How did the garden cope?

Posted on 3 Oct, 2008 2 comments

Before I go back to “my gardens” stories, I just like to tell about how I found my garden back.
Well, 4 weeks long no one could look after the garden. My daughter was here looking after the dogs and fish and as she works days and evenings from home; I could not ask her to water the garden as well. Besides a few dry looking plants, everything survived.
I talked to her on skype from Holland and was pleased to hear there had been nearly one inch of rain in the first week. The soil here is very good and as I have mulched everywhere it kept the grounds from drying out. Being in the hills and often almost touching the clouds, the grass gets damp during the night from condensation. This kept it almost green everywhere, but also since I really poured it on just before leaving. Most plants have hollowish and strong stems in which they retain a lot of water, like helicionia’s and gingers. I have dozens of native trees, which of course survive regardless.
In the short time I was away the garden had a complete metamorphose; some trees had nearly lost their leaves being semi or dormant, and now they have lovely light green leaves. The Evodiella muelleri is in flower again, so great to see some colour ( pink ) on those bare branches, the Curcuma australasica ( herb ) suddenly has shot up and flowered. A little native tree of which I will take some pics soon, suddenly has many golden shower bouquets hanging down, which looks so springy. And last but not least ( but I haven’t made a full round yet ) is the white Etlingeria elatior, which is a great surprise as there never were any last year. I have about 20 of them standing proudly on their own in between their parent stems and leaves. I have no other way to describe this, but rhyzomes like that, do shoot up their own flowers. They do not appear on the parent stem. I am now hoping they will all open, as most of the red ones now have finished flowering. Sometimes I think that plants do better when neglected a bit. They seem to flower as if they want to make a last bid to surivive by giving seeds for the next generation. Not a bad thought anyway.
Although the Roystonea regia and the Ptychosperma macarthurii palms do much better with abundance water, they do survive periods of drought. All in all, everything is still alive and I have been watering this week to give them all a good drink again. Last night it rained 8.5 mm, so today I can have a rest.
I am happy to be back in my own garden, I still prefer the tropical plants to the ones in Holland, even though they have some wonderful flowers, shrubs and trees. I loved the acorns there, so cute!