Never apologise...
Bees on Salvia
Never apologise, right? So a garden visitor from England appears out of the blue, and much of my garden is uber-messy. Eucalyptus leaves cover the gardens, lawns and paths, so walking anywhere is 'crackle and crunch' noisy. My March mess is out of control, and I spend an uncomfortable hour apologising. Aargh!
Show the visitor the messy places...
And, rather than be selective and show off the prettiest gardens (there are some), I show my visitor all the messy places. How silly! I go on and on about the big gum trees, the cause of much of my March anguish - launching into detailed explanations about how I hate double handling, and I can't burn the rubbish yet because there's a total fire ban. I splutter some more about how gum leaves cannot be successfully composted. I even show the visitor my piles of rubbish along the fence-line. Why on earth do this?
Off I go again, explaining. My fence-lines are full of twice as much burnable rubbish as much as last year, a lot more gum tree rubbish and gum leaves. Oh, and Cordyline and Phormium leaves - no easy way to get rid of these other than bonfiring. Or spending hundreds of dollars taking trailer-loads to the tip. At the moment there's a total fire ban...
Mess on the Fence Line
We shuffle through the snap-crackle-pop Wattle Woods path, where my hoses are on, watering the Camellias. I then make THE silliest of Garden Tour Guide mistakes. It's early autumn. 'Oh, you should see this garden in spring', I gush, dodging some dead Astelia leaves. 'The Camellias are just gorgeous then.' And I apologise. Again. For the mess.
It gets worse. We wander over to the shelter belt of Leyland Cypress, which I indicate proudly, including the mess piled up underneath. Oops. I sense that my visitor (English) does not approve. The southerly! I try to explain - it's a nasty wind, cold and rainy, sourced from down there near Antarctica...
Leyland Shelter Hedge
Saturday 9th March
Today the dogs and I went around the garden revisiting the messy places. I love having dog company - no need to apologise to them, no excuses needed. But I'm still struggling with garden-guilt. I admit it - I've been a bit garden lazy, and it's as if my visitor caught me in the act. The Hen House Garden is a disgrace - I could park the trailer over there, fill it four or five times, and still have more mess to rake and trim. More shrubs to prune, more trees to clean-up. I wish I could have raked the paths for the visitor.
Me Working in My Messy March Garden
The dogs and I ínspect the Pond Paddock gardens. And we notice (well, I notice) how terribly tall and bulky all the trees have grown. It's become a dry, shady forest, and the lawn isn't happy.
Pebbles with Fred Kitten
When?
So when did all this skyward growth happen? And more to the point, how and when will I modify the gardens beneath? A truckload of shrubs for dry shade? I could at least shift some of the struggling plants, yes? So I've put the hoses on the Camellias again - when in doubt, put the hoses on. I need to think, think, think really clearly - I also need to start digging, shifting, and trimming. It must be possible to organise this messy, over-grown place. Bring in the bulldozers? Hmm. Tempting...
Later...
I've made a start. I've shifted some dahlias and some sad roses, and dug out two clumps of the lovely ornamental grass Miscanthus zebrinus. These have all has been replanted in the sunny Hump Garden. Have I redeemed myself? The dogs don't really care. 'Throw the stick'...