Late spring into early summer in my garden

in #gardenjournal20195 years ago (edited)

Although spring and summer are considered growing times, I'll start with some plants I grow that go to sleep in summer:

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Tylecodon Paniculatus

These plants are found in very hot arid areas which tend to receive most rain in winter so during summer, they lose their leaves and only start growing again when the weather cools. If you water them when they are dormant, they rot so I just put them in a cool, semi-shaded area and forget about them for a few months.

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Conophytum obcordellum makes a tiny new set of leaves and shrinks into the dried shells of the old leaves

In contrast, these lithops are early bloomers. They have recently shed the old leaves and surprised me with a flower.

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Lithops pseudotruncatella, subspecies dendriticum, native to Namibia

I did a lot of repotting and tidying and pest removal a few months ago and many plants are growing with renewed vigour.

aristaloe aristata.jpg
Aritaloe aristata was badly pot-bound and had become infested with ants and aphids but has recovered nicely

aloe karasbergensis.jpg
A subspecies of Aloe striata, this attractive variant is karasbergensis and growing well now that it's in a bigger pot. It's naturally browner with stripes but I'll expose it to more sun as it gets bigger.

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A medusoid Euphorbia that I bought in a junk shop, doing much better in a bigger pot. I'll only know what it is once it flowers though, many of these look very similar

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The buggy Phalaenopsis orchids I got from my mother have recovered well and one has even flowered

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The vegetables are growing well now that it is raining and I have already harvested beans, kale and zucchini

Some very old brinjal seeds I sowed didn't germinate so I bought a tray of seedlings. The problem with these seedlings is that they are old, sown two to a compartment and were heavily pot-bound. I was loathe to just kill off half the seedlings so I decided to separate them. I rinsed off all the soil in a bowl of water and teased the roots loose with a toothpick and then pulled them apart. There was a fair amount of root damage but I put them back into soil, watered heavily and left them under a tree to recover. So far, so good and I have doubled the number of plants. I'm gradually exposing them to more sun so that they can survive the transition into the vegetable patch which is extremely hot and sunny right now.

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Finally, the next insane project: my garden has always been an ugly wasteland that I have tackled piece by piece and I have been renovating the cottage so the builders have created an even worse mess. Before I start showing the place to tenants, I will need to do something about all this. It's not just a matter of clearing rubble and planting though, the soil is stony and full of building rubble and will need some sieving in the areas I wish to plant anything more than grass.

I have started but it's too hot to do much. There are also 2 Privet stumps that need removing. Luckily the rubble beneath has prevented the roots from going very deep so theoretically, it should be easier. I'll see when I get there. It's extremely hot right now, not a good time for digging but I'm on it, I will show progress photos soon (hopefully).

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Published as part of @simplymike's November garden journal challenge

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Desert plants cab be so beautiful..

They have a charm all of their own

Looking good. Exciting times ahead :0)

Those seedlings in the one-before-last picture, what are those? I looked up 'brinjal', and it gave me something that looked like eggplants. is that correct?
(I have never grown eggplant myself, so I don't know what it looks like. Looks like those are gonna grow into beautiful plants.)

Thanks for joining again.

Thank you!

Yes, a brinjal is an eggplant, it's the name I grew up with. You get white-skinned fruit eggplant varieties that actually look like eggs but I have never been able to call the large black fruit types eggplants. They should do well once they are out of the trays and into soil.

Can't wait to see them grow.

Wow!you have been working too hard!!
But your effort is laying off! Lots of flowers and vegetables! Amazing really!

That orchid is lovely!

Yes, the work is finally starting to look like something. I was pleasantly surprised by that orchid

Love the look of that vege patch, looks productive!!

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Thanks! I finally got it that way with terracing, sieving the soil down to bedrock to take out all the rocks, rubble and other crap and tons of compost, hopefully this patch of soil has turned a corner



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Hola amiga. Como siempre tienes unos bellos cactus y, algunos florecidos. Vi una planta de maíz, y unas de berenjenas, un éxito tu último trabajo de jardín.
Y que les pasó a los gatitos?, esta vez no robaron cámara. Saludos.

Amazing plants!!

Thank you!

It's good that you are going to make your home garden. In a hot climate this is wonderful.

It helps a lot to have my own fresh vegetables

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Wow, nice flowers photography.