B Is For Brunswigia

This beauty flowers in mid-March, but the letter “B” is now, so these are from last year.

The Brunswigia (often spelt Brunsvigia) is originally from South Africa. A mature bulb can be as big as a football. They can be quite expensive – I’ve seen prices up to $100 for one bulb.

You can find out more about Brunwigias over here. I'd love to know if anyone else is growing them.

They can take up to 14 years to flower from seed, and can sulk for seven years after being moved or transplanted.

It’s worth the wait.

This one flowered for us for the first time last year. It was a gift from a mad keen fellow gardener. RIP Alan D, one of Nature’s true gentlemen. You are remembered, especially when the Brunswigias flower.

B is also for Baby Brunswigias.

These seedlings are from seeds I collected from a different flower from the pink one above. Yes, we have two. I harvested twenty seeds, and nineteen germinated. That’s a pretty good strike rate. Now, if I can just keep them alive (and myself!) for the next fourteen years, to see them flower.

Gardeners have to be long-lived, to see what comes up!

It's An Ill Wind ...

It's certainly been that lately, with houses unroofed and trees brought down.

But it's an ill wind that doesn't bring any good, and the little bit of good that came my way was literally a wind-fall.

We were at a family function at Mr M's niece's place about an hour drive away last night, mmmm, home-made pizza, when one of the neighbours came in bearing armloads of Leucadendron flowers/branches. A nearby tree had blown down, and we got to share the bounty from the clean-up.

I had enough to fill three vases. Luckily I still had some large vases left over from my days doing Floral Art. You wouldn't think I'd ever done that, given these rather primitive "arrangements" (just stick 'em in the vase, these days).

Oh well, they should last a couple of weeks at least, at a time when the garden isn't doing much yet. Just a few daffs - I think I recorded the first Narcissus out in June. They really should be called Winter Bulbs rather than Spring Bulbs - or is that an effect of global warming?

Persistence of Nature

It never ceases to amaze me how Nature persists in the face of adversity, in the most unusual ways.


This red-hot-poker is not only growing in the wrong season, it's growing in the gutter of the garage!


Do you think it might be time to clean out the gutters???

Cloche Encounters

I finished another hat!

I used the same pattern as the last one, but I actually followed it a lot more closely.

I also used a different yarn. This was left-overs from last time I had been knitting – over twenty years ago. I suspect it’s acrylic 8 ply, but there were no ball-bands so I’m just guessing. It went really quickly this time.

The increase pattern which had that ‘make one’, which also made a decorative hole, worked much better in the thinner yarn. It also showed the spiral pattern of those increases much better too. I will take a better photo when I can persuade Polly to co-operate.

I used these colours to match a jumper I had. I wore them both to a wine-tasting afternoon, followed by lunch at the Fairfield Boathouse. Both events were very nice; lunch was yummy.

In between rain-showers (it was Melbourne, after all!), the sun did shine, and I liked the effect of the backlight on the lavender bushes near where we dined. Of course I had my camera with me!

And of course, it wouldn’t be a Boat house without boats …