Savaged Garden

Gardening as a hobby, especially in my case with zero farming background, means I depend a lot on my childhood memories growing up observing my parents and grandparents tending their backyard garden, and recalling all the chores and the workflow of things the way they managed their gardens. Those days, there was no such thing as online shopping or glossy catalogue, so they usually start their plants from seeds or air layering, cuttings and other propagation techniques which was quite fun for a kid to try, sticking a twig into the soil, patiently wait and see if it takes root or not. It was a lot like playing in the sand box and trying to grow sun flowers in it.

When I became a teenager, I was not very much into gardening. I always like flowers but at that time, I had other interests, was very active in school's extra curiculum activities, and burying myself with music scores over the weekend. Those musical notes did looked like sprouting seeds though. I didn't go for summer holidays with my parents because every summer break I was involved with students' exchange programme from all over the world, which means which ever school around the world I was sent to for the 3 months, my mother always asked that I bring home some plant seeds and even brought home a tiny lemon grass from Peru. Mum was ecstatic and that lemon grass was growing in her living room throughout winter months! Then I started college and off to the university and during those years, whenever my parents went on their short break or holidays, they left me in charge to water their garden and pot plants. That was quite a task, because my mother collects mediterranean plants, and whenever she comes back from the warm south, without fail, there are cuttings of all kinds of oleander and other plants and all of them are thirsty plants in summer but need special winter care which usually dies off during winter months because the air indoor is too dry.

While my mother collects flowering plants, my father was collecting trees! All kinds of trees, from fruiting trees to ornamental trees that after some years, their house disappeared amongst the amazon like woodland. There's a saying; "Teach your children by examples" and I think my parents did exactly just that. Today, I see myself becoming more and more like my parents, collecting plants from all over the place and my kitchen backyard is now a part-time nursery because the green house is running out of space.

It felt as if spring just started a few weeks ago but BANG! suddenly summer is here. Today was 27 degrees celcius but the moment the sun goes down, the quicksilver dived down to the 9 degrees. I haven't even finish digging up planting holes for the bareroots which arrived last February and some of them are already blooming in their temporary pots. Time move so fast, and I have too much things to do and the garden is now lining up the top 10 priorities. The tasks are almost endless.

Blaze Superior, which I started as a cutting taken from mum's garden, is blooming for the first time this year.Another one I rooted as a cutting, taken from my mother's garden many years ago, is also an early blooming rose. My mother can't remember what rose this is, so that kind of left me in the dark over the identity of this rose. It could be Clair Matin but it can also be something else. It has gotten quite tall. All I can afford is a side profile. Will try to climb the nearby tree for a full face picture. Conrad Ferdinand Meyer, a 3 metre tall rugosa rose, excellent for hedging because he is very thorny. Exquisite fragrance. Etoile de Holland, seen from my dining window. A typical tea rose that nods but the fragrance waft in the air, and when I open the window, the house smells wonderful. Best use for arch or pergola where the beauty can be enjoyed by looking up. I probably will move this rose again for the pergola late autumn this year but I'm not sure how I'm going to do that without shortening its canes. Its already 3 metres tall. Once matured, it can reach 6 metres tall. Butterflies are very dreamily pretty floating in the air, but their larvae are very destructive.



Even though gardening is just a hobby, to be very frank, at times I do feel overwhelmed by the list of things to do in the garden especially due to my climate with very short growing season.

I don't really have much time to walk around the garden and hand pick those horrible pest, not especially when I have too many plants. I cannot control nature and since I understand the fact that when I started the garden, I am putting, adding and inviting lives into it. If the bad guys thrive and damages can be seen, that means the good guys are also around but they probably over ate and too chubby to move faster and catch up with the baddie destructive larvae that don't sleep and ate the garden around the clock.

I also notice, at certain time of year, depending on weather phenomena, while their predators are still incubating or sleeping, certain critters, bugs and insects became extremely active very early in spring, especially when the temperature is warmer than usual and their population tend to explode in numbers because these insects lay dozens of eggs after each mating season .

There are options lining up the garden stores with array of portions for quick and fast working ingredients to combat the garden invaders, but I am most reluctant to employ these products. It maybe the easiest solution but in long run poisonous application of insecticide can lead to an imbalance of the garden’s natural bio diversity.Tipping the balance of the nature will lead to an irreparable long term damage to the environment in general. Anything that destroy the irritating bugs, will also destroy the good predator bugs and other wild life in the garden environment.Last winter was a hard one and this spring, and the garden allies predators that eat up those pesty bugs showed up very late.

This metallic predator bug above and the silver gold bug below are good allies but if only these bugs can multiply like rabbits and eat up all those nuisance pests.

The leaf roller bug is getting more and more bolder this year. I have so many rose bushes that look like they are rolling up tobacco with their leaves. That snail on the rose cane is probably trying to hide from the snail eating birds. Interestingly, they cleverly manouver between those thorns....

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