My Family History
Tuesday, August 7, 2012
Nearly end of Winter
The Greenhouse project has started - I spent a lovely Sunday clearing out the area marked for the greenhouse, just behind the carport next to the big shed.
It will be wonderful once it's built as it would enable the planting program to run more smoothly (as much as I can anyway!).
Vegie Garden zone is doing well - harvesting lettuces, spinaches, broccoli, peas and herbs. I also harvested citrus fruits - mandarins, oranges and lemonades. Lemon Butter coming up! The mandarins are great this year.
The Fruit Grove had a haircut a few weeks ago and looks lot better now. We just need to fence it to deter rabbits and mulch it all over before Summer hits us.
The Banana Circle's getting very crowded and we will have lots of bunches to munch through very soon! Time to work on the circle before snakes come back.
We've got kittens, both gals - in training to be the 'barn cats' for our big shed to get the rodent problem fixed and scare off the pesky possums. At the moment the feline sisters are inside the house as they are only 12 weeks old. Kids just love them to pieces - the kittens are really great, quite laid back and affectionate!
Not much else has been happening as it's the maintenance period for this property. Hopefully within 2 weeks I'd have something interesting to report and share photos.
Cheers till later!
Sunday, July 17, 2011
Oh, what a frosty morning...
First I saw this on lawn
Then I realise it was a nice and light frost so took photos.
Thus it is mainly a photos blog, rather than an informative blog...
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| Blades of grass |
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| Beaded daisy flower - Gorgeous!! |
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| Jonquils (hoped I spelt it correctly) |
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| Ice beads on broccoli leaf |
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| Dusted spinach leaf on dusted mulch |
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| Even some potato plants were dusted |
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| The edges of lettuces were laced with frost - colour isn't good here. |
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| Another beaded kale leaf |
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| You can see some ice on this leaf! |
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| It was gorgeous to see very tiny ice cubes on the red cabbage leaf |
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| Once again dusted baby spinach leaf |
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| A geranium leaf really shows it attracts frost really well |
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| Not easily seen but almost all lichen were dusted but as sun hit, all dissipated... |
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| Nicely laced leaves of weeds in lawn |
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| View to South - frost all the way |
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| Lovely yellow rose - all beaded |
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| One of first two plum trees flowered for the year |
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| Magnolia - ready to open soon... |
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| View to West - frost all the way with Tassie following me |
So I hope you've enjoyed all this.
Teralba report: 6 baby pears are growing out of two pear trees (the only pear trees I can see have flowered and fruited - seems to be a while to grow, etc); plum trees flowered - two trees so far, but already other three are not far behind; several apple trees budded; an old nectarine tree all budded and a few flowered. Harvested another bucketful of Lemonade, oranges and broccolinis.
Cheers till later!
Monday, October 4, 2010
I want to report September missing!
So here are assorted photos and reports of what we've done in September - I promise I will do wee better this month reporting! :D
1. General gardening photos - it was taken on the first day of September and it was a lovely day. Thought it was a good day to take stock of all fruit and nut trees on this property. Took way too many so will just put up a few for you to enjoy.
Plum flowers - it looks like we'll get heaps of plums if Spring is going to be nice to us and give us mild and gentle spring weather (so far we've got a bit more rain and winds than we usually get for the last few weeks...):
I have to say that plum flowerings are the most showy - so good and full of both honey and native bees...
Elderflower is also in bloom (well, it has always in flowering for the whole year, but it is much more fully than the usual. The bush was only planted in July 09! Had tripled in size and I am going to plant many more as it seems that this area's suitable for them -I've got three of them and all going crazy!):
Apple-shaped Quince in bud (I think it has to be the amazing pome tree - the leaves are so 'furry' and the flowers most beautiful!):
This is one of three mulberry varieties - Hick's Fancy and it seems it is doing very well, considering it was only planted a month before this photo was taken and already covered with fruit!:
As per Spring's style, here are numerous ornamental flowers - all have to host for all the winged bugs anyway:
Gorgeous wattle - native to this area:
Iris - its close to the bush, so not waterlogged one?
This is the plant with berries and flowers that the native birds go crazy over, and they're almost everywhere here - I've let them grow as I thought it would be a good plant to encourage birds away from our fruit trees. I still need to find out what it is and how 'good' it is, etc. Any idea?
Orange tree is finally flowering - it didn't fruit this winter at all, so we missed its delicious and juicy oranges!
First time ever grew any asparagus and it actually shoot through very well - had to put cage over it to stop dogs from knocking it over before its ready to be harvested. It crops up so fast - now I understand what others meant about harvest almost everyday - I think I did watch one shoot up literally!
Spring onion flowered and a bee, along with other hunderd of bugs, knows it.
Don't ask me why they're lined up there! As of today, we're down to 9 - one of black chooks went AWOL and we could not find her. However, our Broodie's sitting on a nest of eggs at the moment so there's a replacement coming up...
Lemorange/Lemange - it needs to be harvested as it's already budding and flowering! I need 40 hours day and 4 sets of arms!
This is just a random photo - just loved how lichen grows on the bark:
Hope this post got you satisfied?
Let me know what else you'd like to see.
Cheers till next posting!
Thursday, November 26, 2009
Harvesting first spring produce
Got to harvest two nectarines from the old nectarine tree in the chook run. Two of them weight a whooping 170g. There are heaps on the tree but also heaps of bird damaged and rotting ones too - I'd need to make a time to go and work on that tree.
Decided to check the vegie bed to see if I did grew any potatoes - YEP! However they're all small - baby sized. I am attributing this to the heavy soil and not enough mulch. I still need to unearth many potato spots - so will be interesting to see which thrives out here, etc. This batch weight at 685g. Gonna harvest some more later for xmas potato salad in few weeks time - Yummy!
Ari, our friut boy, nabbed the first white flesh peach from our fruit grove. It is so delicious - smell superb and very juicy! There are few more on the tree (one of many I planted last July) so we all will get to eat one each, I hope. He loved it and wanted to plant the seed for more fruits!
A dog fence is being built at the moment, so will take photos this week to show how much have changed at the moment. The entire Jasmine climbers have been cut down to make way for grapevines.
Sunday, October 25, 2009
It RAINED today!
It has been a while since we got a nice soaking.
This morning I was working in the Fruit Grove and I was amazed to see hundreds of bees, hundreds of ladybirds and, unfortunately too many cabbage white butterflies everywhere, along with hoverflies, several unidentified insects there! It is awesome to stand in middle, with all the insects buzzing around you, non stop and think they're so happy...

I am seriously contemplating asking a bee keeper to put in a hive - imagine someone's getting free honey elsewhere from my hard working green manure! heh. I am still working on getting fruit trees staked where needed, mulched and such. I think there's about 2/3 of the whole area to go! Sighs...
Find the fruit trees inside this yellow flowered area! They're there...

See how tall are those green manure plants compared to my lil boy! I am not sure what plant those yellow flowered ones are - however I am gonna plant them again next year! They grow so well and fast, kept the soil so well and cool down there, etc and most above all, the insects love them!
Even this cursed Cabbage White butterfly!
Here are the evidence the Fruit Grove's thriving...
Plum: Only 5 fruits can be seen from 2 trees! It is only first year, so we'll see how next year bring...
Apple Cider "Yarlington Mill": There's 4 and perhaps other 4 growing on this tree alone. Not bad...

Nectarine: It's fruiting so well out here, I think there's 3 trees and there are numerous fruits on them, and there's the old nectarine tree at the back with hundreds on it. (Got the bird netting over it today so fingers crossed we'd get some this summer!)

Peach: I've got heaps of peaches growing as well. All are about golf ball sized at the moment, but will needed to be netted asap anyway. Interestingly enough, all are in different colours, such as rosy blush, peachy blush, greenish blush, etc. The trees are at about a metre tall.

At the Pear Strip, this Elderberry is flowering slowly. Am looking forward to see what it looks like when its fully flowered with its fruits.

Now to other important stuff...


Inside the Chickbox, there's 5 chicks, including those two black chicks. Pippa and Rosie loves to get their cuddles with me!



And his twin sister.

When I was in Ballarat during the October Long Weekend, I went to visit an ALS friend who is also a great chook expert. I got her to teach me how to tell which is boy or girl with the chicks and we had fun! Thanks Roogz! So this is why I am abit more confident that I've got 4 female chicks and a male chick. In few more weeks, I will know if I am right anyway.















































