Gardening Archives - Page 3 of 17

Salvia cultivation; what are the best growing conditions?

November 23, 2017November 30, 2017 Stephen Carlin

Salvia cultivation overall tends to be straightforward. They are on the whole undemanding plants with a few pests and a few basic needs. There are a few generalisations that can be made. As a group, they tend to like deep, well drained soil, and are not overly fussy about pH or soil nutrients. Of course the more you get to know them the more you see that they are a diverse group and have a matching range of optimal growing conditions, which you can use to your advantage in siting…

Salvia involucrata, a big showy subtropical sage

August 24, 2017April 30, 2019 Stephen Carlin

For sheer size and winter colour, Salvia involucrata varieties are outstanding in our subtropical garden. This is the original salvia in our collection. When we first moved into Hill House there was a well established patch growing at one of the entrance gates. It’s well away from the current house but nicely placed on the driveway to announce the house paddock with big pink flowers from autumn to spring.

Salvia elegans, pineapple sage

May 25, 2017March 16, 2021 Stephen Carlin

Pineapple sage, with its brilliant red flowers, scented leaves and neat shape, is a wonderful plant for the garden. The botanical name is Salvia elegans. I got my first pineapple sage plant as a scrawny slip from the $2 stand at a local nursery. I had never heard of it before, but the scent of the leaves made it seem like like a good addition to the herb garden. When it grew to a good-sized bush and was covered with red flowers through the first winter, I came to realise its true worth in the…

Salvias, six months on

March 23, 2017 Stephen Carlin

Six months after buying my first serious lot of salvias, they are looking great. They have flowered through an unusually harsh summer with some weeding and a few waterings to keep them from wilting. On the back of that success I have recently acquired another 26 to expand the collection. The first twelve When I first decided to try salvias it was hard to know which ones to order. Fortunately Sue Templeton at Unlimited Perennials offers sets of 12 of her choice which she selects for your conditions, so I…

Salvia ‘amistad’ makes a pretty Spring show

November 23, 2016December 21, 2016 Stephen Carlin

Salvia ‘amistad’ was the first of my new salvias to make an eye-catching show in the garden. Very soon after planting, it put on good new growth through August (late Winter), and followed with spikes of beautiful flowers.

Salvias, a new garden theme

October 21, 2016December 7, 2016 Stephen Carlin

For the past couple of months I have been establishing a Salvia (sage) garden. They seem to be an ideal plant for our conditions, and I’m hoping they will have the potential to fill the bank under the house with colour and interest. Usually with Salvias you think of the eye-catching red and blue bedding types, which are always available in punnets for seasonal colour, but the variety of forms and colours goes way beyond those two, and collections of more than a hundred types seem to be standard with…

June herbs from the garden

June 27, 2016July 14, 2016 Stephen Carlin

Midwinter here can be a little cool and gloomy when the clouds make an even cover all day, but it’s never long before we get some beautiful sun again. Our garden is productive right through Winter, and that includes aromatic leaves to pick for the kitchen; the June herbs. I thought I’d do an inventory of what I can pick, and maybe follow it with Spring and Summer versions. This is what I found on a walk round. Clockwise from the left, in an inward spiral, they are: lemongrass, curry…

Loofah: vegetable and scrubber in one

June 6, 2016 Stephen Carlin

This Summer I tried growing loofahs for the first time. I sowed a few seeds in with the green beans and cucumbers thinking that they could share the fence and trellis, and it turned out to be a good strategy. The loofah is a rampant vine, but it is slow to get going in early Summer, so my beans and cucumbers were finished before the loofahs took over. By Autumn my few plants had spread way beyond their bed, and right along the two fences of the vegetable patch available to…

A new produce basket for collecting the harvest

April 21, 2016April 21, 2016 Stephen Carlin

Our friend Sue gave us this lovely wire produce basket, which she found in a local market. I think it is going to be very handy for collecting produce from the garden. It’s quite sturdy, made of hexagonal weave wire around a rigid frame, with a wooden grip where the two handles meet. I’ve been using whatever comes to hand to collect from the garden, but this is definitely the best so far. Calico bags are handy to carry but everything gets jumbled in, which means that the delicate things…

Snake beans to black eyed peas; beans for humid Summers

February 1, 2016September 4, 2017 Stephen Carlin

I used to pass snake beans by in the green grocer, mainly because they weren’t a familiar vegetable, but also because I didn’t imagine that the long floppy ropes of bean could be as tasty as the standard round and flat green beans. I was wrong, and they are a great crop for humid summers.