What’s that mean? Understanding Gardening Vocabulary – Part 3
Understanding gardening vocabulary can be quite a tricky proposition but I hope my vocab series is helping make sense of some of the more common misunderstandings! If you have missed parts 1 or 2 they can be found here.
Part 1 – annual, biennial, perennial & deciduous.
Part 2 – mulch, compost, manure/fertiliser & trace elements.
For this edition we will be looking at the words native, succulent, specimen plant and ground cover. And as usual there is no time like the present to get straight into it.
Plant of the Month – Melaleuca 1
For the month of March I will be taking a look at 4 different varieties of the Australian Native Plant called the Melaleuca. The Melaleuca species of Australian Native Plant is quite varied with some varieties growing like shrubs and others more like small trees. Many Melaleuca varieties are regularly confused with varieties of Bottle Brush due to the similarity in flowers but they are indeed a very different species. However, the similarities do mean that they work very well in combination with varieties of Bottle Brush.
Here is the first variety for March
Genus: Melaleuca
Species: fulgens
Common Name: Apricot Delight
Flower Colour: Orange
Foliage Colour: Green
Growth Habit: Shrub to 2m
Flowering: Spring
The Melaleuca fulgens is more a shrub like Melaleuca, though it can grow rather tall and bushy. It can handle most shade situations, from full sun to full shade, and can also survive quite well in clay soils. In spring it has the most delightful little Bottle Brush like apricot flowers. One thing I really like about this variety of Australian Native Plant is that it is easily shaped. If planted side by side with either other fulgens or mixed with other shrub like varieties it can become a fantastic hedge that you can trim to suit your desire. A great choice of plant!
Thanks to Lullfitz nursery for much of this information!
Gardening Monthly – March
March truly marks a transitional period in the garden. Though the weather can still be very warm in March, this is the month where the temperature does start to head south a little, especially overnight generally making the garden a cooler place in the morning. Though this brings many benefits to your gardens one of the draw backs is that the more mild temperatures make your garden a great environment for bugs, particularly caterpillars! Keep an eye out throughout March for bugs trying to take over your plants that have fought hard to survive all summer. Treat quickly when found.
With March also marking the beginning of autumn it is a good time to start thinking about what you want in your garden in spring and what needs to happen for that. Yes, winter comes and goes first but a top spring showing requires forethought. From about Mid-March to May you’ll want to get any winter/spring flowering bulbs in the ground, so perhaps start preparing your bulb garden beds now so that they are ready to go when the time is right.
March in advance
Welcome to March! The last couple of weeks have been pretty crazy for me but I am back and ready to keep offering you the top advice on how to build a gardening lifestyle, today and tomorrow. Here is some of what you can look forward to reading over this next month.
Plant of the Month
This month’s feature plant is the actually a tree! Throughout March I’ll be reviewing 4 different Melaleuca tree varieties. Many Melaleuca varieties have similarities to bottle brushes which means they look fantastic in combination. Learn more about this fabulous Australian Native Plant this month!
Also this month you will get all the tips on what you should be doing in your garden throughout this month. In ‘My Gardening Story’ I am featuring my other Grandma, Grandma Tysoe. We’ll add some more gardening terms to your vocabulary or perhaps simply help you to better understand words you already use! My Australian Native Plant nursery of the month is a little bit out of the box, it is actually called ‘The Australian Native Plant Nursery’ and is located in California, USA! So if you are a USA reader YES, Australian Native Plants are available to you.
As well as the above articles my garden product review will be the humble ‘garden shed’, I’ll be reviewing 2-3 different garden sheds that are available at your local bunnings garden store. These are only a snippet of what you can expect to read at AussieGreenThumb.com this month.
Newsletter
It is not too late to sign up and receive the FIRST edition of my newsletter. That will be coming out mid-late March and then once a month there after. PLUS when you sign up to my monthly newsletter you will receive my FREE e-book on ‘Buying Gardening Tools’ which has a bonus feature article on buying an electric hedge trimmer that is not available anywhere else. To sign up simply fill in the form on the right side of this website. Make sure you fill in your name and email, submit it and then check your inbox and click on the link sent to you to confirm your email account is valid. The email may get sent to your spam box so make sure you keep an eye out for it.
Let’s continue to develop a gardening lifestyle, today and tomorrow!
Gardening Guru’s – Gardening Australia Magazine
In the gardening hints, tips and idea’s world there are few giants as big as the ‘Gardening Australia’ franchise. For this months gardening guru’s section I’ll be specifically focusing on the Gardening Australia magazine (as opposed to the program or website). Gardening Australia Magazine is one of the top notch gardening magazines available at your local news agency. The quality of its content is phenomenal and the range of topics covered amazing. Because this franchise has grown so large, they can afford to employ the best and the brightest so I absolutely thoroughly recommend this magazine. As opposed to the Burkes Backyard magazine focus on lifestyle and gardening, Gardening Australia focuses 90% of it’s articles specifically on gardening and this alone makes it my #1 magazine for gardening tips and idea’s.
Article Headline Examples
Special Feature
Italian Garden
Starch Staples
Plants & Flowers
Undercover Colour
Heady Hydrangeas
Gardens & People
Chook palaces
Grow your own
Know How
Sandy Soils
Thrifty Gardens
Best of the Regular
Clippings – Monthly guide to the latest plant releases, products, events and gardening news
Backyard Wildlife – Reviewing various animals that you may find in your backyard, both beneficial and dangerous.
Troubleshooting – Gardening experts answering readers questions.
Last Word
The Gardening Australia Magazine retails for around $6 and is available at most local newsagencies. You know you are getting quality when you buy something from the Gardening Australia franchise and you also know you will be able to find added content on their website which I will also be reviewing at a later date.
Plant of the Month – Pimelea 4
So far this month I have reviewed the Pimelea ferruginea, the Pimelea physodes and the Pimelea rosea. Here is the final Pimelea variety for February.
Genus: Pimelea
Species: spectabilis
Common Name: NA
Flower Colour: Pink
Foliage Colour: Green
Growth Habit: Shrub to 1m
Flowering: Winter – Spring
Once again we have a variety of Pimelea that is clearly defined by its flower. The Pimelea spectibilis is quite different to the other varieties of Pimelea that I have reviewed. The flower consists of an outer halo of mostly white flowers circling an inner white cluster with a deep pink centre. The leaves of the spectibilis are a lot more pointy and indeed prickly but this should not deter you from planting this fantastic shrub. The spectibilis is very simlar to the other varieties in that it likes a sunny to part shade position in the garden and prefers soil with good drainage.
The Pimelea family is native to the South-West of Western Australia, my home area, but in recent years has very much been taking of Australia wide and is available from a lot more nurseries than previously. I hope that the reviews of the Pimelea this month have at least led you to consider planting one or more of these varieties in your Australian Native Plant garden.
Gardening Product & Review – Stihl Brushcutters
Last month I reviewed lawnmowers, in particular I recommended that when you go to buy a lawnmower that you buy a Victa lawnmower. However when it comes to making your grassed area look good, mowing is only one aspect. When it comes to keeping your grassed area’s and your garden beds separate one of the quickest and easiest tools to use is a Line Trimmer or a Brushcutter. When it comes to buying a Line Trimmer or Brushcutter in Australia I believe there is a brand that stands head and shoulders above the rest and that is Stihl. So why should you buy Stihl line Trimmers or Brushcutters? Read on to find out.
From the Vault – February
Continuing my series ‘from the vault’ I bring back a very successful article from 2007 where I discuss one grass type I thoroughly recommend you do NOT grow, cooch.
1 type of grass NOT to grow
Do you like to have an easily maintainable garden? Do you have limited time to spend mowing, weeding and generally keeping your lawn and garden separate? If you answered yes to these questions then do NOT choose ‘Cooch’ grass!
Cooch grass is one of the most popular types of grass chosen in Australia. This is because it grows easily, keeps low so you can get away with less mowing and generally looks ‘good’? So why am I recommending that you don’t grow it?
The main problem with cooch grass is the way it grows. Cooch send its roots down deep, 20-30cm or more and THEN sends runners out to spread the grass. This is problematic because when the cooch runners ‘run’ into a garden then grow up, to remove the cooch is very difficult. It isn’t a simple matter of removing the top, growing grass, you need to dig down and get the roots and runners. This is very difficult of course in a dense garden bed!
Read more »
Plant of the Month – Pimelea 3
This is the third Pimelea variety review. Week 1 I reviewed the Pimelea ferruginea, last week I reviewed the Pimelea physodes. Here is this weeks instalment.
Genus: Pimelea
Species: rosea
Common Name: Rose Banjine
Flower Colour: Pink
Foliage Colour: Green
Growth Habit: Shrub to 1m
Flowering: Winter – Spring
The Pimelea rosea is a lot more similar to the ferruginea than the physodes in that the flower structure is very similar. The rosea has small flowers which cluster together at the end of the stem creating a larger, more striking presentation. The rosea’s flowers are a mix of pink and white, making an almost purple colour when looking from a distance. The rosea also generally grows slightly smaller than the ferruginea.
Pimelea rosea likes a sunny to part shade position and a soil with good drainage. Like the other varieties I have reviewed it does grow best in temperate or cool climates along the coast but, again, is being mixed with other varieties to make it more hardy and tropic friendly.
Aussie Green Thumb Newsletter!
It is now officially the ‘middle’ of February, the second month that this blog has been active. I would like to take this time to offer you to join with me in the next stage of development for AGT.com and that is the LAUNCH of my free monthly newsletter.
Why sign up to my monthly newsletter?
I like to think that Aussie Green Thumb provides a lot of useful information to its readers but I am always looking at ways to provide an even better service. When it comes to writing my articles I do a lot of research and also as a part of running this blog I read a lot of other content around the blogosphere. In my newsletter I will provide links to some other fantastic resources that I have found, I’ll provide UNIQUE content only available to my newsletter subscribers and the newsletter will make sure that you keep up to date with the BEST articles from AussieGreenThumb.com.
From time to time I also hope to provide the opportunity for SPECIAL deals through various gardening agencies. It will also be a place that I can point out great deals that I have come across or offer you FIRST access to some resources that I am looking to provide at AGT.com.
The best thing though is that it is FREE to subscribe to the newsletter, so what do you have to lose?
Special Offer
As a special offer, everybody who signs up to my FREE AGT.com newsletter will receive a copy of my first e-book on ‘Buying Gardening Tools’. I recently ran a highly rated series on this blog about what to look for when buying gardening tools. My e-book combines all this content, reworked to be even more beneficial, PLUS a *BONUS* review on what to look for when buying an electric hedge trimmer. To receive this e-book just sign up to my newsletter, confirm your subscription and you will receive a copy in your inbox within a few days.
How do I sign up?
On the right hand side of this blog you will see a form to sign up. Simply input your email and your name and an email will be sent to to the address you gave for confirmation. Go to your inbox, confirm your subscription and that is it, you will be on my newsletter email list.
What about my privacy?
I, like most people, detest spam. I will NEVER provide your email addresses to any other person, company or organisation. It will simply be used to provide you with fantastic content from AussieGreenThumb.com. For the moment the frequency will be once a month. This will never rise above being more than once a week so you don’t have to worry about my newsletter becoming virtually spam itself (as some other newsletter subscriptions can become).
If you have any questions or queries about this simply contact me via my contact page and I will get back to you shortly.
I look forward to continuing to work with you in your journey towards a gardening lifestyle, today and tomorrow!
Click here to leave a comment...