Blue[green]berries, an unlikely flower and a curly problem...

I've just come in from an arm-buggering session mowing the grass.  I own a handmower partly because it's better for the environment (not using petrol or electricity), partly because I can't afford to get someone to regularly mow my lawns for me, and partly because it's a lot cheaper than a gym membership (that is, it's good exercise).  I haven't really needed to mow all winter, but now that it's spring, it seems to be a weekly calling, which a bugger 'cause i really don't like grass (and have evil plans afoot to kill it all...).

However, spring has also brought a few other surprises: the very unlikely flower that bloomed out of the otherwise unremarkable spikey plant has bloomed again (pictured above).  I don't know what it's called.

The blueberries are starting to form.  It's the first time I've ever seen blueberries that have not come from a plastic container,  so I'm pretty damn excited.  The particular plant variety pictured right is called 'Denise', but 'Brigitta' is also starting to produce.

As an experiment, I planted the two trees in different areas - Brigitta is in full sun in the front yard, and Denise is down the side of the house with partial sun, particularly in winter.  Now I know it's not a true experiment as they're different varieties; but because blueberries apparently like full sun, I just wanted to see what would happen.  Interestingly, Denise, who lost all her leaves in winter, has actually produced more flowers (and hence will produce more berries) than Brigitta, who retained a few of her leaves.  They're actually very beautiful bushes, with leaves that turned a lovely artichoke purple in autumn.  You can see a few of the white flowers that then turn into the berries in the picture.  The berries are still quite small and not ready for eating, but I suspect that I'm going to have to net them this weekend before the ruddy blackbirds cotton on.

Meanwhile, the artichokes are on super-productive-mega-drive.  I can't keep up with the sheer pace, particularly as the one plant seems to have divided over the 8 or so months I've had it, and so I have twice as many artichokes. I didn't realise until this morning, but the buds are forming all the way down the stem, not just at the top.  I had a few friends around last weekend and decided to see what they were like to BBQ.  I boiled the artichokes for about ten minutes, then halved them and BBQed them with some olive oil.  They're fantastically versatile vegetables once you get over the initial fear of cooking them.  Additionally, while people say 'oh you have to get out the choke', 'you can't eat the choke', I believe that's rubbish.  I eat the choke every time (and I've never choked...).

The strawberries that the crazy neighbour gave me last year, too late in the season to actually produce, have quadrupled in size and have the lovely white and yellow flowers that I'd be quite happy having in the garden even if they didn't produce fruit.

One thing that disappoints me however, is that my nectarine tree seems to have leaf curl.  This morning, I trotted off to the nursery that sold me the tree in August to get them to confirm the problem, and they seemed surprised that it had the problem so soon.  Apparently, there's not much I can do about it at the moment other than pull all the 'curled' leaves off and burn or tightly bag them and stick them in the bin to stop the spread of the fungal infection.  Then next winter I need to spray them with anti-fungal spray, and again as the tree's budding.   

Easter Weekend Gardening Part 1: the front yard

The distinctions between the vegie garden backyard and ornamental frontyard are slowly melting away.  Apparently the (now) old couple who built and lived in the house for 50 years had a deal where he would tend the vegie garden in the back and she would do the ornamentals and flowers in the front.  Of course, when I moved in the vegie patches were just bare earth with the exception of the rhubarb (oh and a lot of weeds!), however the front yard had a lot of cottage-gardeney kind of plants.  What's even more exciting are the bulbs that keep sprouting up.  Not a month's gone by without a new variety springing out of the soil, such as these brilliantly red flowering ones to the right and below (no extra points for the old daggy plastic edging though - I think that'll have to go).

Many people have advised me to live in my house for a year before planting so that I get to know about the weather, sun patterns and wind etc. to make informed choices, however, I was rearing to go.  However, the bulb thing is another reason to wait.  The ugly plastic fenced patch above, which is in an awkward position in the backyard, was first on my list to go when I moved in, yet 6 months later I'm enjoying the near constant changeover of bulbs.  These red ones are dying back now, and there are some pink budded ones just about to emerge.  It's kind of like bulb tag!

Anyhoo, my Easter weekend list had a lot of things on it, and gardening was not high on the list in terms of deadlines.  However, as gardening is a fantastic procrastination method, I actually got quite a lot of digging, planting, weeding and strategising done. 

Firstly I got myself a couple of tiny box hedges (left) in a first step to realising my life-long dream of creating a topiary of my dog.  I figure that my sculpture major should be utilised somehow.   I planted one in the front yard, and I think I'll put the other in the backyard, just in case I find that I get performance anxiety.   I was going to topiarise (?) my bay tree that I planted when I first moved in, however, they grow so slowly and I'm chomping at the bit here!

My other purchase was a large native that, according to the woman at the Hobart Farmers' Market, is apparently very good at screening out nosy neighbours, being sufficiently tall, bushy and quick growing.  I don't think she knew who she was up against, but I bought the Dodonaea Viscosa (or Hop Bush) anyway, and strategically placed it down the side outside my kitchen window behind the bay tree.  I do worry quite a bit about blocking light to other parts of my garden, however, there are some sacrifices you have to make...

At the New Town Station Nursery, I came across a large number of blueberry bushes.  Considering the number of punnets I go through each summer, I felt that their $20/bush price tag was relatively reasonable, so I bought two.  While varieties of plants usually have fairly abstract or esoteric names such as 'Tigerella' tomatoes, 'Cox's Orange Pippin' apples, or 'Good King Henry'; my selected blueberry bushes are called Brigitta and Denise.  I laughed when I saw the names, because only the night before I'd been drinking with two women by that name (one of whom is my PhD supervisor). As a result, the plants have become quite personified in my mind. 

I planted Denise, which is shorter bush growing to about 1.5 meters and which produces big fat berries, down the side of the house next to the pepperberry bush.  Apparently blueberries can deal with part shade to full sun, and while I'm a little concerned that Denise won't get enough, it'll be interesting to contrast it to the larger growing Brigitta who I planted in the comparatively very sunny front yard.

Denise (with a small Camelia in the b'ground)

My two other major tasks for the weekend were installing a watering system in the front yard to counter my laziness in watering, and fixing the front lawn and weeding around the f#@*ing roses (which I loathe but feel guilty about pulling out). 

I've never been much of a lawn fan.  I can put this down to a couple of reasons: a) I'm allergic to grass, b) I've lived in so many rental houses where the grass has been the bane of my existance - it's grown and I haven't had a mower, it's been weed infested, it hasn't been watered so it's died, it's been killed by overexuberant house parties etc. etc. 

Little wonder then that when I moved into this house, I planned to get rid of the lawn in favour of a front yard overgrown with plants and a fairy path down the middle. However, I think I'm coming round to the grass thing.  For one, I haven't enough money for all the plants in my fairy garden scheme; secondly I can see that perhaps it might provide a nice background to my future topiary (in a kitschy, Tim Burton kind of way). Plus the dog appreciates grass.  So my task for the weekend was to scrape off the mat of brown spikey weed seeds that had scared the grass away on the southern side of the lawn, so that I can plant some grass seed (while trying not to sneeze).  You can see the patch left behind in the image below; and the bags of weeds and seed in the image to the left.
 

The foggy bits in the photo are due to my watering system which I finally installed (woot!).  I should point out that strangely, it's cheaper to buy the bits for an entire Neta watering system than to buy a good hose.

The end of my epic post (but not on the weekend - vegie garden update still to come)