Spring is here!

Today is the first day of Spring and it has turned out to be gloriously sunny. It was a big surprise to see such a quick change in the weather after the terrific thunderstorm and lashings of rain we had last night.

I woke to hear the dawn chorus from the many blackbirds, thrushes and tuis that visit our garden. 

I managed to photograph a tui in our neighbour's pink blossom tree which leans over our fence. The blossom looks like bunches of dangling bells and is full of nectar which the tuis drink. Tuis are lovely birds with a little plume of white feathers at their throat. Their song is amazing to hear, it is very long and cheerful with a very wide range of notes. 

I wandered around the garden with my camera and Otto followed as usual. I found many flowers just starting to open including a dainty forget-me-not, which I enlarged in the photo above, and discovered a tiny ant drinking nectar from one of the flowers.

I noticed a few flowers on the yet-to-be-named blackberry/boysenberry bush. We didn't have any luck with the fruit on it last year. The fruit all dried up for some reason, despite the amount of rain we had. This season I need to get advice on how to look after them and identify what sort of berry they are.

The pretty, mauve-flowered bush above fell over and split its trunk during the Winter storms. It managed to layer one branch, which survived, and this is flowering now. We had to remove all the rest of the dead branches. It used to be quite a large bush.  

The white arum lilies are flowering now and stand out brightly in the shade under the trees.

The Meyer lemons are ripening nicely. I picked one yesterday to use in a chicken and leek in white wine sauce recipe. The lemon was juicy and full of flavour and added just the right amount of zinginess to the dish.

The hellebores are still flowering since the beginning of Winter, and there are more buds forming. I don't deadhead the hellebores, they are left to self-seed under the trees.

This Spring we are lucky with the little blood orange tree. It has produced quite a lot of fruit for its size. Now it is just a matter of judging when they have ripened fully and picking them before the birds and slugs get to them.

A few of the anemone bulbs which were planted last Autumn are flowering. I was lucky to find this one which hadn't been munched on by snails.  

This fucshia managed to survive the Winter outdoors and today I discovered flower buds on it. When we bought it last Autumn it was in full flower. I took a cutting of it just in case it didn't survive, and the cutting has been successfully growing in the garage on a shelf by the window. I need to find somewhere to plant it out now.

The bad storms this past Winter blew the tree in our lawn over sideways even more, and it is now on a great lean towards our neighbour's property. We might need to contact an arborist for advice about it. If it needs to be removed we will need to get permission from the council who will come and inspect it. 

Our Alder tree was also blown sideways and lost many branches due to the hurricane. It is such a shame as it is a large old tree. It will be awful if we lose it.

On a brighter note, the Chinese primulas have grown well. They like the partial shade that they were planted in. And the flowers are in varying shades of pink and white. These should self-seed under the trees and bushes and make an even better display next year :o)

In the next week dad and I are planning to go to the garden centre to buy compost and vegetable seedlings. We will also be looking for flowering perennials and shrubs and maybe a couple of dessert grape vines. I'm not sure what time of year they sell different plants, but I enjoy looking anyway.

I hope this post finds you well and I am looking forward to hearing from you.

Hugs, 

Rose xxx

It's the first day of Summer today!

Happy first day of Summer! 

December the 1st is the first day of Summer in New Zealand. It has been a lovely warm 24 degrees C today, slightly overcast and no wind. A perfect day to start putting the Christmas tree up, decorating the house and opening door number one of my advent calendar.

I walked around the garden, barefoot, this afternoon, with Otto following me. He is such a curious cat, watching what I am doing all the time, apart from when he is running up the trees or climbing onto the roof of the house! 

In the garden I found a few ripe boysenberries and raspberries, which tasted delicious, lovely and juicy and full of flavour. The small passionfruit vine is flowering and there is one fruit forming already.

The Feijoa (pineapple guava) is full of red flowers, but I didn't see any Tui birds nearby to pollinate them. Hopefully the Tuis will find them so we can enjoy feijoas this year.

The Pohutukawa tree overhanging our fence from next door, is absolutely full of flower buds. It's going to look spectacular when the red flowers are open. Nice and Christmassy.

I hope that you are enjoying the first day of advent too.

Do you follow any traditions for December the first?

Hugs, Rose x

Spring treasures in my garden

Blueberry blossom

I had a lot of fun taking close-up Springtime photos of blossoms, buds and leaves using my cell-phone camera this week. I was hoping to photograph the many honeybees on the blueberry blossom, but they were too fast for me, and it was rather windy. I'm surprised my photos didn't come out all blurry! 

I love the pink blush on the blueberry flower petals and their light blue-grey frosted sepals. 

Most of the blueberry blossom has been pollinated now. The flowers are already starting to drop off the bushes, leaving behind tiny, newly-formed berries.

Spring fig leaves

The fig trees are quickly coming to life with gorgeous, fresh green leaves. Such a nice change from seeing bare twigs. The trees are quite prehistoric looking.

Thornless berry blossom

I've yet to discover which type of berry these thornless plants will produce. The blossom looks like it may be blackberry or boysenberry, but I have no idea really. Any guesses?

Dad cut out all the dead and damaged berry canes yesterday and I tied up the new fresh ones along a system of wires and posts. This really should have been done before the new canes sprouted leaves. Hopefully no damage has been done by doing this now.   

  

Yellow cherry guava buds

The yellow cherry guava tree is covered in little flower buds waiting to open. There are also some small cherry guavas on the tree still to ripen from last season.

Naval orange blossom

We finished harvesting the last of the naval oranges for the season a couple of weeks ago. Mum enjoyed eating the last one that was sitting in the fruit bowl today. They were very juicy, full of flavour and smelt delicious.

The orange blossom was opening on the tree while the oranges were ripening. There are hundreds of flowers waiting to be pollinated! It will be almost a year before we'll get more oranges from this tree. 

We need to continue to feed the tree with citrus tree food, and make sure that the soil doesn't dry out over Summer, so that the fruit will be juicy when it's time to pick them.

 

Feijoa buds and new leaves

The feijoa (pineapple guava) tree looks promising, it is full of flower buds waiting to open and there are lots of new leaves. I'm hoping that the tui birds that visit our garden will find the feijoa flowers to pollinate them. Tuis love to drink the nectar that the feijoa flowers produce.

 

Yellow wild strawberry flower

I discovered some wild strawberry clumps growing in the garden near the quince tree. Amazingly they have yellow flowers instead of white. I didn't realise, until I looked it up on the internet, that there are yellow-flowered wild strawberries as well as white ones. 

There was one tiny red strawberry on one plant which had been partly eaten by something. It didn't look appealing at all and hasn't been included in my list of fruit in my garden. I will let the blackbirds enjoy them if that's what they like :)

Plum blossom

The plum blossom is starting to open up and it smells lovely. There are quite a few buds on the tree :) The previous owner said that the tree is a Black Doris plum. We should hopefully get some plums from it around Christmas time.

The plum tree branches are covered in lichen, which I read is a sign of healthy air. I read that lichen doesn't harm the trees that it grows on. However, dad thinks that this tree is dying. I hope not. 

  

New quince leaves

This little cluster of leaves is the only sign of life on the quince tree so far. I'm hoping that there will be a lot more new growth to follow. 

We discovered the quince tree when we were tidying up some overgrown bushes. The tree was right in the middle and looking very sorry for itself. Dad gave the tree some fertilizer and we tidied up the weeds that were growing at its base.

I hope that the tree recovers as I've never tried quinces before, nor have I seen them for sale in the shops.

I'm having fun checking the fruit trees and bushes for new growth. I love the surprises I get each time I go out into our new garden, and there are so many good things to look forward to!

See you again soon. 

Hugs, Rose xxx