Summer Garden

This year we have had the most fabulous rainy season for many years. As I write we are having a shower. Last night we had over an inch and our seasonal total is now over 30". The stream in our front garden is flowing briskly and we go to sleep at night lulled by the sound of the water gurgling and splashing down the rocky slop to the bridge at the bottom of the garden.

The garden itself is green and lush. Cannas are in full bloom, as are the blue salvia, nasturtiums and violets. Day lilies are putting on a brave show.The hibiscus shrubs are just beginning to blossom. The frangipanis are just going over and are being replaced by ornamental ginger and tumeric. THis year, the bouganvillea have been spectacular and we have struck and planted out a lot more along the boundary fence and around the houses. We are not great lawn advocates leaning towards the belief that they are little more than green deserts and take up space that could be more prodcutively used. Nevertheless it's nice to have a bit of a lawn at the front of the house and ours slopes down to the stream with pleasing effect. And it's as verdant as a bowling green with all the patches that died back in the heat revived and happy. The one thing we love about lawns is the smell of new mown grass. We have to mow about once a week and have discovered that our two milk cows love the clippings which we mix with their evening feed. So maybe the lawn is no longer just a green desert.

We are reaping gauvas for freesing and bottling and are at constant war with the vervet monkeys as to ownership of the crop. They really are a pest and I wish we could work out a way of controlling them. All our veggies we now grow in a shade house which is more or less monkey proof. I guess we will have to do the same with our fruit trees and have netting thrown over them to keep the pests out, Baboons too are encroaching on our land