Close-up of cover plant that had nice red flowers. It grows without any effort on our part. Looks very nice in the mornings when wet with dew.
More of the garden
Garden panorama
This is a number of shots merged together. It looks terribly small here, doesn't it?
So click on it and see it as it should be seen!
Junk and Rose
Right there in front of the garden shed, those two white structures, one resting on the other. Two potted plant 'surrounds' or 'enclosures'. You place potted plants within them so the pots are not seen.
Picked them from the lot left outside by neighbour Kate Sorenstam for removal by council. Sold them a year later for $1 each at our garage sale.
That rose (below) was a potted 'standard' outside the lounge patio.
The steps were paving slabs discarded by a new resident in the neighbourhood.
looking good
The garden bench was cemented to some hardcore and was too much trouble to be brought down to new ground level and so the floral bed had to incorporate it as is.
Gave rise to the need for some 'stepping up' from pea gravel path implemented with discarded remnant narrow long bricks from a new house being constructed nearby.
That's a letterbox, not a birdhouse.
Those three grasstrees were salvaged from a lot where a new house was being built. Sadly they didn't make it.
That framework guard was another something we picked up.
See that Frangipani cutting from Vincent's house two streets away in same estate? Actually, it was an overhanging branch from his neighbour's tree.
All in, we derived three nice cuttings from the pruning of those overhanging branches.
All three established successfully in a few weeks.
That long bendy stalk-like skinny thing just behind the tin watering can is an inflorescence of one of the succulents in the groundbed.
That circular cobblestone feature cost $110. Consisted of quadrants of cobblestones on string mat to facilitate laying out. Needed minor adjustments to get the size to suit site, leaving some spares. We planted multicoloured Portulaca in the central space. And filled gaps with very small sized (really 'pea-sized') pea gravel.
Notice those two pot surrounds in the bed behind? We planted two Woolly Bushes in that bed.
The freshly laid paved area in the backyard with spaces filled with gravel. Weeds came up out of those gaps but were easily plucked out or sprayed with Zero weedkiller. Not a problem.
The boardwalk material was treated and varnished hardwood remnants from construction of a staircase in a neighbouring lot. Real heavy stuff, almost broke my back lugging them. This boaedwalk is at the rear of the house. Those lallang-like leaves are from one of the few varieties of Kangaroo's Paws. This one had yellow flowers. Nearside bed was Penny's herb plot.
See the new anaks growing from the succulent 'leaflets' ?
Paving the backyard
With the backyard levelled to patio floor level to enable easy walk-across, it was between returfing or paving.
Chose to pave, bought pavers from WA Salvage 30 pieces per trip as they are laid. Loaded, unloaded, fetched in, and laid, all done by the two of us.
The two cute kiddy chairs were picked up for $2 each at the flea market in Wanneroo (first Sunday each month).
That's the kitchen window in the centre of the photograph.
Beyond that is the patio off the Formal Lounge.
Click on photo to see lots more details.
The orange tree in foreground; grapefruit behind it.
Watch that bed where the pink and blue chairs are. It's barren here but will be full in next few photos.
The new paved area is linked to the garage by a snakey path laid over with pea gravel.
Decided against an underlayer (to prevent remnant grass coming up) as that would mean more work.
Pea gravel bought by the 30 kg bags from Soils aint Soils.
All sorts of pots
More little pots of succulents all over the place. These two are on an old birdstand.
The wooden crosspiece is for the bird to perch on, and the tray holds all food bits, droppings, etc. Bought it for $2 at the Canning Vale flea market.
The floral design mosaic was an easy weekend project.
That's (above) one of the many Fuchsias in Penny's collection, of a nice soft pink watercolour.
That's fresh cuttings in the wicker basket.And that's a small brass coal tender picked up at a garage sale.
All sitting on the barbie in the backyard patio.
Some colour
Ahh, here are the Orange, Grapefruit and Kamquat trees, from right to left. There's a bit of view of the thick and gnarled-skinned lime to the right of the orange tree ie nearest the garden shed.
There's no soil, just thick fine sand; which wasn't great as a source of plant nutrients but provided excellent drainage.
One of the many Zygoes that Penny bought from The Dutch Windmill nursery. The made in China pot was $3 from Bunnings.
See the path towards the garage? That's what's 'created' out of the garden floor after we formed the shrub beds.
Two hanging pot plants. The longer one is hanging from a corner roof eave rafter. Quite in the way and gave us a few good knocks when cornering too closely.
See the rose motif mosaic table top? All my own work! The metal table frame was bought at a flea market.
See the little succulent 'anaks' in the germination tray in the photo on the right? Give a bit of time and they'll be like the grand daddy hanging there.
Succulents
Ended up with different types of hanging pots to contain our pendulous plants most of which are succulents.
They required to be 'turned' every month or so to encourage even growth on all sides.
That's a Zygo in the foreground pot on the left. Had the prettiest white/pink/mauve/purple colours in the winter.
These pots are hanging from the pergola outside the formal lounge behind that white French door.
Close-up of 4 types of succulents.
Garden before makeover
This was taken in Feb 2004, before the garden makeover. Taken from rear of garage. The palms are from rear neighbour's backyard. There were 8 along our common boundary frnce !! They drop small messy flowers and seeds which germinate easily but slowly in our property. The palm fronds drooop very low and we could standing on our feet reach up and tarek them! They drop when dead; dangerous! The leaflets from the palm fronds cause chokage to roof gutters and downpipe, requiring constant removals. Once we didn't clear them and they choked water flow in winter so badly that gutters overflowed and sogged up ceilings under the roof eaves! So check out next door neighbours' trees and vegetation before you buy a property.
Two large hanging pots of Burro's Tail. Extremely heavy those pots. I think at least one of them was a repot as the original broke with the weight of the heavy plant and soil ! They grow very easily. No effort once you've placed them (no need to stick into soil or even provide layer to cover them!) into a pot and hung it aside and arranged for regular watering which I provided via connections to the garden's water reticulation system.
The Burro's Tails are very sensitive to touch and clothes brushing them when we walked too close caused the little 'anaks' to drop off and get crushed underfoot. We simply picked or swept them up and dropped them into other hanging pots nearby. Gave away numerous little pots of Tails to admirers.
This is one of the many citrus trees; a Grapefruit. The fruits are hugmongous, juicy and beautiful. Unfortunately they were neither sweet nor sour.
Citrus
This is the Orange tree, still young about 3 years. Note the poor lawn condition. Didn't like it as the ground level was higher than the patio floor level. We had it cut to patio floor level at cost of about $300. The contractor took almost a day to cut the soil and cart it away, a one-man job, with a small Dingo excavator. Still, it required the temporary take-down of the rear garage roller door to get into our yard.
Here's a shot of the Grapefruit in which we can see the reduced ground level.
That there is a nice little timber bench we picked up from amongst the junk thrown out by a house for council removal.
These are some of the fruits from the garden. Thin-skinned oranges and kamquats.
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