Cut the grass there this morning. Imagine having to cut the grass Christmas week.
I’ve been growing a pile of Australian native plants and perrenials form seed and cuttings. Red Flowering Gums, Bottle Brushes, Correas, Red/Green Kangaroo Paws and Westringia. Now nearly ready to plant out. The Red Flowering Gums sell for $70 at the nursery.
The herbs have been great, though I bolloxed up the Parsley and we’ve been without for weeks, fixing that.
The vegetable garden is towards the end of the summer, tomatoes nearly done, but Eggplant, Capsicums and Squash coming through. I’ve started mulching the beds that are finished and digging drills to bury vegetable and fruit scraps for the worms to convert to compost. I’ll start planting the winter vegetables in March.
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You can keep them pruned to mid sized. They are stunning when they flower.
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First cut of the lawn today.Bit wet but badly needed it.
Took advantage of a dry morning here on the peninsula to cut the grass. First cut of the year but the mower started first time 
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You have that grass cut to the bare bone I’d say.
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A gift from God when they go first time. Of course if you’re negligent and forego an oil check your asking for trouble…
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At the end of summer I’ve generally been very neglectful of the vegetable garden and let it go feral until I’m ready to plant out the winter stuff. But it means the soil gets baked and turns to dust and I have to buy in a fair bit of manure and compost.
But I’ve done my own research this year and am much better prepared.
The kitchen scraps that I compost in the Dalek like bins produce very dense compost , but it takes forever (9 months) for little return. Instead I’ve dug trenches in all the vegetable beds, filled them with the scraps and raked the soil back over them. The worms can go to work and we’ll have compost directly in the root zone in weeks. The ither thing I’ve learned from the very good Huw Richards ( https://m.youtube.com/@HuwRichards ) is mulching the soil with grass clippings and not leaving it bare. The contents of two worm farms have gone into one of the beds as well. I have plenty of compost ready to cover everything else.
The upshot of all this is that for the first time at the start of a growing season , I won’t need to buy any manure or compost. The soil is black and rich and the whole operation is becoming self-sustaining. I’ll be planting the Winter vegetables out this weekend.
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Great work. Would you have any interest in coming home to a 5 year contract as head of Bórd Bía where there’s currently a vacancy…
You know with my background in sales, I might just be the man for that job….
The first cut of the grass here.
I donno if I’ll have it done in time to go to the Gaelic Grounds.
Dahlias, Cosmos, Zinnias all from seed. A great display beside the vegetables. We have a fantastic vase of flowers in the house all the time now.
Do ye get earwigs on the Dahlias over there?
I stopped growing them because of that.
I hate earwigs.
No, I’ve never actually seen an earwig here.
I’m convinced that the work I’ve done on building a wildlife friendly garden means there’s lots of predator insects to get rid of the bad ones.
Not a jewelery fan?
I know they’re harmless and actually eat other garden pests.
But they seem to love Dahlias and hide in the flowers. Must be after the pollen. So if you cut the flowers for indoors the earwigs are all over the place the following morning. So I stopped growing them.
I might post another reason after if I have time.
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