Hooray our wee garden survived our long absence in spite of our cobbled-together irrigation system and masses of snails - and no TLC! What we came home to was actually a bit of a jungle.
We gathered as many of these hungry little gastropods as we could find and in the garbage they went. Some tried to escape up the wall - I hate killing them but ..... maybe I should find out how to prepare them for a tasty entree!
We’re actually still finding a few carrots hiding in the garden. .
After clearing away dead stuff plus bags of errant passionfruit trailers which had grown out of the root stock and were clinging lovingly to almost everything, under all that tangle, low and behold we found some welcome-home pressies. Pretty sweet peas (Lindsay’s favourites and which have put in quite a burst of growth since we’ve been home), bunches of carrots, armfuls of silver beet (in spite of the snails!), masses of herbs - AND a few passionfruit plus more to come judging by the presence of a few flowers. The gorgeous pale green orbs had to be hauled back over the ‘fence’ because they were dangling over the footpath 5 floors below. Wow!! Clever garden.
In the side garden, it was rather a mess, fragrant and pretty, but still a mess because the trellis, with its luxuriant perfumed Chinese star jasmin attached, had become detached from the wall (the glass wall of the terrace). We were chuffed however to find some broad beans (enough for a meal and the rest only good for seed stock) and a couple of dozen baby figs (now there are 5-6 dozen)! Under the thick blanket of Chinese jasmin and trellis, I found both the native Billardiera scandens (apple-berry), a passionfruit vine (which I had rescued from the community garden) trying valiantly to wave long trailers of pretty leaves and tendrils, and our one and only precious Helleborus (winter rose) still hanging in there. We have installed a new trellis since and the vines are all firmly fixed back in place and are looking OK.
It’s a tiny garden by almost all standards but after storms, winds and sizzling days we were tickled pink to find it so ‘healthy’ and edible. We've planted a few veggies but we will be on the road again in less than 4 months (fingers crossed) so have restricted our planting to flowering plants for the bees and other insects and those veggies we can harvest before we go. Now it's time for some serious training in readiness for our next adventure!
While on the road I managed to get in some knitting and crocheting for KOGO and I am still going strong finishing a vivid jellybean-themed afghan rug for the bed in the caravan (12 or so more squares to go and then the ghastly task of hooking them all together - not looking forward to that but ....). And of course I’ll be packing kilos of yarn when we head off in April for another Australian Odyssey.
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