June 30th, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
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The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
DESIGN ELEMENTS
 |
Conifers in the landscape |
with landscape designer Louise McDaid
Are you looking for something out
of the ordinary to kickstart your garden?
Have all those gardening and
lifestyle magazines left you a little bit bored with the same old same old?
Unique ideas are as rare as hen’s
teeth but I think we've got some great ideas in part 2 of garden design with unusual themes-ground cover conifers.
Conifers are really tough and can take dry conditions –
and there are some fantastic ground covers. Many of them spread to create
carpet like covering over the soil which is an excellent weed suppressant.
For a large area or slope they are a very useful plant used en masse.
In a
smaller garden situation, they perform well too and look best if used just like
you would other ground covers, teamed with plants in a range of sizes and forms
for a cohesive arrangement. Or use them as spillover over a retaining wall.
One of the most spectacular of all feature plants, conifer
or not, is the weeping Atlantic cedar Cedrus atlantica ‘Glauca
Pendula’. It’s long cascading branches drip with blue-green leaves – it can
be grafted onto a standard form and the branches look fantastic flowing over an
arch.
Hope you’ve found a bit of inspiration to grow some conifers
in your garden!
June 30th, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
WILDLIFE IN FOCUS
with ecologist Sue Stevens
You mightn’t know this fact but Ravens are in fact native.
Ravens are all closely related and descended from one common
ancestor.
When it comes to intelligence, these
birds are as clever as chimpanzees and dolphins.
Many ravens got the food on
the first try, some within 30 seconds.
In the wild, these birds have pushed
rocks onto predataros to keep them from climbing to their nests, and played
dead beside a carcass to scare other ravens away from a delicious feast.
If a raven knows another raven is
watching it hide its food, it will pretend to put the food in one place while
really hiding it in another.
Since the other ravens are smart too, this only
works sometimes..
As Sue mentioned, Ravens recognise
people carrying guns, they avoid traps, and they follow and harass large
predators for food, or follow trappers and steal bait from traps.
The best fact of all is Ravens have
learnt to turn road-killed cane toads over and eat them from the belly, thus
avoiding the dorsal poison glands.
You might this hard to believe but
did you know that in captivity, ravens can learn to talk better than some
parrots.
They also mimic other noises, like car engines, toilets flushing, and
animal and birdcalls.They’re also as good a flyer as
falcons and eagles.
Turns out that Ravens' family tree
evolved in Australia.
They then radiated out into the rest of the world where
they proceeded to become the world's most diverse and successful group of
birds.
If you have any questions about Ravens
or have a photo to send it, drop us a line by visiting www.realworldgardener.com
or write in to 2RRR P.O. Box 644 Gladesville
NSW 1675.
June 22nd, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
PLANT OF THE WEEK
Eucalyptus Caesia
This week’s plant of the week has
got be one of the standout plants for the colour of the leaves, bark and
flowers.
This week, plant of the week is
highly decorative and one of the most sought after gum trees for home gardens.
It’s a native tree, and is a brilliant ornamental tree growing to about 8 m before the foliage
starts to weep.
The young branches are red and glossy
with older growth being covered in a whitish bloom and the bark peels in curled
strips. The flowers are stunning large showy pink to red with yellow at the
tips of the stamens arriving in Spring .
Not only is the tree not too big,
but Yes it’s a gum tree from the central Wheat belt region of Western
Australia, where it is found on a small number of granite outcrops, but it’s
too good not to have one in your own garden no matter how small.
I’ve seen it do well in pots for a
great many years.
Eucalyptus caesia and E. caesia 'Silver Princess" are both small but spectacular feature trees in residential gardens and sometimes as a street tree.
Both eucalypts have dark brown bark which peels in curling strips to show a pale undersurface and has deep green leaves that looked like they’re coated with a whitish bloom.
The beautiful pinky-red flowers in winter and spring are big for a eucalypt.
Flowers are followed by large "gumnuts" about 3cm in diameter.
Eucalyptus caesia grows to about 6-9 m high.
Eucalyptus caesia 'Silver Princess" grows to 5 metres in height.
Apart from the eye candy this tree has, it’s also very useful as a food source and nesting site for birds.
If you have any questions about growing Eucalyptus caesia Silver Princess, why not write in to realworldgardener@gmail.com
June 22nd, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
DESIGN ELEMENTS
with landscape designer Louise McDaid
Are you looking for something different for
your garden,
You’ve been looking through garden
design books, or books about famous gardens from other places and just can’t
seem to find something that’s a bit different but is doable in your own garden.
Some of the English, Italian or
American gardens are on too much of a grand scale for you to get any real idea
of how to incorporate it into your own garden.
So why not start you’re your own
theme for the first of 5 weeks of ideas.
Unusual Themes_conifers pt1
We start the series with a look at conifer gardens in part one.
Louise says
"Conifers can be a bit divisive amongst gardeners – many love
them for their particular shapes and variety, but a lot of gardeners loathe
them and just cant’ get that picture of a 70’s style garden out of their mind,
a time when the yellow leafed ones were popular like the Swanes Golden Cypress
(cupressus sempervirens). "
There are so many that you’re sure to find
something that suits your garden, even if you might not want a whole area
turned over to conifers. While they look great planted in groupings, you can
use them effectively amongst shrub borders, as screening or as features.
Let’s find out what this is all
about.
Conifers need not be dull and boring if you look for something a bit
different to add to your own garden.
A patch of lawn surrounded by a flower border
with a tree in the middle: Does this sound like your garden?
If so, jazz it up with some unusual garden
ideas and there’ll be more keeping over the next four weeks.
some of the conifer varieties mentioned are
 |
Blue Arrow |
 |
C. sempervirens 'Glauca' |
Juniperus
scopulorum ‘Blue Arrow’.
Cupressus
sempervirens 'Glauca’
Japanese
black pine (pinus thunbergii)
If you like the idea of conifers, but aren’t sure how it would work
in your garden, choose one of the ones Louise mentioned either from this week
or next week’s episode, and it it’s not available, don’t give up, either order
it online, or from a mail order catalogue or from your garden centre.
June 15th, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
DESIGN ELEMENTS
with landscape designer Louise McDaid
No dig gardening you might’ve even
heard of and wondered what it was all about.
The fact is the idea has been
around for almost 80 years!
No dig gardening is
exactly that - gardening without digging the soil – perfect for when you have
rocky soil, or soil with too many rocks to remove, or if you have an area
that’s just rock with no soil at all – the idea is you create your own soil,
mostly used for veggie growing
Instead
of buying in truckloads of soil to plant in, you can create your own with a mix
of different materials that will compost – start by collecting things like
leaves, grass clippings, scraps from the kitchen like vegies and fruit, weeds,
prunings that have been chopped up and even shredded paper – most of these are
free things you can gather or get from around the neighbourhood – you can also
use your own compost that you’ve made
No-dig gardening is a method used by
some organic gardeners.
Nobody is really sure where the idea first started
–possibly in when a Mr Masanobu Fukuoka started working on this idea in 1938,
and began publishing it in the 1970s calling it "Do Nothing Farming."
Two pioneers of the method in the twentieth
century included F. C. King, Head Gardener at Levens Hall, South Westmorland,
in the Lake District of England, who wrote the book "Is Digging
Necessary?" in 1946 and a gardener from Middlecliffe in the UK, A. Guest,
who in 1948 published the book "Gardening Without Digging".
No-dig gardening was also promoted by
Australian Esther Deans in the 1970s, and American gardener Ruth Stout
advocated a "permanent" garden mulching technique in Gardening Without
Work and no-dig methods in the 1950s and 1960s.
June 15th, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
WILDLIFE IN FOCUS
with ecologist Sue Stevens
The onset of winter brings the star
of the season, one of our winter migrants, the Spangled Drongo, into our neighbourhood.
Whilst most migrating birds have
spent the summer in Australia avoiding the cold in the Northern Hemisphere,
this bird has been to northern Australia and Papua New Guinea for breeding.
Going against the general flow of traffic it comes to spend the winter with us
arriving in March-April and stays until September-October.
Not only is the Spangled Drongo a
bit of a comic, it’s also a great mimic of other bird calls as well.
Said to be the only one of it’s kind
in Australia, although I’m sure you might think you saw a couple of these at
your local watering hole.
If you have any questions about
Spangled Drongo or have a photo to send it, drop us a line to realworldgardener@gmail.com or write in to 2RRR P.O. Box 644
Gladesville NSW 1675.
June 8th, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
DESIGN ELEMENTS
with landscape designer Louise McDaid
Raised Beds
In this episode of design elements
it really doesn’t matter if you don’t have shallow or rocky soils, because
raised garden beds can apply to those gardens with other problem conditions.
Not all raised garden beds are
alike and Louise has some great ideas.
using soil that’s more ideally suited to the
plants you really love.
And since you the gardener doesn’t walk on the
raised beds, the soil doesn’t get compacted and the roots have an easier time
growing.
Plus one more advantage of raised beds is that
close plant spacing and the use of compost can result in higher yields with
raised beds in comparison to conventional row gardening.
The best thing about raised beds is
being able to grow vegetables without having to bend over to tend.
June 8th, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
SPICE IT UP
with Ian Hemphill from Herbies Spices
 |
Bush tomato-photo Ian Hemphill |
Have you ever heard of a bush
tomato?
If you haven’t, you wouldn’t be
considered silly if you thought it was a version of those tomatoes that seem to
spring up in your compost heap or throughout the garden wherever you deposited
your compost.
But in fact, you couldn’t be further
from the truth..well almost, because the bush tomato is still in the Solanaceae
family like the regular tomato.
So what’s so different about it?
Should you consider growing your own bush tomato, Solanum centrale is the botanical cultivar of the only type of bush tomato that you should use-the others are toxic.
The bush tomato looks like a very small slightly stunted grey-green chilli plant with a purple flower, very much like the flower of an eggplant.
 |
photo Ian Hemphill |
Bush tomatoes grow to about 30cm high and fruit for 4-5 years.
The tomatoes dry in the bush in their natural environment but I'm not sure that could be said of those plants grown in other areas.
Bush raisin, Akudjera, all those different
names, and from the sounds of it, it’s a very versatile addition to sweet and
savoury dishes-anzac biscuits, chicken dishes, and risottos to name just a few.
Like all Australian spices, the flavours are strong and should only be used in small amoungs.
By the way, I’ll post the risotto recipe on my website
June 1st, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
DESIGN ELEMENTS
with Louise McDaid Landscape Designer
Gardening with Shallow and Rocky Soil part2,- What Plants?
Have you got shallow rocky soil somewhere
in your garden?
Maybe it’s in all of the garden.
You’ve tried this or that plant
and it’s either just sat and sulked, or grown but it’s quite stunted.
Maybe a rethink of what plants
work in these conditions is what’s needed.
Look at
some of the local plants that do well in your area, generally smaller plants
will have smaller root systems – alpine plants are good for rockeries, coming
from regions with shallow soil, this applies to Mediterranean areas as well
that have shabby soil – use lists from these regions to research plants that
might suit your place.
Some herbs like purple sages, tricolour sages, Creeping Thyme -
Thymus serpyllum - nectar rich and thrives in thin soil forming a dense cover, stachys,
small hebes, small buxus..etc !
There are loads of plants you can grow in soil
that’s shallow.
Just take a look at the depth of the pots in the garden centres and you can
gauge what might grow in shallow soil-excluding the 3m plus shrubs of course.

Plant a
mix to get something interesting happening all year round for you to enjoy as
well as the animals, birds and insects that visit and live in your garden
June 1st, 2014
REAL WORLD GARDENER Wed. 5pm 2RRR 88.5fm Sydney,
streaming live at www.2rrr.org.au and Across Australia on the Community Radio
Network. www.realworldgardener.com<?xml:namespace prefix = "o" />
REALWORLD GARDENER NOW ON FACEBOOK
The complete CRN
edition of RWG is available on http://www.cpod.org.au/ , just click on 2RRR to find this week’s edition. The new theme is sung by Harry Hughes from his album
Songs of the Garden. You can hear samples of the album from the website www.songsofthegarden.com
PLANT DOCTOR
 |
Rust on all parts of the bean plants |
with Steve Falcioni from www.ecoorganicgarden.com.au
Did you know that rusts are amongst
the most common fungal diseases of garden plants?
Trees, shrubs, herbaceous and
bedding plants, grasses, bulbs, fruit and vegetables can all be affected. Notice the rust pustules on the bean pod itself as well as the leaves.
Rust
diseases are unsightly and often (but not always) reduce plant vigour.
In
extreme cases, rust infection can even kill the plant.
Rust can effect many different garden plants, and for the most part, each plant has a specific type of rust that won't transfer to a different type or genus of plant.
 |
rust on Pelargonium leaves |
The main symptoms to look out for are pustules, or raised bumps on leaves and
occasionally on other aerial parts.
Pustules may be orange, yellow, brown,
black or white in colour.
Rust is caused by fungus, and rust can happen at any time if you’ve
the right conditions and climate but is seen mainly in mid- to late summer and
autumn.
If you have any questions about rust
on your plants or have a photo to send it, drop us a line to realworldgardener@gmail.com or write in to 2RRR P.O. Box 644
Gladesville NSW 1675.
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