast out on the veranda - as I do every day - I gazed around from this high vantage point to admire the colour that is in my garden. My spoon dropped into my dish as I spied the crepe mytle. Beside the driveway the crepe mytle was in full bloom, better than it has ever been before - smothered with the deepest cherise coloured flowers. This morning it was brown! A layer of petals lay on the gravel below but not one petal remained on the tree. I left my breakfast and rushed down to take a closer look. Sure enough the flowers had all gone and there was no evidence as to why - until I looked down to the flowers below. Resting on all the green leaves were the culprits - small orange beetles (with very full tummies).
There is nothing to be done. There is no point spraying when the damage is done.
I walked across the drive to see if any of the flowers over there had been touched. This is what greeted me.

The first thing I noticed was one of my miniature roses - it has decided to be a large rose and has grown quite vigorously and now is about waist high but still with miniature roses on it. The grubs obviously like the sweet soft wood of the growing tip as well as the pretty roses. Click on the photos to see the damage more clearly.
Then I looked over at the big dahlias that are creating such a dramatic splash of colour in the garden and they too look a real mess. Here are a couple of photos of two of them - I wont upset you by telling you how many flowers are like this.

I was so mad that I went inside and grabbed a can of flying insect spray and sprayed the flower heads. One squirt made the outside insects drop straight away and twice as many that were deep in the petals came crawling out to escape. I know that I am not solving the problem at all - there are more insects in the trees and grass and the entire garden but I took real pleasure in attacking these ones! I do not normally use any insecticides on my garden - I rely on nature to provide the control so I have plenty of birds, insects and lizards and spiders and so on that do no harm at all and I do not want to destroy them. I shall be back outside tomorrow with a pair of secateurs to cut off all the dead flowers to make sure that they do not continue to poison the insects!
Just before dark I decided to take a look at another part of the garden - I remembered that there was a small crepe myrtle that I had grown from a cutting of the first one by the drive. Sure enough, no petals on that - but the horrible little invaders were smothering the leaves so I just had to call out the rest of the family to come and take a look. I dashed inside for the camera but had to use flash since it was almost dark. Take a look at these beasties.

They were as thick as this throughout the garden - so you can see how pointless it would be for me to try and spray them all! I hope that they do not stay very long now they have cleaned my garden - do you realise that they have even started eating the geranium flowers?
I had a sudden thought. What about my pink flowering gum? I looked up. NO! They had eaten those too.

The bugs are still inside the cups of the flowers so by morning there will be no colour left on the tree at all. So now I am feeling very sad. I put all this effort into creating colour and what do I do? I attract not only the birds that enjoy the nectar in them but the horrible little creatures that destroy everything in their path. My garden will look like everyone else's by morning. Just green. Sigh.....
AJ

An old place with a face lift

Every large town has a water supply and that water supply is also a place where the public are encouraged to visit and to picnic. Our water reservoir has been closed to the public for two years while the dam wall was raised to more than double the capacity of water that the dam would hold. Just before Christmas the construction workers packed their machinery onto trucks and the finished project was opened to the public.

Two days after Christmas and only a week since the gates were opened to the public, Colin and I took my new  little car (a red Toyota Corolla) for a run. I packed a picnic hamper and filled the large thermos flask and with the skies blue - for a change - we drove through the lush countryside to visit the Hinze Dam. We really expected for there to be crowds of people there when we arrived but to our surprise there were only two cars in the large car park beside the picnic tables and when we drove on to visit the Information Centre there were only about twenty cars up there.

This is the view over the dam from the Information Centre. This particular area contains tables and chairs for those wishing to sit and have coffee or lunch here. Below the fence is a series of paths through lawns and areas planted with sedge plants (they are the darker green nearest to the fence).

There is yet another room to the right of this picture that has a huge glass-less window that also looks out over this scene and it is called "the Function Room" and it is where groups of people can meet and do whatever is planned for them (!) It is a very striking location for a meeting.

This was the view of the spillway that we saw when we first arrived at the Hinze Dam. When the dam is full and running over it would be a wonderful sight to see. You can tell from this picture that new vegetation has been planted, in fact there is new vegetation all around the picnic grounds too so once that is all established the place will look quite stunning - I know! It looks pretty good already!

Looking down on the spillway you can imagine just how dramatic the water will look when running down this at speed! There are so many different obstructions that will break the flow and create amazing spray and turbulence that I just can't wait for the dam to fill and for the spillway to be used!

We have some wonderful things to see so close to home!
AJ

More on Sovereign Islands

"Money can't buy you happiness" is how the old adage goes - but it certainly helps! The home we visited yesterday on Sovereign Islands looks tiny in comparison to the one across the road from it and yet it has the same number of bedrooms.

As I pointed out, each and every home on the Sovereign Islands is individual. There is not one home that you would be able to purchase here under three million dollars and any vacant land (such as next to this home) is eagerly snatched up and before too long the security fences go up and the construction of a new masterpiece is begun. Each house block faces water. This home faces a man made canal which means it is a safe anchorage for a very large boat - each home has its own pontoon.
This particular house has four levels, garages and offices being on the lowest level and then three levels of living and entertainment. It is fabulous! This home is not too big for the people who live here - there are people coming and going all the time and I haven't met anyone so willing to offer a bed to friends as these people. They live life to the fullest and they enjoy sharing it.
When I return home the contrast between my lifestyle and expectations and theirs really hits me - but I am happy with my situation and love my "country" home!
AJ

Amazing Gold Coast

Christmas and all it entails is now quietly slipping into the past and once again normal life can resume.
Desperate to get out and about Colin and I hopped into the car to go and visit family that live at the Northern end of the Gold Coast. The area in which they live is reclaimed land - land which used to be sand at the bottom of the sheltered patch of briny between South Stradbroke Island and the mainland. A series of islands was created and a covenant ensured that only homes with a huge price tag for their constructions were permitted. As a result the islands are home to some of the most amazing mansions you could hope to see. Some are beautiful, many are unusual, some have multiple garages for dozens of vehicles but all are magnificent.
I just had to stop and take a photograph of one of the homes that is still under construction. If you click on the picture to see it larger you will see evidence of the builder's activity in front of the main entrance. While most of the homes on the Sovereign Islands are huge, this one manages to dwarf most of them.

The house covers four house blocks. This is not really the front of the building - this is the part that faces the street, the front of the house faces the waterway known as the Broadwater. Only a regular sized family lives in this amazing mansion - a couple with two children. They may be regular sized but they certainly cannot be called a "regular family"!
If the outside of the home looks this grand I suspect that when finished the interior will be breath taking. I doubt very much if I shall ever get the opportunity to see the inside or even the front of this home but I can hope!
AJ

More colour from my patch of garden

I must be doing something right this year! My garden is really rewarding me with colour. I suspect it is my industrious husband's doing - he is out every single day with the hose, watering my seedlings and providing me with trailer loads of new soil. Tomorrow we are off to see if we can purchase some sugar cane mulch direct from the farm! My garden is really "spoilt"! I think it gets more attention than we do!

Number one picture is another look at my pretty multicoloured Tibouchina mutabilis. With these blooms all close together you can see how they change from white to a stronger pink colour. I prune this bush back once it has finished flowering and that keeps it from getting too big but better than that it develops more flower branches for the next year. Last year this bush was quite open but this year is more dense. Next year it should be even better.

The Agapanthus are out! They really are a majestic plant with their strappy green leaves and tall stems with big heads of blue on the top - they are such a contrast to most things in my garden which seem to be various shades of pink! I suppose I will have to dig some of them out after their flowering is over - they have multiplied so that they take up quite a bit of room. I wont be throwing them away though, when I lift them I shall plant them down the side of the driveway that goes down to the shed in the back. They wont mind being in the shade of trees and come November we shall be rewarded with a fantastic display of blue!

I have only one white Agapanthus and it is a little slower to open than the blue, It also looks a bit lonely but it will have "pups" so that I will have two or three plants next year.

The best bit of all is kept til last - the daylilies start showing off in November! I have about eight different daylilies and, like the agapanthus, they have pups that give me new plants every year so I have clumps of daylilies all through the garden ranging from single buttercup yellow to deep red that is almost brown. I love daylilies and have visited daylily farms - this is where some of my plants were purchased. I have a gorgeous one that a friend brought for me from a holiday and another that I bought from a gardener who had a stall on the side of the road! I will share some more of their beauty with you another time.
Dont forget that to see the pictures larger, click on them!
AJ

Yellow flower

Thanks to Jenny in Western Australia I now have a name for my bright and cheerful yellow flowers!

So for those of you who are curious, this yellow daisy is Coreopsis, It multiplies quite well and can be pulled apart easily and spread around. I started with only a punnet of seedlings so all these plants in one garden plus the plants in the next picture, in an adjacent garden are from those original six. I have not found it to be weed-like. It does not spread wildly appearing all through the garden unexpectedly - plus it is fairly shallow rooted and really easy to pull out should the plants become too numerous.

A friend gave me the pretty flowering shrub (lots of the plants in my garden have a story!). I was told it would be a white Tobouchina but, as you can see it is not completely white. The new flowers are white with pink on the back of the petals and as the days pass that colour appears on the white front of the petals. Because the colours mutate the plant has been called "Tibouchina mutabilis" Which, for me, makes remembering the name so much easier! This same friend gave me four different cuttings from his white Tibouchina but not one of them turned out to be white. The other three are deep purple. The purple variety is known as "Tibouchina austenville" and is the most common of the varieties seen around this area. it will be a few months before the third variety in my garden comes into bloom again. It is a pretty pink colour that does not mutate. The flowers are rather tatty when seen closely but the show created by the masses of flowers makes up for that.
(Click on a picture and you will see it larger, then click on the "back" button to return to the blog)
AJ