A new year, a new beginning...the January garden.

January 2018  Happy New Year

Welcome to a new year in the garden

Some of the birds visiting every day; there are many more, some are seasonal.

I do not like birds to be caged. I think it is very sad for a bird to be caged. Think, to be able to fly and be caught behind bars. It is very cruel. If…I would ban to cage birds all over the world.

Water bowl for bees.

China Rose, Old Blush, also called Parson's Pink. Bees love them, always swarming with bees. This rose is flowering through summer, winter, spring and autumn. It is a simple rose but amazing, very beautiful. The first rose from China introduced to Europe to create Tea-roses. Probably cultivated in China before the 10th century. 

I prune the spend flowers and on goes the flowering. 

Food and water is paramount for roses.

January, summer, heat, clouds, storms, thunder and lightening...

13/01/2018

Slowly moving and getting used to a new year. As usual this time of year it is hot and humid around 34 - 35 C

The kitchen garden produces now Melons and Pumpkins, later also sweet potatoes. Early mornings are reserved for the kitchen garden to keep it tidy and watered.









That's I there wading through the pumpkin leaves.







Pumpkins are classified as fruit not as vegetable.  Aren't they just absolutely marvellous?



Looking over to the neighbour's property, beautiful native tree flowering now. I think this is Buckinghamia celsissima, commonly known as the ivory curl. A species of trees, constituting part of the plant family Proteaceae. They grow naturally only in the wet tropics rainforests areas of north eastern Queensland, Australia. 



Dwarf Dahlia are flowering now on the upper Terrace gardens where the Kitchen garden is located.





Catharantus  are pretty toughies, they do not need special coaxing to look so friendly and pink





The pretty old rose Amelia Anderson. A Bishop's Lodge Rose. The old roses are making buds again now. As small vases I use empty perfume bottles. Generally they are so pretty and well made that it  is a shame just to discard them. I take off  the spray thingy which sometimes can be a pain in the butt to do, as it generally does not come off easily.



Here is another one;


28/01/2018

“Hope
Smiles from the threshold of the year to come, 
Whispering 'it will be happier'...” 
― Alfred Tennyson


It seems it was a long month, hot and dry;

The garden looks fairly dry, looking forward to some rain. A few spits today.




Waterlilies are flowering well now.




Mussaenda has no problem with dryness.




Grevillias do not mind it either, Australian natives are used to dryness.




Even the bog garden dried out and I had to water the water hungry, liefy plants.









Daisy kind of flowers, as the name suggests pretty, straight forward no glam. great for the dry garden, no fuss no drama with these plants from South Africa.








The  first page of the new year has already some scribbles, little notes of another beginning, still shrouded in cobwebs sticky and opaque, waiting for the time to move forward, today, tomorrow...Ts

31/01/2018



Every day this lizard makes a visit from  the wild garden. Goes for a swim in the pond.




I do enjoy the Dahlias, they have suffered in the hot and dry. Now after some rain they are fine again.







Good bye Lulu, you were a favourite visitor. Lulu has joined her friends over the rainbow and rests in the garden. She was 13 Years old.



Sunrise

The sentence is spoken there is no  return 31 days  have flown the roost, good, bad or wonderful it does not matter anymore. The first 31 days of the  new year are gone, have already become part of that little piece of sky you may see from a quick, backward glance.. ..

Maybe I see you around  in February.

©Photos/ Texts etc.  Ts Lavender and Vanilla.