These are the flowers we had in the garden in early autumn 2018, taken mainly on 15 March 2018. They're not all overly
pretty, but the purpose of the photos is to record what was in the garden at the time.
The increase in watering time has definitely made a difference. The roses, in particular,
are doing much better, though there's clearly room for further improvement:
The Clematis are also looking almost
normal for a young plant at this time of year:
That's the one on the trellis. The one on the fence is not doing as well:
That's the one that broke off
during planting. The other stem grew along the ground, and is now covered by a
happier-looking Tropaeolum. I can
only see where it was by the flower that is showing through:
Clearly it can't stay there, but it's a good candidate for transplanting.
And as expected, the Mandevilla
laxa is now flowering happily:
It's almost as if summer has only just arrived.
The lime tree is still not looking spectacularly good, but compared to previous months
(where I didn't even think of taking a photo), it's much better:
That one probably needs still more irrigation, along with more fertilizer.
Then there's this plant in the veggie patch, and nowhere else:
What is it? I planted some Italian seeds a while back in the hope that they might be some
kind of French-style salad, but I didn't think they would look like that. Yvonne doesn't recognize them either.
The Strelitzia nicolai seems
also to be happier with the additional water, and new leaves are coming:
The “black” Tropaeolum in front of the
house is now showing a few isolated flowers, but they're definitely not even close to black:
And the ones near the water tanks, with
the Solanum laxum, are looking
better than they have done, as are the Solana:
There's still a way to go, but they're improving.
And the tree ferns are looking happier since I stopped spraying them with bore water:
Other things aren't looking as good. In particular, I think that
our Salix babylonica is dead:
That's probably the result of a few days without irrigation last month, but it's not a good
location for a Salix anyway. I'll give it until spring to recover, but probably we will
find a replacement.
Round there the
small-leaved Carpobrotus are still
flowering, something that I've never seen before at this time of year:
Another set of plants that seem to have suffered from inadequate irrigation are the
Hebes:
Some of them seem to have had blocked drippers. After fixing, I'm relatively confident that
they'll survive, and hopefully we'll get more flowers next year.
And then there's the Alyssum, which for
some reason has all died back:
I don't understand why. It had enough water, and in the past it has flowered prolifically.
The grass bush with the tall flower spike has now finished flowering, and it has large seed
pods:
Inside, my big Hibiscus
rosa-sinensis bush is growing furiously, but not flowering much as a result. The other
one is making up for it:
And the last Phalaenopsis flower
just managed to hold on until today, though it's clearly on its last legs:
There were something like 10 blooms on that stem, and the others all died off months ago.
Here it is a month ago, and then 6 months ago:
Here are the rest: