Late Spring - November 2011

This post is very late. It is already the first day of summer.


17 November - Netted two tomato silvery fir plants to prevent caterpillar attack. Regular pruning of tomato leaves required.

18 November
- Did pH test for Eureka lemon and comquat calamondin - about pH 5-6 - treated with dolomite lime and fed epsom salts, hopefully their condition improve.

- Big fig is budding at the branch which I cut off in spring just for an experiment to see if it will re-shoot and also to test out controlling tree size. It seems to put putting on tiny figs but have to keep observing.

- Figgy is producing more figs on top of the two it grew in early spring. Exciting! Can't wait to eat figs again.

- Trying to figure out effective physical possum deterrent in the garden. Puts my head into full- time thinking mode.


19 & 26 November
- Rain Rain Rain...Shower Shower Shower...Hooray Hooray Hooray!!!

20 November
- Sweet corn seeds sown a week ago germinated quickly.
- Pruned rose bush. Remove old calendula plants.
- Remove fungus-infected hydrangea leaves.
- Pruned blackcurrant bush. Still no fruit in sight.
- Sown more sweet corn seeds.
- Eggplant peacock about 5cm tall.

25 November - Trimmed golden sheen hedges and work against possum invasion.

I removed all the plum branches overhanging this fence as I know the possum could use it to get onto the plum tree.

Hubby and I removed all these branches which were close to our roof to prevent the possum from getting onto our roof.

I drove in a few stakes and wrapped the trunk of my plum tree with strong plastic. This will deter the possum from climbing up the tree.

An ugly but workable piece of wire mesh to stop the possum from walking on the fence.

I need to buy about 8 metres of good netting to protect my grapes. Note the tall plum tree at the far end. If the possum can get up the tree, it can assess the roof to get to my grapes. No way am I sharing my grapes with them especially when it this is going to be my first harvest.

This is my back lawn in early spring, looking patchy and ugly due to my dog's urine and heavy traffic :

And I am relieved to see that most of the grass has grown to cover up the patches. It is almost impossible to believe that the back lawn will look good again. The difference in the pictures shows it is possible. Good thing we invested in self-repairing Buffalo Sapphire.  I have since trained my dog to do his wee on the big patch of mulch on the other side of the back garden. :

I finally bought $5 worth of duckweeds to cover the water surface of my water chestnut tubs. I put the two goldfish here to rid mosquito larvae :

Each of the two rectangular tubs  has a 20 cm pot planted with one water chest nut plant. I used some garden pebbles to stop potting mix from being washed out and plunge the pot into the tubs of water. Then I spread duckweeds on the water. I am not sure how productive these two plants will be.  It will be an experiment.  I have to get several more gold fish to rid mosquito larvae here as changing water can be a hassle.

Mr Spotted Neck is getting really fat.  He is about the fattest pigeon I have ever seen. He comes almost every day. Here we took a shot of him perched on the fence, all fluffed up.  He is still very scared of us and will take off whenever we went out into the garden.