Garden Bloggers' Bloom Day June 2013

It's hard to believe that it is more than a month since my last post and that I missed May Garden Bloggers Bloom Day completely. However, I am slowly making inroads trying to get the house in order and catch up with study for a short course I have enrolled in.

The garden has been neglected, but being wintertime here in Brisbane, I can almost get away with it. Unusually for this time of year, we have had a little rain. Although the shortest day of the year is only just around the corner and the temperature is dipping to around 20C by day and under 10C in the evening, there is still plenty of colour to be seen in my winter garden.

'Wilders White' Hibiscus

In the front garden, most of the colour comes courtesy of the aloes, several members of the sage and salvia family, and the deep red foliage of the Cordyline Rubra.

Looking across the front garden to the aloe and Hawaiian Fan Palm, the striped foliage in the foreground is a rhoeo.

Aloe 'Diana'

Afternoon light throught the cordylines.

   

Yucca 'Purple Royale' to the right of this Diana spike

Aloe 'Southern Cross' and grapetopetalum

On the driveway, the Strelitzia or Bird of Paradise are in bloom (and  Bella and Onslow are keeping up patrol duties)

Nandina

Interestingly, in the side garden my Brazilian Red Cloak is still putting on a great display, although it was back in March that I was admiring them in the City Botanic Garden. I like it with the dark foliage of the cordylines in the background, and I am leaving a similarly coloured euphorbia volunteer to the left of the red cloak for the same reason.

Brazilian Red Cloak Megaskepasma erythrochlamys

Three of the salvias are adding a pop of colour to the garden bed.

'Heatwave Sizzle'

Pineapple sage

'Hot Lips'

Two of the bromeliads are in flower. The top one is Aechmea 'Burning Bush'. I don't know the name of the other, but the bright purple and red combination make it one of my favourites.

All in all, the garden has held up quite well in spite of having been somewhat neglected while I've been busy.  Like Onslow I have been on the inside looking out, rather than out there getting my hands dirty. Hopefully, I will be able to turn that around by the time of my next garden report.

To see what is happening in other gardens around the world this Bloom Day, visit Garden Bloggers Bloom Day host Carol at May Dreams Gardens.

Splendid succulents

Before the last summer rains which culminated in the devastating January floods, Brisbane had been languishing in an extended drought over a number of years. This led to a major reassessment of how we used water.

Like many gardeners I had a water tank installed and followed council restrictions on water use. Of course, this also impacted on plant choice and my plans for a lush, tropical looking garden were revised to include drought tolerant plants and a 'Mexican garden' theme.

This time last year I potted up a selection of succulents. They have performed brilliantly, and many are quite transformed at the moment as they are covered in clusters of flowers at the ends of whimsical antennas.

Onslow inspecting the outdoor setting I bought at Easter with 'pot plant display out of puppy reach" in mind.

These gorgeous rosettes are three different types of succulent: golden Sedum nussbaumerianum, blue graptopetalum and green echeveria.

As it looks now, in bud.

The same type of graptopetalum in its own pot.

Now cascading down the side of the pot.

Echeveria 'Doris Taylor' planted in one of the side pockets of a strawberry pot.

Other inhabitants of the strawberry pot: Sedum pachyphytum, not sure what the rosette is, and Portulacaria afra 'Variegata'.

Loved the effect of a morning shower on these three different rosettes.

Detail of the flowerhead on the echeveria in the mixed pot.

This book has been a brilliant introduction to gardening with succulents, and has been a great help with identification. Many I bought weren't labelled, or else just had a very generic (and unhelpful) 'succulent' tag. Hope I got them right!