I have just experienced my first test as a new gardener, surviving a brutal heat wave in the garden. I can't say that I have passed with flying colours.
It all looks a little like a scene from Apocalypse Now, not the windswept, buccolic impression I was hoping to create. With current dam levels hovering at or just under 50 per cent, our water restrictions only allow me to water every second day and then only with a hand-held hose. This I have done, with great gusto but with little result. In spite of the water, in spite of the many layers of mulch, the problem is the sheer, blinding ferocity of the sun. Its unwavering brutality has meant that anything in flower looks as if it has been dipped gently in a vat of acid. And it's heartbreaking. Some of the plants I have carefully nurtured through babyhood have gone to the big compost bin in the sky, the strawberries are reduced to sunburnt stalks and we shall not speak of the hollyhocks.
All a bit miserable really. So here's a photo from a few weeks ago when it was wet and lush and blooming and I'll console myself that days such as these will come our way again.
I've given up. I am hoping now for autumn to return any gardening mo jo I had. I am down to soil testing and nurturing the compost bin, which when I opened it the other day was crawling with maggots. Nice. The day prior, it was sweet smelling and I was giving myself a pat on the back for having a good compost. Nope. Not even that's working for me.
Posted by: katiecrackernuts | 02/04/2009 at 09:02 AM
Ahem...4% dam level.
No watering with a hose at all - only buckets.
AND...42C+ for days in a row!!
The actual stems on my roses have burnt - I've never seen that before.
It is a bit disheartening but you kinda get used to it.
I'm just happy none of the trees have carked it.
Get some great swathes of shade cloth, or hessian sacks or even pruned tree branches and throw it over the stuff you don't want to get burnt - it really does work.
You can see how "lovely and lush" our landscape is at present, here:
http://www.poofanditsgone.blogspot.com/
Posted by: freefalling | 02/04/2009 at 09:32 AM
my roses were burnt as well - just when they were getting lovely new fresh blooms. cest la vie...
Posted by: Andjxx | 02/09/2009 at 03:21 PM