Autumn's coming, the best time of all for planting. There really is an "autumn flush" as plants burst forth with growth before the cold of winter. But what to plant?
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I knew exactly what I wanted from my first garden: food. I'd been close to starving in my last year of school and first year of university, despite scholarships that no longer exist today, part-time jobs and full-time work in the holidays. Back then women's wages were a small fraction of those paid to a man for the same work.
These days I grow flowers to rejoice the soul, but at least 95 per cent of my garden is still for tucker, plus "let's see if they survive" experiments. Having plenty in the larder and the garden is reassuring, even as the decades pass.
For some, a garden is exterior decoration. As long as it's low-care and looks good, the owners can ignore it except for the twice yearly call to the contractor to replenish the ornamental gravel, clean the tiles, trim the hedges, and check the agaves, tree ferns, grass trees and non-invasive bamboo are still thriving. Perhaps this year add another "no work, high result" plant to your collection: wintersweet.
Wintersweet loses its leaves in winter but in spring is smothered in the most gloriously scented pale yellow blooms with purple centres. They are stunning enough to possible turn you into Gardener Type No. 2.
These gardeners simply fall in love with plants. They wander nurseries specialising in natives, roses or camellias, falling in love every five minutes, and usually over-plant their garden with their newly acquired delights. If you are one of those, check out this years' new boronia varieties.
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Boronias are fussy. They need moist but well drained soil, dappled shade but with sufficient sunlight. They'll die if they dry out, are buffeted by hot winds, or simply feel like having an eternal nap. But in the decades since breeders turned their attention to breeding garden friendly varieties of natives, there are new stunners every year, needing less care but giving more and larger blooms.
The newly released Kaleidoscope boronia varieties are said to be hardier, even more floriferous, with flowers all winter and spring, and fragrant foliage. They are also supposed to be perfect for growing in pots on a patio. I've yet to try them, so I don't know if they live up to the hype, but if I was in a planting mood I'd buy a few.
If you're an edible garden type, like me, consider miniature red bananas. The fruit is tiny and delicious, and the plants are far more cold tolerant than the common Cavendish bananas. In this region they may die back in heavy frost, but lime green decorative leaves should return in spring. Plant your miniature banana by a sheltered sunny wall to maximise warmth, and most importantly water them often and lavishly with plenty of tucker, too. Bananas in cold climates often die from lack of water, not the chill.
Any gardener who has already filled their garden, with only a few deeply shaded spaces left, should consider Bergenias. They grow in dense shade, with light green leaves and gorgeous purple-red rose-like blooms in spring. One plant grows to about a metre wide after a few years. They are a fantastic groundcover to stop weeds invading spaces where most garden darlings refuse to grow. 'Bergenia Ballawley' is possibly the best. Look for new cultivars, more dramatic than the old-fashioned ones.
Calling all wildlife and science lovers!
Help track and record this year's bogong moth migration. I remember when there were so many that Parliament House was covered in them. I offered a solution: use red lights, not white, as bogong moths aren't attracted to red. It would even become a tourist attraction each night: Australia's largest red light district. For some reason management didn't take my advice. They haven't even followed my suggestion to plant out Parliament House lawn - expensive and water consuming - with myrnong daisies and wallaby grass.
Bogong moth numbers have plummeted. We used to get about half a dozen crashing into our living room at night till I put up temporary red cellophane. There have been none for a decade, until I found a single one on the path last year. This year I'll be counting, and hopefully more than one. Ten thousand moths have been tagged. Just snap a pic of the moth, noting its ID, and send it to Invertebrates Australia's Bogong Watch program.
This week I am:
- Remembering the days when I'd be planting enough kale, broccoli, cabbages, carrots, English spinach, parsley, garlic, silverbeet, beetroot, parsnips and winter radish to see us and a horde of visitors through winter or spring. This year we're only planting enough green leaves for winter munching, plus the perennials like spring onions and garlic chives. But if you want winter and spring veg, get them in NOW.
- Mourning the brown tips on the leaves of most of our camellias. Despite growing in shade, the hot spells of this summer have left their mark.
- Finding yet another patch of unknown weeds. Curse all bird droppings and especially bushfire winds. You spend decades eradicating weeds, then a drought creates bare patches and wind brings weed seeds. As the old saying goes: There is no rest for the weeder.
- Wishing we had water enough to grow a cloud of Japanese anemones, or "wind flowers". They'd begin to bloom about now, a dapple of different colours as they are ruffled by the wind. Everyone with an urban water supply should plant lots this weekend for absolute gorgeousness.
- Picking pale pink climbing Souvenir de la Malmaison roses. They are finally above wallaby reach, and Possum X is too full of apples, lemon rinds, parsley and tomatoes to bother with rose buds. After a decade I finally have them all!
