boy it's cold

howdy all gardeners, well it's still cold, and we're having the most bizarre weather, along with a whole year or more of bizarre natural disaster events, so the world is rumbling for sure. There has been snow up here, and up in Helensville (the closest town), and even as far as Dargaville, home of the Kumara, in the "Winterless' North - not any more apparently! It's the first time Auckland has had snow since 1939, long before my time, another weather record broken.

Here are some photos of the garden, when it was still warm and sunny. They cheered me up, and I remembered just how much hard work and love I have put into this little plot. Winter has been very slow, with little opportunity to work outside - if it's not pouring with rain, it's blowing a gale and throwing down hail, and lately all three! It's nice to look back on sunnier, more productive times, whilst eagerly awaiting the return of spring.



who said crocs are not cool...

baby swan plant, food for monarch butterflies. Bees like them too.





Californian poppy. Baby avocado. Only seven years to go....





Globe artichoke in growth...



and bloom.

Salads from the garden

My first ever rose, given to me on my birthday by my mum, with plotting help from the woofer

Nasturtiums, great flavoursome addition to salads. Apparently eating one nasturtium leaf a day can help prevent and ward off arthiritis, according to Dr Vogel.

Of course, the recent terrible weather affects the garden, and the work-ability, and the gardener too! Thankfully the rain has stopped for a little while, and the mud is giving up some of the gumboots and even people it sucked in last week. The chickens got all excited, and laid heaps of eggs with many a squawk and flap, especially Fluffy the big black chicken, who is in her first season of laying and can't really believe what is happening in her nether regions. They have gone into recovery mode now though, unless they are hiding eggs somewhere, so I am trialling a supplement of brown rice and chilli flakes - lots of vitamin B rich foods for nourishment, and apparently chilli gives everything a gee up, a bit like drinking strong coffee for constipation, and gets it all going again. We shall see.

Meantime, I watch avidly for the first light of morning, noting that it comes a little earlier each day. It is freezing cold, that's true, but the sunrises are just spectacular, especially now that the moon is waning. The other morning, I went out on the deck, where pink fluffy clouds hung low in the sky, and I stood myself at the very mid-point of the path of the rising sun on my right, and the setting moon to my left. What a view!

ka kite ano, happy gardening

lou

winter's cooooold

howdy all, winter's arrived, after the warmest May on record, and then the wettest muggiest June for a long time, and the cold has come as quite a shock, with chilly south-easterlies cutting through the skin, and rain forever. However, there have been some awesome rainbows, and some beautiful sunny days, so it helps while I wait for it to roll on spring! I'm hoping for a few more sunny days, to dry out the ground, as it is developing pronounced swamp-like tendencies. Gumboots have been sucked off in the mud, on more than one occasion!

Due to the ground being so wet, the garden is coming along very slowly, the main activity at the moment being stamping one's feet on the ground and going 'isn't it cooooold!' I am considering turning the back garden into a winter olympic stadium for rural sports, such as the Mud-Puddle Gumboot Hop (10 metres and 20 metres), the Stamp'N'Shiver Endurance Month, and the Sway-In-The-Easterly dance competition. Special spot prizes will be awarded for funky hats, scarves and gloves. I have been making use of the indoor warmth though, and planting lots of seeds in containers on sunny windowsills. So far, peas, beans, lettuce, nettles, viola, and even a couple of sunflowers are coming up. Unfortunately, slugs seem to be sprouting up too, and all over my kitchen floor and windows first thing in the morning! cheeky things, but they are good feed for the chookies, who like their little parcels of fresh protein being tossed over their fence.

The chickens are not laying at the moment, apart from Blondie the chicken who ran off to go and fornicate with next door's rooster. The rooster has been dispatched, for extreme antisocial behaviour, and Blondie is looking for secret places to lay her fertilised eggs, whilst singing 'that man he done me wrong, that man he now is gone' in a plaintive manner. I probably won't be telling her where he has gone, and how he got there.... Meantime, I think that there may be some little chickies chirping around come spring, so watch this space.

Here are some photos of the garden in autumn, with accidental pumpkins, and helper chickens, who came from next door to dig up the garden and poop all over it, saving me the job of having to dig it and spread poop on it myself. Sally the Cat supervised the whole project from around the corner....

here are the potatoes in their early stages, just making the most of the diminishing sunlight hours

and the lemon balm grew hard out, and has had a radical haircut since this photo was taken. Anyone got any ideas on what I can do with lemon balm?

aaah those views, aaah that sunset.

Guess this is what they mean by 'living the dream'.

Ka kite ano

lou

autumn

kiaora koutou, well summer has pretty much done it's thing, and we're heading into autumn, equinox has happened and the wind has really changed, very cold, easterlies and southerlies blasting away, and a bunch of rain which is always good for the tanks and the thirsty gardens. Nights are getting longer and my inclination to snuggle and hibernate is getting stronger..... However, the garden is still growing! I have been overcome by pumpkins, I thought I'd chuck a couple of seeds around the place and see what happened.

Sally the Cat supervised proceedings

- and they grew...

and grew...

and grew...

and grew

It seemed like I could turn my back for a minute and the vine would grow three feet, it's quite spectacular.

They are growing in the original compost pile, which has also sprouted avocado trees and several tomato plants, as well as some more borage. They are also growing in the back vege bed which our first woofers, Kat and my mum, were building and working on almost a year ago - so well done guys, all that horse poo and digging and building has paid off heaps!

What else? well, one of my chooks (Blondie) has eloped with next door's roosters,

and can be seen leading her entourage around a la Marilyn Monroe, and giving me filthy looks for being so stupid as to expect her to stay in the coop and be fed regularly and lay eggs.... what was I thinking. Another rooster (there are 6 in total!!) has been seen flying into the chicken coop and sexually harassing my other chooks, who are a bit more compliant and obedient, until he hopped in, at which point there was a lot of frustrated chicken sex on my lawn and much squawking and flapping. This has led to me standing out in the pouring rain for 2 hours fixing extra pieces of chicken wire onto the fence to make it too high for him to get in again. He is also now giving me filthy looks, but my girls are a lot happier! Heaven knows what their eggs will turn out now though, as it's not entirely impossible that they will have been impregnated, I'm sure the rooster was not responsible enough to use a condom.....

Zucchini has been a star deliverer, I have grown one which was the length of my forearm, from wrist to elbow, and another one is looking to be about the same size. Monsters! I have been feeding everything worm tea from my worm farm, which seems to have been successful, and made zucchini fritters, with eggs from my chooks, and basil and chilli seasoning from the garden also. Roll on pumpkin soup with home grown basil and chilli soon! Yesterday I dug up the first potatoes of the season, they were just sitting under the surface of the earth in the compost pile, like little golden and red eggs, just waiting to be picked up. Quite a few came out, enough for a meal for two. There are more potato plants in the horse poo pile, so I will see how they go. On on, I'm off home to taunt the roosters with the information that they will soon be going in the pot hehehehe. Ps earplugs are really a must-have when living in the "peace and quiet" of the countryside! ka kite ano lou

summer lovin'

it's well know among my groupies that I loooove summer, fresh fruity produce and long days in the sun. I'm as brown as a berry, loving the weather apart from a couple of cyclones which have swung our way, and boy oh boy has the garden grown!

here, as promised, are some photos.

Sally the cat enjoying the sunset

Borage going hard out

Maxie the dog looking for the main chance

Flax, NZ beauty

the new vege garden - lettuces, corn, peas, nasturtiums, strawberries, grape vine, swan plant, sunflowers, anything else I can stuff in there!

Potatoes - not 'tyre-d' yet hahaha

New vege garden and dog

Peas

New grape cutting

Borage and nasturtiums

as you can see, it's all chugging along nicely, I've had some lovely helpers from Hong Kong who did a brilliant job of clearing and weeding for a week, thanks guys, good luck in your travels around NZ. I've also just adopted 4 new chickens, so there will be fresh eggs to keep us all fed and strong.

Plenty of produce too, although it is only a small property and small, beginning garden I've been surprised at what has grown well - chillis, lettuces, zuccinis just coming through, cucumbers doing great work, and sunflowers too of course. Strawberries not doing so well - not much room to move! but I will know better for next season

ka kite ano

lou