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Jack Holloway
Passionate Gardener
SEQUOIA FARM Haenertsburg South Africa
More autumn!10 Apr '06 7:09 am
Here are as few more pics taken in the last days. Today was damp and the dogs and I had a wonderful walk. Everywhere autumn is bursting forth (well if spring can, why can't autumn  )and we arrived home sopping wet after pushing through some long grasses and wild shrubs that had collapsed across a path; the growth in the last weeks of this very wet summer has been phenomenal! (some stats: we averaged 11mm per day for the first three months of the year. Maximum temperatures I guess must have averaged 25C; yet we had plenty of sun too. Result: BIOMASS!)
from damwall.JPG
As I have dreamt for years, the red plane is now reflecting beautifully when seen from the dam wall. The rounded red tree is a purple Japanese maple only just turning for autumn. There is still two months of colour to come from here!
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from bottom of meadow.JPG
The foreground and the undergrowth across the dam are all indigenous growth, only slightly managed.
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Meadow flowers.JPG
Photographed in the meadow next to my cottage, Verbena boranariensis is a welcome naturalised exotic, whilst Leonotis leonurus is literally on its home turf.
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Jack Holloway
Passionate Gardener
SEQUOIA FARM Haenertsburg South Africa
My climate10 Apr '06 8:23 pm
Hi Pumpkin! - I was going to point you to the plane posting - but you found it: not so pumpkin after all  . Only 1km from me there are places that don't get frost. My cottage is right on the water near the bottom of a long valley. 'Hot' air from the sub-tropical low-lying Lowveld (think Krugar Park and African bush) pushes over the mountain and then slowly descends. Cold air drops, so as it drops it gets colder. (If my physics are vaguely right!)My winter (mid May to Mid Aug) minimum temperature often drops to freezing, or even -5C, with frost that can lie like snow. By 10am it has all gone and winter day-time temps are seldom under 15C. Winters tend to be dry and sunny - much sunnier than summer, when we often have cloud cover and even very misty weather. On the whole it is - by South African standards - a very temperate climate without the extremes of heat, cold and drought that characterise much of the very high-lying hinterland of the country, or the heat of the sub-tropics. Therefore a good place for beautiful trees and autumn colour - our main claim to fame. (Don't tell any Ozzies this, but that is why I'd rather visit NZ than OZ  )
Tell me more about gardening in Auckland and your trees in particular!
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Jo-Anne
valued helper
Ontario, Canada
More Autumn!11 Apr '06 3:06 pm
Wonderful job, Jack! Love your fall pics! I can't even imagine what trees/shrubs have turned those unbelieveably beautiful colours in the 1st pic, and I love the mix of the purple and orange flowers in the last pic. Real eye-candy! You surely have two green thumbs! Thanks for sharing. Jo-Anne 
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Jack Holloway
Passionate Gardener
SEQUOIA FARM Haenertsburg South Africa
Pics taken 11 April12 Apr '06 8:49 pm
Had a lovely walk yesterday; here are some more pics I took on the walk.
Hawkweed & everlastings.JPG
A few pics to show the wild aspects of the garden - those wonderful insidents you chance on when all of nature is really a garden...
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wild garden.JPG
These very architectural plants are a feature of late summer; they have felted leaves and these wonderful stems - not yet in seed! -which give a ghost-like presence to the plant. I MUST identify them and experiment with them in a garden context (something
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hypericum.JPG
This is one of two indigenous hypericums (St John's Wort) that grow on the farm. It can become an untidy woody 4m shrub eventually, but starts off with many single stems about 1m long. It flowers profusely through autumn and early winter, sporadically for
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Jack Holloway
Passionate Gardener
SEQUOIA FARM Haenertsburg South Africa
Pics taken 11 April12 Apr '06 8:50 pm
Had a lovely walk yesterday; here are some more pics I took on the walk.
Hawkweed & everlastings.JPG
A few pics to show the wild aspects of the garden - those wonderful insidents you chance on when all of nature is really a garden...
60.43 KB / Viewed 128 Time(s)
wild garden.JPG
These very architectural plants are a feature of late summer; they have felted leaves and these wonderful stems - not yet in seed! -which give a ghost-like presence to the plant. I MUST identify them and experiment with them in a garden context (something
68.01 KB / Viewed 136 Time(s)
hypericum.JPG
This is one of two indigenous hypericums (St John's Wort) that grow on the farm. It can become an untidy woody 4m shrub eventually, but starts off with many single stems about 1m long. It flowers profusely through autumn and early winter, sporadically for
28.8 KB / Viewed 124 Time(s)
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Liza
gardening consultant
Waterloo, Belgium
Just beautiful,....12 Apr '06 9:14 pm
...Jack! And not only as photos in an objective way, presenting the beautiful Nature you are surrounded with ; they are beautiful photos artistically! Which means, you are a good photographer, as well..
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janbay
distinguished helper
walh on the wild side28 Apr '06 6:00 am
hi jack my goodness i could never imagine that africa was so beautiful, as that we always see the bare plains and poor areas like in the ones where they are wanting donations to help the poor. i noticed that on your walk you came across a wild animal?? by the way do you get any bigger wild life as in the true african game aroun your place !!!! scary thought  
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Jack Holloway
Passionate Gardener
SEQUOIA FARM Haenertsburg South Africa
Wild animals5 May '06 3:56 am
See my new post for an answer, janbay!
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lol... still love your pics!
