Gardening fun

During the winter, I didn’t mow all that much. I mainly did the area right behind the house because we have been working on preparing to do the paving on the patio. With all the rain of late, that had gotten quite high in a very short time. This isn’t too unusual in winter though. The side of the house was far worse because that hadn’t been mowed for even longer. The grass doesn’t actually give proper coverage to any area in the backyard so mowing ended up being a hit and miss activity and a lot of sand joins the cut grass.

On Tuesday, we had an unseasonably warm day so I got outside to get some mowing done while it was reasonably dry. First I had to clean up messes from the dogs. This time their messes were mostly at the back, which is pretty unusual for them. Once I thought I had it clear, I started mowing, finding more stuff to clean up along the way. There are several large plastic pots out there that had really tall grass growing around it. I don’t always move them around but decided that grass had to go. So there was a lot of shifting things around while mowing. And pulling lots of clumps of grass by hand when it was too hard for the mower. I mustn’t forget all the large, prickly plants that are weeds though. They seemed to grow within a short time and some of them were quite large. Gloves are required for their removal and now I need another pair of gloves because holes have emerged in my current pair.

When the Scientist finished work, he came out and helped out with what I was doing and did some other required tasks out there. It took about three hours to get all the mowing done if I include all the down time to clear out grass from areas it wasn’t supposed to be growing. There’s a grevillea bush outside the side door that had become almost choked by the grass. Well, it wasn’t really choked because it seems to grow no matter what.

The whole back yard area is looking so much bigger and tidier now. We still have the bricks to pave on the patio but we should be organising that in the next few weeks.

It’s become quite obvious that we’ve made quite a few mistakes in our planting out back. We have way too many shrubs that have grown too big. We chose plants that grow up to three meters and really should have limited them to ones that are two meters. The bottlebrush trees are okay because they are more like trees than shrubs and can easily be trimmed so the base is clear of a lot of branches. But there are three that have overgrown really badly and we probably should just take them out sooner than later. One is covering Lego Lover’s window and blocks a lot of sun, but it’s leaning far in one direction and I can imagine it suddenly tipping over some time should we end up with too much rain or it just gets too top heavy. That grevillea that seemed choked with grass is like wildfire, spreading in all directions every time it gets cut back. It looks nice but it becomes a monster unless trimmed quite regularly. There is also the tea tree that took away a huge corner of the side garden. It’s been cut back to the base, more or less but there’s more to remove. We don’t really have tools to carry out the last part of this so it will likely need a professional to remove it. Plus there’s the one bottlebrush out in the back that has grown in too many directions and part of the trunk split at some point and we have doubts as to whether it will survive long term. More importantly now, there’s concern about it falling on the patio roof at some point should it become too unstable at the base. It’s going to leave a huge gaps and the sun will be far more intense there.

We now are considering what we might like to plant out there when the space is cleared. We’ve ideas of growing some dwarf fruit trees. Lime is one of the most likely options and if we could find an avocado tree in dwarf form, I think we might go for that.

There is also a proper hibiscus that has started to flourish out there. But I can see it growing into the corner of the patio so that needs to be shifted, but hopefully just a little way off from where it is. And there’s a solanum plant that is also right on the edge of the patio which needs to be moved. I don’t know where we will put that yet. Plus the two shrubs growing under the patio, of course. I’m pretty sure we will move those to the front yard.

Wednesday was supposed to be hotter than Tuesday and I had ideas of trying to get the front yard mowed. But the dogs had a grooming appointment and it was really hot and the winds were blowing hot air around. It wasn’t ideal for mowing at all. Later on it would have been more feasible because the winds shifted direction and the air was cooler. But it was still windy. But I had to be out to take my care-ee out for his aqua aerobics class in the evening so it wasn’t possible to start so late in the day.

The rain returned yesterday and seems set to be here at least through tomorrow. So further mowing is out of the question until it dries enough for me to feel safe using our electric mower. It’s still windy too.