It's the weekend again!!

Ok, well news is....

The rainwater tank is full, the weeds are still loving the little bits of rain that we have been getting.

The veggie garden is still going well, it looked especially good this morning with the sun on it after we had a little rain last night, the plants are now big enough that they are (mostly) surviving two naughty chooks getting in there, scratching for tasty treats of grubs and caterpillars.In the bed next to the veggie patch is what I believe is a Satsuma Plum, last year it was looking quite sick, with almost half of it dead wood, and I think after our rather hot and dry summer this year it may be completely dead now. So this afternoons job is to get the secateurs out and see if I can find any non-dead wood, and if I cant then to pull it out and I will have myself another garden bed.

From the fruit trees that were planted last year the Almond tree has a few buds on it and is waiting to come into flower and the Apricot tree is showing signs of flowering too, there is deffinate dead branches that need to be cut off but some definite "alive" ones aswell, (see what happens with a little rain and no "easy-fix" poisons, I choose to think of it as "living mulch")
The two apples still have a few leaves on the tips of the branches, the lemonade tree is slowly putting out new leaves, but I will have to wait and see if the Satsuma plum and Peach tree have hung in there after last summer, I cant see any definite buds but they dont look dead either, so it is a wait and see thing.

This week I have gone out an bought more plants from our lovely Arid Land Nursery:

• Melaleuca Pentagona (0.5 x 3m high)
• Eremophilla Deticulata ssp trisulcata, pink (2m x 2m)
• Eremophill Serpens, red stamen
• Eremophilla alternifolia, Magenta (2.5m x 2.5m)
• Eremophilla Galbra Roseworthy, red (ground cover)
• Eremophilla Galbra hybrid, plum (0.5m x 2m)
  
• Grevillea Flora Mason (2m x 2m)
• Grevillea Ellendale Pool (ground covering, 1m x 2m)
  
• Chamelaucium sp, geraldton wax
• Hardenbergia violacea, Purple Coral Pea
  
• Hardenbergia violacea Rosea, Pink Coral Pea

Hopefully I will get a chance this weekend to get them in the ground some of them will go in the native garden out the back but I also want to try to get something growing out in the front yard that wont need lots of watering, so what used to be a rose garden I think I am hopping to turn into another bird attracting native garden.

So now I shall be off to enjoy what is left of this wonderful day outside in the garden.

The lesson of "a little bit, often"

Ok well I have realised that getting out in the garden and doing a little bit at a time can really help.

With being away and I have found the imense value of being able to spend half an hour here and there looking after the garden. When I go out to check the chooks for eggs and food and water each day, or just for a wonder around the garden in the afternoon, pulling a weed out here and there, or spending a few hours on the weekend, tidying things up (like weeding the veggie patch, and pulling out marshmallow plants (or whatever is starting to take over) when I come across them).

We have been having some rain here (so my garden and rain water tank is telling me - yes I might be a little nuts) so what has been barren ground has now turned into knee high weeds, which I know will die off once the weather warms up, and I will be left with the sticky skeletons of the once lush weeds.

The view from the inlet of the rainwater tank (5400L/1200G) only a couple more rungs and it will be overflowing

The last weekend I was home I did a quick calculation of the amount of weeds in the back yard and the time that it would take for me to pull them out, and came to the conclusion that the time I had would come nowhere near the time needed, so out came the whipper-snipper. After a few hours, a fuel refill, untangling line a few times, and a few breaks for me, the yard looked a little tidier. Hopefully by doing this (and yes I know it wont be a quick fix) I will stop some of the seeds forming and also create some mulch, might as well put those weeds to some use. One good thing is it has meant that the veggie patch is doing well.

Yes those rows are still there theres just a few weeds in there too.

This weekend it has been raining (well light showers here and there) but I did manage to get out and pull up the weeds in the "Native Garden". That one wasn't whipper-sniped because the weeds were taller than the plants, and I didn't want any "accidents" so after what didnt seem like that long we have plants again. I didnt take a before photo but you can see by the piles of weeds around the place it looks much better than it did, some of these would have been past knee height. The bricks are to stop the chooks from deciding that is a good place to have a dust bath, oblivious to the fact that there is a plant there that I want to stay in the ground!!! LOL. The chooks had a ball waiting to see what grubs and insects were being uncovered, of course for the sole purpose for them to eat.

I am still around!!!

Ok I just realised how long it has been since I have posted on here, well I guess I have a pretty good reason: work has me working out on the Oodnadata Track, near Oodnadatta, which is about a days drive from where I live, and I am spending a week at a time out there coming home for a few days in the office and then off again, so life has been kind of hectic.

While I am out on site we are lucky that we have working (sometimes not all that well) Satelite telephones and satelite (free to air) TV, definitely no internet where we are, not even on those fancy new mobile phones people are getting around with now days (no mobile coverage at all outside of the "major" towns like Coober Pedy.