Garden Friendships and a bit of swearing

 It is wonderful to have garden friends who understand what you do in the garden and even better when they garden along side you. 

Recently my friend Chris and I were offered some gardening jobs . Not your twee suburban gardens where you do a little snipping , weeding and primping but more the over grown acerage. 2 plus acres .

Naturally the inital response as you drive in is Holy cow !, what happened here? . Has there even been a mower or a whipper snipper near the place? Then on closer look is  Oh F ! thats a weed, thats all weeds, thats a camphorlaurel , a chinese elm and we havent even got out of the car. 

We like a challenge and for me it beats going to a gym any day. 

Neither of us is afraid of hard work and seeing a visible difference is both rewarding and daunting at the same time. We may have a job for life. 

The first step is to not tackle everything at once . We take a walk around and decide where we will start . Sight line from the house , a very bad weedy area  or something the owner has expressed concerns about may become the priority. Also being able to move from sunny spots to shade as we are hitting the summer temperatures. 

The second step is to simplify the gardens as the owners are not really gardeners and you really can have too many garden beds to look after. It is hoped that with a bit of planning the garden s can be tamed and manageable but in our climate everything grows at a great rate and needs pretty constant upkeep. 

This morning we started early and tackled the border alonmg a retaining wall . Huge clumps of salvia, bush basil , ornamental grasses have been dealt with . We emerge from the undergrowth a sweaty dirty mess desperate for water like we have been on a Safari . Chuck all the tools in the car and head for home. 

 

     

The Collectors Paradise .Dahlias proudly on display at Gympie .The collectors garden is the pinnacle on that very human desire to assemble collections of objects,name them ,put them in order and plan for the next acquistion . It may be stamps, beer cans, Rolls Royce motor cars or Dahlias. Whatever the object of desire the process seems the same .

When it comes to the plant collector , who doesnt eagerly await a glossy calalogue . For hundreds of years these nursery brochures have offered cultivars of plants,bulbs and seeds lusciously illustrated.Sadly these catalogues came from Southern nurseries and most of the plants would shrivel and fail in our climate .

The Queesland climate has it's benifits . In my grandfathers garden in suburban Brisbane gladioli plants were grown and cut flowers sold to Perrots Florist in the city . The bulbs were lifted and stored in a cool room at the end of the season . When we have visited single genus plant collectors the special needs of their precios specimins will dominate the scene .

Our sub tropical climate is ideal for so many interesting and rewarding plants and I have long since ceased to grow plants that have fussy needs and are better off some where else. I want hardy plants that can cope with dry periods or flooding rain and a garden that has no back up irrigation system .