Garden, Bird Rescue & Heronswood Garden

The coriander that I bought has produced many seeds due to the hot weather. I dont mind since I do not use the herb every day so it will be good for it to self-seed and make new plants at Patch E. Same goes for the continental parsely :

I bought a malnourished-looking chilli fire from bunnings (since it was only $3) and hope that by putting it in the ground (front garden) and fertilising it, it will take off from here :

I am protecting it with a tree shield from my dog and pests :

My sun king sunflowers are growing strongly but the first flower that opened does not look too glorious :

Three pots of lemon grass planted next to the sunflowers are transplanting well. I have added rooster manure and mulched with sugarcane :

Bird rescue. Marco my dog found a baby bird in our front garden. Not really knowing what to do, I got it into a carton. Boy...his parents came and made a lot of noise looking for their baby.

I have no idea where the nest was and decided to take it to RSPCA. They said since it was not native, it would have to be put down. However, the nice guy also told me that this baby has already left its nest and its parents would be feeding it on the ground till it could fly. Cool lesson learnt. I decided to bring it back and return it where I found it, so that its parents can find it again and do their thing. This little bird got me really busy :

We went to Heronswood Garden again. Beautiful weather. Here's two pretty pictures, one overlooking the beautiful tranquil sea :

And an abundance of grapes :

Stir-fry Black Pepper Beef (Recipe)

Still about yesterday. Son was using the computer while I had a look out of my front garden. The rain was a cool refreshing change. The patch where there is a rose shrub and dying-down calla lilies...that still requires further work. I plan to plant hydrangeas or kangeroo paws and some other flowers. It is too boring at this moment. However, hubby wants me to take my time as I am burning up my budget every month! The pittosporum golden sheens are doing well but I wish they would grow bushier faster and taller! The sweet potato creepers among the sheens are doing great :

The two white nettings are where my other two tomato silvery firs are planted. Doing great. In the foreground are my sanorita and vietnamese mint in pots.

Two conifers flank the small gate. My eureka lemon in that square patch.

The yellow capsicums harvested and spanish (red) onions ready for my beef stir-fry.

Two slices of blade beef steak sliced into thin pieces.

Onions and capsicum fried in ready-to-use black pepper sauce (which I bought). Add beef. Fry till cooked. No need to add water.

Cool weather change and some intermittent drizzle this morning. I did 2 hours of work. Applied large pots with sugarcane mulch, added water crystals to some pots which tend to dry up fast, applied more organic fertiliser to some pots and planted out my buk choys. Time to harvest the two ripened yellow capsicums for beef tonight : Purple king beans are growing on the vines :

Tomato (silvery fir) growing bigger and more by the day :

These are buk choys...normal ones from my shepherd and purple ones from Diggers :

I had some planted in Patch B (where snowpeas used to be), between the bitter melon on the left and cucumber (burpless) on the right :

They are each protected by this plastic punnet which I keep after eating supermarket vege/fruits :

A light plastic punnet will get a rock resting on it :

4 other buk choys are planted here in planters, making it a total of 8 :

The cucumber (burpless) are producing baby cucumbers but I suspect the female flowers attached to the ends of them are not even opened yet. Must continue to observe :

The vines are a pretty sight at the moment and I managed to protect them under a piece of white cloth pegged on the trellis :

Lots of male flowers :

The eggplant supreme has two large purple (my son said violet) flowers opened. Very pretty! :

It started to really pour from noon onwards and last through the evening. I love the rain!!! My son said if I kept saying that, it was going to flood.

39 Degrees Celsius & Windy!

I was kept rather busy yesterday with the hot and windy weather. Was better prepared this year but still not good enough. Probably because I am now on a new property. The night before this hot day, I had moved most portable/lighter pots into shelther : I did not have enough white cloth so I could only shield part of the patch next to the garage :

Ended up using my hubby's old work shirt to shield my bitter melon but it worked now that it is still short :

Kaffir lime, eggplant supreme, lemongrass at Patch C & cyclamens at Patch D were also shielded by pieces of white cloth :

Patch A has a piece of beige tablecloth and I used it on my purple king. Not on the tomato beef steak since it has not produced a single fruit and taking up so much space :

Some heavier pots were under white cloth and a layer of netting. The strong wind beat at the cloth and I had to secured the four corners with strings :

Patch F was also protected by white cloth :

With this, the whole garden did not suffer a single casualty. The front garden was not covered but I had hubby watered the whole of it first thing in the morning since we were within water restrictions time. By 6pm, the air was still hot and stuffy. I went out to remove the white cloth as the next day was a real change of weather...cloudy and possible thunderstorm! Think the weather here in Melbourne changes faster than a woman's mood haha...

Yellow Capsicum, Cucumber Burpless & Strawberry Delight

Tomorrow's weather is going to be really hot and windy, 39 deg cel. I have already put up most of the white cloth I have. I cannot cover the whole garden and only can do so for as many plants as I can. Here seems to be a baby cucumber (burpless). I have two on the vines : My beautiful to look at Strawberry Delight has produced a fair number of strawberries. Here's some more to be harvested :

Yellow Capsicums are ripening on the plant. So beautiful :