A Week of Extreme Weather In October
Hello friends,
October is usually a tumultuous month for us here in Dunedin, with the weather swinging in extremes from hot north westerly gales, to cold southerly fronts, including the threat of possible snow and frost, and this October was definitely no different from previous years regarding this.
In the third week of October we were warned of a spring north westerly wind storm approaching, and the resulting weather watches and orange wind warnings from Metservice had me worried.
In preparing for the north westerly wind storm, it first meant picking up anything outside that could go airborne, including my frost protection buckets (I lost one in the wind, but I eventually found it days later), taking down our bird feeders, moving our patio furniture to a more protected spot, putting our wheelie bins into the woodshed, and tying the glasshouse doors shut as they face the North West.
I also took the precaution of moving my most precious plants out of the glasshouse and into the garage for extra protection. I just couldn't risk losing our tomato plants, and dahlias in pots due to something unforeseen happening, like our glasshouse blowing away.
The big north westerly wind storm itself was frightening, and our house shook and shuddered for hours, first with the North Westerly gales, and then the Southerly front behind it, which took out our grid power for 8 hours. Luckily, we have solar panels on our roof, and a solar battery in our garage, and this system kept our house powered during the blackout (our battery has a storm watch function, and as soon as Metservice sent out the orange wind warning, the system began charging the battery to 100%). We are now very glad we invested in a solar system a couple of years ago.
All around Dunedin mature trees were blown over, trampolines went flying, fences were blown over, and the roofs of houses were lifted off. Many people in the lower South Island lost power for hours, and some for days, and even weeks.
Unfortunately, there were two casualties in my garden from the north westerly wind storm. My Avalanche camellia in the backyard garden snapped off at its base, killing the plant. It was only a year old, and didn't have a thick trunk yet, and it looks like it bent over in the wind until it just snapped. The only good thing about this happening is that it has given me one extra spot to plant a dahlia in this summer, but I am sad that I lost a beloved plant...
And the second casualty, was that my quince tree lost two north west facing tree limbs. They snapped partially off, so I had to trim them back to the nearest healthy branch on the tree. My quince tree is only 3 years old, so it won't suffer from losing a couple of young tree limbs. Thankfully the quince fruit forming on the tree didn't fall off during the storm.
With the north westerly wind storm over, it was time to clean up the garden of plant debris, reinstate our garden furniture to the patio, return the bird feeders to their rightful places, and transfer my precious plants sheltering in our garage back to the glasshouse.
The weekend after the north westerly wind storm was Labour Weekend, the traditional time to plant everything out in the vegetable and main gardens, but I was wary of doing this because Metservice forecast a cold southerly system occurring, with the potential of snow to low levels, and a frost afterward. I refused to risk planting out all my plants into the garden that weekend, only to have to frost cloth them for nights afterward.
So instead of spending the entire Labour weekend out in the garden planting out everything, my plants stayed safely inside the glasshouse where it was definitely warmer than outside, and I watched as the cold weather arrived...
And thank goodness I listened to the Metservice forecast, because the predicted low level snow fell, and settled to about 200 m above sea level in the hills surrounding us, and our temperature dropped to 1.1˚C overnight.
The dahlias growing outside were protected by their frost protection buckets, and all the plants in the glasshouse was protected by a number of layers of frost cloth. After a couple of days the weather warmed up back to early November temperatures, and it was time to plant stuff out in the garden, but it adds to my growing evidence that late October/early November is a risk to my Labour weekend gardening plans.
Have a wonderful day
Julie-Ann
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Planting Out Hardy Annuals and Hostas
Hello friends,
The glasshouse is super full at the moment with all the seedlings growing in preparation for planting out into the garden. I recently began planting out some of the hardier annuals when I ran out of potting containers to grow more seeds.
First up was my collection of different Keith Hammett sweet peas. I basically planted them wherever I found vertical growing space for them.
Next up was to plant out my three Calendula varieties, Calendula officinalis, Calendula Sunset Tones, and Calendula Strawberry Blonde. I already have a lot of Calendula officinalis growing in the front garden, so I planted those out in the back garden that has just been redesigned. I then planted the Sunset Tones and Strawberry Blonde varieties in both the front and back gardens. Eventually they'll all breed with one another and set seed, and I'll have heaps of different coloured Calendula everywhere.
And lastly, I went to a local garden center and bought two hostas that were in the back garden redesign plan. I bought the varieties Purple Heart and Sleeping Beauty for underneath the deciduous magnolia tree.
It's already been a couple of weeks, and both hostas are already growing strongly after some protection from slugs and snails.
We've had a frost already this week, and one more is possible, so the rest of the seedlings will have to wait until next week at least.
Have a wonderful day
Julie-Ann
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Harvesting Calendula, Lavender, Chamomile, and Catnip
Hello friends,
It's a very busy time in the garden with lots of harvesting to do, and last week I finally got around to harvesting chamomile, lavender, calendula, and catnip.
It was a bit of a battle to work around the many honey bees, bumble bees, and native bees who were all doing some harvesting of their own, but I finally got the flowers harvested.
The calendula and chamomile went straight into the dehydrator, but I had to chop the lavender stems back to make the lavender flowers fit inside. My dehydrator now lives in the garage, as the scented air flow sets off my asthma.
Once that was done, it was time to harvest the catnip. I grow our catnip in the berry cage, as it's the only way of getting a harvest for our indoor cats, Missy and Rosie, without the neighbourhood cats destroying it first. The catnip plants however had grown like weeds, and were far too large to fit inside the dehydrator.
After giving the branches a trim, luckily there was enough space inside the glasshouse walkway to fit them all in, so I laid the catnip out flat to dry. I put an old mesh door over the glasshouse during the day to stop the birds eating my tomatoes, but it also handily fends off the neighbourhood cats too.
Now that all the plants are dry, they go into storage for later on in the year. I plan to use the chamomile, calendula, and lavender in soap making once I have the time and space to do it. And the catnip will go into the cat's stash of catnip I keep all year for them.
Do you spoil your fur babies with their very own catnip? I find homegrown catnap is much more potent than store bought.
Have a wonderful day.
Julie-Ann
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The Vegetable Garden is Planted
Hello friends,
Over Labour Weekend in October hubby and I planted our vegetable garden for the summer.
My first task was to weed the garlic growing in the smallest vegetable garden bed, and then also sow onions, carrots, beetroot, radish, sugarbeet and carrot seeds as well.
Hubby then dug over the two remaining large garden beds, and I added sheep pallet fertilizer for the soon to be growing plants.
For the next bed, which was already growing peas and potato plants by now, I added lettuce, rocket, black turtle beans, summer sprouting broccoli, and cabbage, that I had been growing in the glasshouse.
With the last large garden bed I planted maize, corn, and pumpkin plants in the top half. In the bottom half of the garden bed I sowed wheat and linen flax seeds, while hubby acted as a scarecrow to keep the birds off them, and then we double bird netted the seeds to protect them from the birds.
With most of the glasshouse now empty of plants, we emptied out the space, and hubby dug over the garden bed. After that there was just the task of fertilising the soil, and then planting cucumbers, basil, chillies, capsicum and many tomato plants. There was also the big task of setting up all the climbing frames for the growing plants.
It's been a few weeks now, and everything is growing nicely in the garden, despite low snow falling the week after we planted everything. I can't wait to feast on all our vegetables over the coming summer.
Have a wonderful day
Julie-Ann
Want to discuss my post? Feel free to chat with me on Instagram or Mastodon.
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