Really Is An Avocado Plant!

I cleared up the mighty red tomato bush this morning. With only two tiny fruits on it (some looted by possums, some eaten by my dogs), it's not worth keeping it. I have been rather curious with a plant growing in the midst of the tomato bush and after cutting the bush down, I was able to dig a little to check if this was an avocado plant. Right instinct! It certainly was. I think I must have buried one last winter or spring with all the vege scraps from the kitchen. It is already 15cm tall. The large seed was still in the soil. I know avocado trees take donkey years to grow and fruit, say at least 10 years. And I will be fortunate if it ever fruit! So I have shelfed the idea of growing avocados after doing some research and reading forums on it. However, recently I read something by Jackie French, who says an avocado tree can be trained to be in a large pot in-house, where it serves as an ornamental tree due to its beautiful green glossy leaves and expensive look. That is quite tempting, though I always wanted useful trees that produce edible fruits. Pots and pots...Notice the fly screen barricading the vege patch behind the pots? I had resorted to that because recently Marco has decided to venture into the patch due to boredom. Upset is an understatement. He uprooted one of my flowering capsicum, snipped some tomato branches off, knocked over the laundry hamper covering the fruiting capsicum and stomped on my oriental radish seedlings. I only managed to salvage my seedlings. It was a distressing moment given I have put in so much effort.

The avocado plant with seed still in tact. The tomato bush cut down, the avocado plant growing just close by.

Seedlings of oriental radishes growing fine, saved by me after being stomped down by Marco.

My little experiment of growing avocado from seed here on the window ledge. Been waiting for a long time.

Vietnamese Mint roots super fast, within a few days of standing in water.

Big Day Work

Warm and still day. A good day to do major gardening and so we did. We spent a good 3.5 hours at our new property.

1. Clearing all the bark mulching revealing a layer of weed mat. We did one stretch today. Pulled up all the rose shrubs which are not growing very well due to neglect and the drought. Dug only three holes as that almost killed my husband. Probably another seven more to go for that stretch. Add composted cow manure. Planning to grow hedges. I like the spittosporum shrubs, either the silver or the golden sheen. They make good tall hedges (at least 1.5 metres) if pruned regularly in the first few years to establish bushiness. I would love to establish a privacy screen for this large area to house my fruit trees (tendatively planning persimmon, fig, nectarine, grape, peach, apricot) and flowers (sunflowers, daffodils, nasturtiums are among my favourites). Of course, not forgetting my beloved herbs and veges. It's going to be an exciting journey establishing a wondrous green haven right at my door step!

2. Pruning the lavendar on the left side of the patio. We bought a pair of Friskar Pruning Shears, a super light one and it made work easy. I do hope the lavendar bushes on the right side of the patio will survive as I think I have cut into too much of the old wood. One book 'The Complete Burke's Backyard' says they will almost certainly die. I hope not. :( But well, there are a lot of lavendar on this property and I jolly well can grow some other fanciful plants if they really die. A grape vine? Good idea!

Lavender trimmed on left of patio

Lavender cut back way too much into old wood on right of patio.

3. Fertilising the 3rd vege and 4th patches (below) in the backyard with cow manure and blood and bone. Then covering with weed mat after watering. The unidentified vine (below) growing at the corner was rescued by me previously as it was overwhelmed by the sprawling parsley. I cleared the corner of parsley, fertilised the area with cow manure and gave the vine a stake. Today, it looked very well.

One of the vege patches in the backyard. Researching now to assess if the dwarf fig can fit here.

The unidentified vine. Either keep it or may replace with passion fruit which can climb the green wooden wall.

4. Harvesting a bucket of parsley which have filled up patch #5 since the the last harvest few weeks ago :

5. Mulching around the olive tree.

6. Mulching around the plum tree.

7. Weeding. That's Samuel's job. :) He was pulling up the easy weeds which had triangular leaves and pinkish flowers while I handled dandelions and lamb's tongue which sprouted up among pebble-mulch. Tough weeds!

A tiring but fruitful time. Looking forward to more work before we finally can move in in December.

The Neighbouring Onion Has Sprouted.

Fine sunny weather today. Went to the library with my son and did reading up. Got a parking fine because I was two mins late. :( Anyway, I did a little gardening work today. I used Mancozeb Plus Garden Fungicide on two pots of mints which were having powdery mildew here and there since the day I potted them. Even with pinching off affected leaves, it did not help very much so I resorted to fungicide to salvage the mints. As I was inspecting the plants, I was happy to announce that the 'neighbour' has finally sprouted too...I mean the left onion. :) I also finally got down to making a cage for my buk choy which were always attacked by egg-laying white cabbage butterflies. I cut down the leaves today and fed them to my earthworms. I am pretty sure it will deter the butterflies now unless they are going to bomb my buk choy mid-air with their eggs! The cage is made of galvanised wire and is rust-proof. Here's how the cage looks like :

I just read a book about the importance of standing large pots on bricks or any support you can find. This helps with proper draining of excess water during watering :

Miessence Balancing Moisturiser

If you are looking for a safe and organic skin moisturiser, try Miessence. They have four types in their range suited for different skin. I am currently using the balancing moisturiser. Ingredient wise, it certainly has the most natural things you find in nature : Certified organic aloe barbadensis (aloe vera) leaf juice, olea europaea (olive) leaf extract, certified organic calendula officinalis flower extract, certified organic matricaria recutita (chamomile) flower extract, certified organic lavandula angustifolia (lavender) essential oil, certified organic simmondsia chinensis (jojoba) seed oil, non-gmo lecithin, certified organic althea officinalis (marshmallow) root extract, sclerotium rolfsii gum, certified organic olea europaea (olive) extract, aqua, certified organic rosa rubiginosa (rosehip) seed oil, certified organic helianthus annuus (sunflower) seed oil, certified organic butyrospermum parkii (shea) fruit butter, certified organic hypericum perforatum (st johns wort) flower extract, certified organic ethanol (sugar cane alcohol), citrus aurantium amara (bitter orange) fruit extract.

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One Rosemary Cutting has Flowered.

Cold morning. Cosy afternoon. A little drizzle interspersed cloudy and then sunny day. Collected a few drops of rain in buckets ;o. Since the soil was moist and soft in the morning, I did some weeding. The creepy weeds are growing very well at the sides of the vege patch and soon will come near my capsicum and mighty red tomato bush. One of the potted rosemary cuttings has decided to flower instead of growing. Flowering for herbs is not really ideal since it means its energy for growing has been given to flowering. But it is not a bad sight at all.

One dandelion weed growing well in the vege patch. Dandelions are common weeds and their leaves are nutritious for making tea, which can be used to water plants. In fact, shops sell dandelion tea bags for human consumption and dandelion flowers can be used in salads. They have deep tap roots that can draw nutrients from deep in the soil.

My capsicum is growing well, at least with much peace of mind since I am able to protect it from possums. Another on the right of the picture is developing.

One little purple king pod is growing near the ground just close to the very mature pod. I have placed a plastic sheet under it on the ground weighed down by rocks.

The aloe vera is growing two new pups in the centre...one tiny one and a slightly longer one.

The vietnamese mint overtaking the large pot's surface. It is really a sprawling grower. I am ready to harvest some for ladies' fellowship next Monday.

Two of my six lots of oriental radishes. I am now cracking my head on how to protect them from digging possums. Neighbours just told me possums dug their ground and ate their silver beets!

One cluster of chillies from the nellie kelly hot chilli.

Another cluster. So happy to see larger chillies developing before ripening. I have harvested some ripe ones in the past but they were really tiny.