Gardening in Waitaki May 1st 2024

Autumn in the Oamaru public Gardens

May has sneaked up on us while we have been enjoying the wonderful mellow days of autumn, warm days in a row intensifying the glorious leaf shades. I often bike through our public gardens enjoying the changing seasons and the brilliance at this time of year coming out on top. I acknowledge the vision of those who selected and planted those trees to create the visual beauty we now enjoy. Compost and pig manure have been applied to my gardens to supply nutrients for worms to take down to plant roots to benefit spring growth, beneficial to trees, shrubs, and plants by also keeping the ground warmer during winter. Pig manure is available at the Resource Recovery park, it has been aged with sawdust and straw, has no smell and is easy to spread. Conifers have been out of favor for several years but still, I consider conifers along with the trees to be the bones of any garden and now that leaves are disappearing from deciduous trees I am appreciating the wonderful conifers I planted. Finding the right conifer for a particular spot needs a little homework because size and preference for shade and texture need to be considered. A conifer can be used as a focal point, to add interest at the end of a vista in an otherwise bleak winter garden. Find an image of the right conifer for your garden and get the information required then order because Garden centers do not carry many varieties these days. Conifers planted alongside erica's and callunias are the perfect combination for a low-maintenance planting to make a winter garden interesting. Pots that have been full of summer colour will now be looking very tired so replace the growing medium as all nutrients will be exhausted. Huge pots can be filled with stones on the bottom, then filled with soil/compost and topped up with a heavy potting mix then planted with winter flowering annuals like pansies, Polyanthus, primulas, and dwarf wall flowers, all of these have shallow roots.Succulent pups can be pulled from Mother plants because many will have become stalky which means that it is time to forgo the Mother plant and plant out her babies. Each rosette can be broken off with a little part of the stem and pushed into river sand to quickly develop roots. These Baby succulents look great in pots over the Winter months, You can fill all of the vacant space or push in around the edges of potted plants, succulents give pots some interest before bulbs come up.  Lawns perked up again after the rain, and lawn seed sown should be up and growing before the threat of frost, I have sown grass seed on the bare patches in the hope the ground will stay warm long enough for germination. Don't waste lawn fertilizer on grass now, save it for spring but a dressing of dolomite lime now will have worked down by spring to sweeten grass roots.  Vegetables: Plant broad beans, cabbage, carrots, and spinach here on the coast, further inland forget about the vegetable garden apart from planting a green cover crop to protect soil while breaking down over winter.  Cheers Linda.

A green cover crop protects soil over winter.