Lovely! I'm very envious, given that I have a backyard covered in snow.

Very nice garden! Aloe and pineapples are houseplants only here in the frozen North! :)

Thanks for sharing.

FataMorgana

Daisyduckworth,
Instead of the site link, copy the info from the HTML code box, and paste it to the bottom of your post. This HTML info contains the image info for the photo you wish to show up here. If its more than one photo, you can add as many of the HTML codes to a post.

Your Pathway photo I liked:

"Whaaaah!!!" Why am I in this zone?!!....oh yeah....family....

Beautiful garden, Daisy!

Snow here today with windchills of -30 to -40.

Wow, you can get an elder to grow into a tree in your heat? Gives me hope. :) I was hoping for elderberries, I thought that was the most I could hope for in my heat.

Oh Daisy

It is so lovely - exactly how I would love my little yard to end up - you are an inspiration. Thank you so much for sharing

Something to dream about while I'm at home after a rootcanal yesterday - gazing at the snow from yesterday's blizzard and enjoying sitting with the cat [Mocha] beside me while it is -34C with a -47 windchill - I'm really looking forward to the summer

Fern

What great pics, Daisy! Thanks so much for posting. I see quite a few people from the north posted here and are probably green with envy (including me!)

ksrogers, thanks for the tip. That photo is my favourite, too. These were all taken by my gardening friend who comes from interstate to help me out, since I can no longer do such things for myself.

This garden has been recently made-over, so most of the plants are still very small and young.

In the Pathway photo, you don't really see all the herbs that are in there - though sharp eyes will spot a daylily, some lemon savoury, a baby pyrethrum, a lemon thyme, and a leaf or two of a small meyer lemon tree. Hidden completely are a red yarrow, a heliotrope, a baby echinacea, the clary sage (still a baby), a baby valerian, 2 baby English lavenders, some speedwell, a lady's mantle, some ginger, a strawberry plant, and a baby comfrey. That's just within the frame of the photo.

There are other herbs elsewhere, including around the corner from the basil (some chillies and the aloe vera and some more vagrant nasturtium), and a separate area to the left of the pots under the clothes-line. That's where the elder tree is - it grows gangbusters in this heat! It's taller than my house. In that narrow area I have things like galangal, lemongrass, sage, a coffee plant, arrowroot, a large cardamom, liquorice and assorted weeds (that's the next place listed for a makeover!)

On the right-hand side of the Pathway photo, is a large clump of nasturtium, drowning a couple of gooseberry plants, more ginger, curly parsley and Italian parsley, the pineapples, a costmary, and the trunk of the passionfruit vine which grows around the pergola (to the front of the photo and out of sight).

There are also many other pots around the place with different herbs in them - agrimony, assorted mints, lemon balm, a pepino plant, brahmi, soapwort, stevia etc.

The garden will always be a work-in-progress, with more herbs being added all the time, space permitting! It is such a tiny area, but I don't mind if things get a bit over-crowded.

As you can see, herbs can make a very beautiful garden. You don't need ornamentals to provide colour, and there is endless variety in foliage shape and colour. There is no plant in my garden which isn't a herb (except the occasional weed!).

Must smell heavenly when you brush past the plants. I bet bees and other pollinators have a great time in there too.

Very, very pretty - - and, somehow, much as I expected, Daisy.

Thank you for taking the time to explain what we are almost seeing . . .

Steve's digits

Tee-hee! Well, they're there! Some you see, some you don't. I've answered a lot of questions I get by email describing it in detail.

My gardening friend who is responsible for all the work done in my garden says he loves doing it because of all the different perfumes.

Yes, I get plenty of bees. They ignore most things and head straight for the basil - or, if it's been pruned, they go to the thyme as a second preference.

Bees and Basil, yes! A few years ago I made the mistake of releasing some praying mantis egg cases. A BIG mantis sat near teh basil blossoms and would catch a bee every day. I stopped using mantis as an insect preditor. Another flower bees go nuts for are the flowers in garlic chives. I also see tiny bees and other pollinators that flock around the dill blossom heads, before they turn to seed. Because th bee population around here is very low, I decided to also releae some orchard mason bees. They help to pollinate all the very early blossoms like honey berry, blueberry, and fruit tree blossoms. Nice, friendly, passive bees and are back to their nesting tubes by the end of May, for the next year.

Great garden, Daisy! What do you use the clary sage for?

Clary sage can be used just like common sage, though I haven't tried that yet. I'm using it as an eyewash in an attempt to strengthen my eyesight, which has deteriorated dramatically since my illness. (Clary is a corruption of 'clear eye'). I'd prefer to use Eyebright, but I can't get it in my part of the world.

A tea is made from the leaves and used as an eyewash to remove foreign particles from the eyes. Seeds are soaked until they become mucilaginous, then a single seed is placed in the corner of the eye. The foreign object adheres to it and comes away when the seed is removed. Or a tea is made from the leaves and used as an eyewash. 60g dried leaves steeped in 600ml vinegar for 2 weeks can be applied as a compress for boils. A tea of the leaves is used to treat delayed or painful menstruation or pre-menstrual tension and to reduce night sweating, especially if associated with menopause. It is used as a gargle for sore throat, or as a wash for wounds. It is reputed to firm the breasts if the essential oil is massaged in regularly. The aroma of the essential oil can be inhaled during an asthma attack or when feeling stressed or during or after an epileptic seizure.

Great garden Daisy, hey I've got a question, how long did you have your pineapple plant before it set fruit? I started mine from the top of a pineapple I bought and it has been growing nicely on a pot and has never set friut. In winter it's growth is stunted and the leaves yellow a bit but in spring and summer it has very nice growth and the leaves gain their green back.

It took only 7 years to get pineapples! I think you might have to wait a bit longer if your winter is affecting them. Mine just soldier on in winter, here in the subtropics.

My next pineapples will be a lot quicker than that. I learned a trick to hurry them on a little. You need to 'force' them to produce a flower. I was told to push a stick into the centre of the plant - like tease it with the stick - but I thought this was going too far. Instead, I put the hose onto full blast and held it over the centre of the plant for a few minutes. I repeated this every day for a week or so - and next thing, I had a flower.

Apparently this method will encourage many bromeliads into flower.

DDW,

Your herb garden is lovely. Gives me ideas for this spring.

DL

BTW I totally love your ID - daisyduckworth - makes for a big smile :-))

Hi Daisyduckworth,

Thank you for the peek into your garden! I always enjoy reading your informative posts. Seeing a bit of your herbal sanctuary is a treat.

Regards,
PoseyPlanter

Thnx for the advice Daisy I'll try it, but when you say to push a stick through the center of the plant, like to push it through and make a hole or just bruise it a little.

Anyways I like your method much more.

Santi

Just bruise it a little. Or, to be very specific if a little crude, use the stick to 'have sex' with it! Just briefly. Gentle, but firm. You get the idea now?

LOL, thnx Daisy I get very clearly the idea, I'll try it and see if it works.

Daisy, I love your photos! Thank you for inviting us into your garden. I'm curious about your garlic chives. The only ones I've ever seen have white flowers. Yours look more like what I know as Society Garlic. Do all garlic chives in your part of the world have those pinky purple flowers? I'd love to find some like that.

Becky

All the garlic chives I've ever seen have the purple flowers. The only Society garlic I've seen has variegated leaves, quite unlike garlic chives (or even garlic for that matter).

Certain wild garlics do have white flowers.

Perhaps different plants have different names in different places!?! I got my original plant from a herb fair at our Botanical Gardens, so I'm quite confident I have the real thing.

http://i268.photobucket.com/albums/jj15/Daisyduckworth/P1010031.jpg

Here is a link that might be useful:

Mine are white flowers and a bit smaller size, and were originally started from a seed packet about 8 years ago. The leaves are wide like your photo, and have a thicker center going the full length. The garlic chive seeds I collect and replant are black. Bees love the blossoms which are very few on each stalk.
My wild onions don't set much of a flower either, but grow next to the garlic chive. The stems that hold the wild onion bulbils will usually have a tanish paper wrapping that splits open and then a few blah looking flowers come out between the tiny bulbs. I pluck these bulb clusters off and crumble them to replant where I want. The leaves look like regular chives, the same size as chives, and taste like chives, but grow from late fall through late spring, then they die out in summer heat, and form the new bulbils. I can harvest a bunch right now, as the snow has melted for the time being.

Just beautiful

Lovely garden Daisy!

I'm curious - how long did it take for your pineapple to set fruit? I had a plant that was 2 years old and never showed any signs of fruiting and it got shuffled to the back and forgotten in a frost, so it is long gone. Yours looks so cool, I am inspired to try again.

Alexa

Alexa, it took 7 years for my pineapples to set fruit! I'd almost given up on them. Then I discovered the 'forcing' method described above. I suggest you try it. Flowers appeared for me within a couple of weeks. Pineapples need heat, so if you have frost, you'll need to keep it in a hothouse or similar. They are a tropical plant.

I ate one of those pineapples a couple of days ago. It was superb!

Oh man... I don't know if I am that patient! Obviously, I had skimmed over the response you posted a little further up - sorry!

7 years... my oldest would be getting ready for college! YIKES! LOLOLOLOLOL!

Alexa

Beautiful Herb

hay daisy, I just bought a variegates elderberry tree, and the plants are all multi-stemmed, I was wondering if your beautiful specimen has just one stem or if it has many? and also how do you care for it? Do you prune it or just let it be?

I know it is an old post but..., hope you answer.

Thanks

Santi

Most years, during winter (when it loses a lot of its leaves, even here in the subtropics), I get a helper to cut down the elder tree to roughly the same height as the fence on the right side of the photo shown in the previous post. The plant just keeps sending up more and more branches. One year it was attacked by termites, so the tree was chopped right back to only about 30cm tall. The picture shows the tree less than 3 years later. It is a very rapid-growing plant and I'm convinced that nothing could kill it.

Another question, does it have one main trunk/stem or has it got many? cause both the plants I bought have like five main stems.

What do you recommend, prune and leave one or leave them all? Also are the berries nice flavoured?

It has a main trunk and branches grow out of that. I've kept the trunk very short because the plant is in quite a cramped space - and I want to keep the thing a manageable size. If you look again at the photo, you'll see that I've failed - on the left-hand side, you can see the roof guttering of my single-storey dwelling. My young helper climbs onto the roof to harvest the fruit or flowers for me - the best are always near the top which gets more sunlight than the rest of the plant.

You can prune how you like. As I said earlier, I've chopped the whole thing down to nothing, and the photo shows how it responded to such rough treatment!

To my taste-buds, the berries taste not unlike blackberries. They should NOT be eaten raw, but need to be cooked. Green berries are toxic, and some of the toxicity remains when they are ripe, but cooking makes them safe to eat. Some people say they taste a bit like a black grape. I use them to make jam, or pie filling, or to make a jelly or syrup. However you prepare them, the added sugar makes them quite sweet.

Daisy, your Herb garden is amazing! Stunning. I love it. Do you have any problems with pests/bugs eating the plants?

Yes, occasionally. Grasshoppers are my biggest bugbear - they seem to eat anything and everything, and we get lots of different ones in this area. At present, the patchouli is under attack - I've never seen it attacked by anything before, but there's always a first time! I have a philosophy that while bugs might be attacking one plant, they're usually leaving the others alone, so I don't fuss about these things too much. The patchouli is a baby - once it's grown up, the grasshoppers will probably move on to something else - like the orange tree, perhaps! A few years back they ate almost every leaf off that, and it took a while for the tree to come back. Which it did.

I don't worry about bugs too much. When push comes to shove, I usually just give the plants a little garlic spray, and cover the plant with mosquito netting or similar to give it a chance to recuperate and keep the grasshoppers out.

I do get leaf miner in the citrus trees. For the main part I just ignore it, but occasionally I'll give it a spray of White Oil, and a feed of compost or fertiliser. That helps get rid of the aphids on the trees, too.

Really, I just accept that there are good bugs and bad ones, and that they usually sort things out for themselves to create a balance. I'm not bothered by the occasional leaf being chewed, but I must say I reached for the secateurs in a hurry last summer when I spotted the most enormous green caterpillar eating the leaves of my chaste-tree! I'm not a squisher, I'm a chopper when it comes to caterpillars.

One bug I'm guaranteed to have in my garden is bees - they particularly love the basil, and they are always a welcome addition to any garden.

I get quite a lot of skinks, which I encourage because they eat bugs. Once or twice I've seen a blue-tongue lizard - a very welcome sight indeed because they have an appetite to suit their size. We have lots of birds around, and they also help to keep the bug population under control. I NEVER feed birds deliberately - I want them to forage to work for me!

Basically, I accept that there will be some losses to bugs from time to time, but in the main I allow Nature to do its own thing in my garden. It's only when a particular bug is in plague proportions that I take action to control them.

daisy....I'm wicked jealous! :) Nice looking herb garden. How long did it take your Garlic Chives to reach maturity? I have some that have been going strong for about 2 months now & am curious.

Daisy, being new to gardening I find myself getting upset when I see a Geranium plant totally eaten, or my Zinnias. There is one area where the Zinnias never got a chance to grow! Yet the other side of the same herb garden, the Zinnias are thriving (knock wood). Maybe the Curry plant or Basil are helping? I am trying to learn about companion planting, and also plants that would encourage the good bugs. I don't know how you more experienced gardeners keep from getting despondent. Today I saw a pot of Marigolds all wilted and almost cried. Apparently, hubby forgot to water that lot the other day and I was too busy to notice. Hoping they will perk up soon with some watering. It's almost as bad as taking care of babies. I am on pins and needles every morning inspecting what was eaten and what was untouched! Save me, LOL

By the way Daisy, how long have you been gardening?

I've been gardening since the Year Dot. My father was a great gardener, ignored ornamentals completely and concentrated on things we could eat. I learned a lot from him, and haven't stopped gardening since. My father died a couple of years ago at 96, which gives you a clue as to how long I've been gardening!! My age is classified information. Another clue - I started my passion for herbs somewhere between 40 and 50 years ago.

What a lovely garden Daisy! I have appreciated your advice on the Garden Web for years, to see your garden in living color adds to my admiration. And how sweet of your friend to maintain it for you, yuoo are a true example of getting back what you give.

I will be visiting NSW for a month and would love to try Gotu Kola for my arthritis. Can you recommend a source for live plants?

Try one of these:

Richters
Horizon Herbs
Nichols Garden Nursery

FataMorgana