Winter bulbs

I've had very little experience with growing plants from bulbs. But the one experience that I had, was totaly worth it!

In our Melbourne garden, we planted bulbs of Jonquil early in our gardening days. They flowered every winter and multiplied over time. They were the only flowers that were flowering through the cold months and could be seen from the kitchen window. In addition to looking pretty, they had a heavenly scent. I loved them. 

This winter we decided to bring in some bulbs for our pots. We had less expectations from them because we don't get any sunlight, but were pleasently surprised.

The first bulb we bought were Muscari or Grape Hycianth. We've had Hycianths before in Melbourne. They smelled lovely too, but did not grow very well. In subsequent years they stopped growing. 

I used the IFFCO soil to grow these bulbs as I wanted them to get a good start.

Planting in Dec'21

The Muscari is a very small plant. This flower was smaller than my palm. Here I've grown it into a small container that was used to serve takeaway fries. Despite the small size, it had a lovely scent.

Muscari

Another bulb we got were Lily. We've never grown lillies because of the dogs (they are poisonous to them), but now they are old enough to avoid plants that are not good for them. We bought yellow Lily, which is looking spectacular when blooming!

Yellow Lily

Amongst other plants, we did get a Strawberry plant too. It managed to give one fruit before realising that there is no sun to support it's growth!

Strawberry

Finally, we did buy bulbs of Narciss too. But they did not flower due to the lack of sun. Hopefully they will flower when we move to our new home!

Summer round up - 1

Not much is happening this season as we did not plant any new vegetables. Vegetable grow quickly, so there is something new every week. Fruits take so much longer!

Guava – I saw 8 flower buds in December. These have now become fruit. The fruit are still in the growing phase, so they are only as big as a strawberry, but still, getting there!

Fruit in February'16

Strawberry – Speaking of strawberry, we discovered a hidden stash of strawberries growing deep within the plant. I had given up hope as for the last two years we had lost our crop to a pest. But my aunt and uncle, who came to stay for a day, found them. They were really healthy and much bigger than we have had before. More are expected, equally big in size I hope!

Strawberries

Promise of more Strawberries!

Melon – I planted three melon seeds from a fruit that was store bought. One of them germinated and is now trailing along the width of the vegetable patch. The yellow flowers are quite striking, but were slow to attract pollinators. Now, I can see a couple of fruits forming. I am not sure whether they have enough time to grow and ripen before the winter comes. As I understand it, they need a lot of heat to ripen. But, look like the fruit is doing just fine! The photo on the left is from 22nd February, the right photo is from 26th February. Look at how much it has grown in  4 days!

Melon - photos are 4 day apart

Pomegranate – As usual, the tree had a zillion flowers during spring. Many looked like they would become fruit, but fell off. I read somewhere that pomegranate should be planted in a sheltered position, with less wind. Unfortunately, ours is not and Melbourne can get quite windy. That is why most fell off…save one. This flower was right at the bottom of the tree and we almost missed it. Now it’s quite well grown. The tree we bought does claim to give a large fruit, bigger than one’s palm. Let’s see whether that happens.

Lone pomegranate

Lime – We are plagued by the Citrus gall wasp, which is common in Australia. It burrows a hole in the stem to lay its eggs. These are characterised by bumps and lumps in the stem. I tried to snip off those branches last year after the eggs had been laid, but I think I succeeded partially only. Hence, this year too we got lots of leaves, but no flowers. A month ago, we saw a bunch of them in the stems at the back (which incidentally did not have any visible citrus gall wasp infestation). These now look like potential lime. It is ironic that this was the first plant we bought (2011) because we genuinely eat lots of lime and it is quite expensive here.

Lime

Potato – Potato still surprises me by growing from a different spot every year! I have no idea how it travels from one end to the other of the 7 ft vegetable patch, but I swear it does! This year we got three plants, which I harvested a couple of weeks ago. The potato were quite tiny, but so delicious.

The other potential vegetable harvests like Broccoli, Asparagus and Herbs did not do well. I was only able to harvest a few Chives and Basil. Everything else was too minimal to harvest, so I let them take a break and go to seed :D

Just yesterday, I cleaned out the vegetable bed of the dead Virginian Stock and unearthed what looks to be a chilli plant. I had small chillies growing in that spot in 2015 summer and the plant looks like that. I am now debating whether to bring it indoors for winter. It will certainly not have enough time to grow, flower AND provide chillies before the winter comes.

Chilli

Preparing for winter

Winding down summer is always a sad feeling, especially for us when we have grown up with sunshine all year round in India. The plants make up for it by giving us vegetables that last us for a while.

The newest addition to the veggie patch was the Brinjal (Eggplant/Aubergine). We harvested two really nice ones, though I had to watch out for the hidden thorns on the green part of the vegetable! There are a couple more that are developing, but not sure whether they will make it before the cold arrives.

Brinjal

The potatoes are still faithfully providing us some every year. They tend to start sprouting from a new spot in the vegetable bed every year, so I really have to watch out for them through the mulch!

Potatoes

Next up are the various chillies. I had planted three varieties last summer and had over-wintered all of them. They did well, though not as much as last year. This season will be their last in my garden.

Chillies

I also harvested the various herbs and a single bhindi (okra). Obviously the bhindi needed more heat than our so-called summer gave it.  In the picture below, clockwise from top, are mint, cinnamon basil, capsicum, chilli, jalapeno, large chilli and bhindi in the middle. The final harvests were done, summer was over.

Last summer harvest

To cheer us up, we thought of trying out our hand at some easy to grow winter veggies. Winter is a cold, damp and windy time in Melbourne, so we were not looking for something that needs a lot of care. We settled on Kale, Spinach, Garlic and Peas.

Winter veggies

While we were there, we also picked up a vertical herb planter. Our wall gets the sun in winters, so I thought this might work. We got Coriander, Parsley, Rosemary and Chives. We filled in the other spaces with Basil, Mint and Strawberry cuttings from our existing plants.

Vertical planter

Flowers in the garden

With the progression of spring, more flowers appear. It is a great time to be outdoors after the cold winter and the sight of these flowers brings a lot of joy.

While most people revel in the beauty of annuals and perennials, a gardener will look out for the flowers on the vegetable and the fruit trees. These give hope for a harvest worth eating! Strawberry is one such looked forward to fruit. The white flowers start popping up in the October and quickly turn into fruits. Once they start flowering, there is a ongoing supply of strawberries (if the birds/possums don't get to them!).

Strawberry flower

Another vegetable to look out for is the cucumber. We have had cucumber plants before, but they were not pollinated enough to give us any cucumbers. This year the task is to prop them up on some support to allow the bees to access the flowers.

Cucumber flower

Finally, who can forget the humble potato. Not the prettiest flowers, nor the most elegant of plants. But the most bang for you buck! Plant one and you will get a kilo of harvest from each plant. This year is our fourth turnover from the one we planted in 2011.

Potato flower

A substantial harvest

Season 2 of garden harvest was more consistent. This year we had planted lettuce, capsicum, tomato, potato, strawberries, mint, cucumber, coriander, carrot and three kinds of chillies. Our veggie patch was groaning under the weight of all the produce!

Roma Tomato

Cucumber

Capsicum

Lettuce

The potatoes were our oldest plants. They were shooting up from leftover spuds in the ground. Compared to last year, we lost fewer to rot.

The strawberry plant was also from last year, having multiplied. Unfortunately, this season we have had an ongoing battle with a strawberry thief. We were unable to beat him to the fruit! Despite covering the plant with a cloth, the rat/possum/bird/whatever it was, still ate all of them.

This year we harvested the first of our asparagus. There was only one thick enough for eating. All the others grew side shoots very quickly, which is what sets the roots for the upcoming harvests.

Asparagus and few strawberries

Our most substantial harvest was from the chillies and capsicum. We had three varieties which had different levels of hotness. Hottest were the tiny ones, Jalapenos were less hot and the least hot were the fat ones. There were so many that I had to freeze them for use throughout the year and distribute them to friends!

Chillies in their full splendour

Mild chilly

The entire chilli harvest - ready to be frozen

We had a decent harvest of capsicums too. Most we ate while they were green, a couple we left to become riper and red.

Capsicum

Previous year, we had not liked the lettuce variety too much. This year we bought iceberg lettuce plants and harvested them in full before it became too hot and they started to bolt.

Iceberg lettuce

We harvested many more tomatoes this year, as we had planted them earlier in the season. They were Roma tomatoes, really juicy. The mint plant grew well and I dried a lot of leaves for the year.

Roma tomato

Mint for drying

I had also saved up coriander seeds from last year, which gave us some leaves. Frankly though, coriander needs too much work. One has to keep sowing them successively and can only harvest a few leaves per plant! Also, we got an odd carrot or two but most went to seed. The cucumber did not flower at all.

Coriander

Lone carrot

This season reinforced the satisfaction of growing our own vegetables. They were not as large as the ones in the supermarket, but were really tasty. Season 3 of our garden ended with a resolve to grow more next year!

Summer harvests

Following the relative success of the vegetables in the first year, we were really keen to try some more. BAAG was the place for some good veggie saplings.

Asparagus had recently become part of our diet and is easy to grow if you have patience. It takes two years to give a worthy harvest!

The other new addition to the garden was strawberries. The plant struck quite quickly and even gave out runners in a couple of months!

Strawberries

The other vegetables were a repeat of last year but started off earlier in the season. We got fresh plants of lettuce, chilli, spinach, capsicum and tomato.

Lettuce

Capsicum

 Meanwhile, the orange tree had some flowers which would soon turn into fruits.

Flowers in bloom on the Orange tree