August Meeting 2017 Truffle Hunting!

We were all very excited about our local Willowglen Gardeners’ invitation to visit Tarago Truffles and the day dawned with bright sunshine after 24 hours of (well-needed) non-stop rain – a big relief, especially for our hosts Denzil & Anne Sturgiss. Denzil led us to their Trufferie & asked for volunteers to sizzle but no takers so he turned off the electric fence after we took turns to swish through the foot bath – no dirt, mud or alien germs allowed.

Denzil planted the Trufferie in 3 stages from 2002 to 2009. Acorns & sterilised truffle spores are planted into a pot & form a symbiotic relationship – then the small trees are planted into the ground after 18 months. First truffles are expected in 4 years after planting out. Holly Oak & Old English Robur Oak are used & hazelnut trees planted between each oak tree. Tree roots need sun & frost – open canopy between trees, sprinkler for each tree – 13 million litres of water used per year.

On to the hunt! After Dusty the dog has indicated a truffle, Denzil digs carefully with a spoon so as not to damage the truffle. The truffle smells earthy but surprisingly also sweet. Wazza, John, Carolyn, Jude & Irene all took a turn of lying on the ground sniffing the truffles after Dusty indicated. (What photos, hehehe.)

We returned for morning tea & our usual chat about members’ garden experiences this month. Wazza has a common birthday shared with all horses, and today was the day – happy birthday Wazza & all the other horses!

Wazza’s lemonade tree suffered badly from our recent -10 o C temperatures. Jude said a wombat ate all their broadbeans despite being grown in a mesh covered garden and now they have about 40 roses to prune – a mammoth task – we’ll call her Rosie in future.

Best wishes go to Jackie as she recovers from even more hospitalisation & treatment and to Doug who still drove daily to hospital although suffering a very painful knee injury. Joy said a chainsaw took to John’s leg but he’ll survive. Her limes are perfect but yellow skin (only green inside) and her lemons have no juice.

Bridget’s lemon tree not producing despite following all suggestions. Wazza suggested keeping the
pots of citrus trees on large saucers full of water. Joy introduced Anne (our new Canberra member) who needs to move 2 large tall standard roses growing across the driveway. Wazza said to cut 2/3rds of roots and also 2/3 of tops, soak in seaweed solution 2 weeks before & after the move.

Carolyn said John chainsawed the old gnarly roots of the old rose bush they moved – it’s in clay & gravel and now doing well. She is picking bok choy but “the roos are growing fast”.
Tony & Sandra have a small problem – a wombat goes under the fence & the dog goes out through the hole but at least their garlic is growing well.

Irene’s broadbeans look good, Lloyd sold 3 wethers – and one has just given birth to a
brown lamb (strange but true). Kevin & Margaret’s lemon was burnt by frost but carrots & parsnips growing well (need fresh seed, keep it moist, don’t plant too deeply).

David’s MG garden is going well & the VW garden is nearly done but the Holden FX frame needs to be replanted (we’ll be able to see all this at our Christmas party). He’s reduced their rose pruning because he reduced the roses from 30 to 4.

Liz-Ann & Peter grew ginger successfully in the Blue Mountains this year and are happily cooking with it.

After our lunch (Anne’s delicious cauliflower soup, which Denzil topped with fresh truffles) Anne talked to us in the Truffle Shed about how she cleans, grades & packs the truffles. Our heads were full of the delicious aroma of the black truffles – much sweeter than the truffle farm we had been to in Provence a couple of years ago.

We then toured Anne & Denzil’s gardens – their citrus & other fruit trees are heavily covered with shade cloth to protect from frost. Anne said that Denzil is reorganising her veggie gardens, with garlic growing well.

Denzil has made very high raised veggie beds which gave us all ideas of how to save our backs. Wazza invited Anne & Denzil to our Christmas party, where they can sit back, eat & drink and chat with everyone about gardening or the world (just not politics), whichever appeals more.

Thank you to our friendly hosts, Anne & Denzil, for your warmth, hospitality & generosity. We really appreciated this opportunity and highly recommend the experience to you all www.taragotruffles.com.au

The Truffle Festival is still on around the Canberra region until the end of August www.trufflefestival.com.au . Our next meeting is on
Tuesday 5 th September at 10am at Ni &Alan’s place.

Article by Liz-Ann

August 2017 Meeting - TRUFFLES!

Washing our feet

We were all very excited about our local Willowglen Gardeners’ invitation to visit Tarago Truffles and the day dawned with bright sunshine after 24 hours of (well-needed) non-stop rain – a big relief, especially for our hosts Denzil & Anne. Denzil led us to the edge of their well fenced Trufferie & asked for volunteers to "sizzle" but sadly there were no takers so he turned off the electric fence after we took turns to swish through the foot bath – no dirt, mud or alien germs allowed. Denzil planted the Trufferie in 3 stages from 2002 to 2009. 

 Acorns & sterilised truffle spores are planted into a pot & form a symbiotic relationship – then the small trees are planted into the ground after 18 months. First truffles are expected in 4 years after planting. Holly Oak & Old English Robur Oak are used & hazelnut trees planted between each oak tree. Tree roots need sun & frost – open canopy between trees, sprinkler for each tree – 13 million litres of water used per year. 

Denzil & Dusty

On to the hunt! After Dusty the dog has indicated a truffle, Denzil digs carefully with a spoon so as not to damage the truffle. The truffle smells earthy but surprisingly also sweet. Wazza, John, Carolyn, Jude & Irene all took a turn of lying on the ground sniffing the truffles after Dusty indicated. (What photos? hehehe...)

 

We returned for morning tea & our usual chat about members’ garden experiences this month. Wazza has a common birthday shared with all horses, and today was the day – happy birthday Wazza & all the other horses! Wazza’s lemonade tree suffered badly from our recent -10oC temperatures. Jude said a wombat ate all their broadbeans despite being grown in a mesh covered garden and now they have about 40 roses to prune – a mammoth task – we’ll call her Rosie in future.

Heads down, bum's up!

Best wishes go to Jackie as she recovers from even more hospitalisation & treatment and to Doug who still drove daily to hospital although suffering a very painful knee injury. Joy said a chainsaw took to John’s leg but he’ll survive. 

Her limes are perfect but yellow skin (only green inside) and her lemons have no juice. Bridget’s lemon tree not producing despite following all suggestions.  

Katie's lemon's on the other hand are amazing and growing out of control so if anybody would like some, please let her know!

Wazza suggested keeping the pots of citrus trees on large saucers full of water. Joy introduced Anne (our new Canberra member) who needs to move 2 large tall standard roses growing across the driveway. Wazza said to cut 2/3rds of roots and also 2/3 of tops, soak in seaweed solution 2 weeks before & after the move. Carolyn said John chainsawed the old gnarly roots of the old rose bush they moved – it’s in clay & gravel and now doing well. She is picking bok choy but “the roos are growing fast”.

Tony & Sandra have a small problem – a wombat goes under the fence & the dog goes out through the hole but their garlic is growing well. Irene’s broadbeans look good, Lloyd sold 3 wethers – and one has just given birth to a brown lamb (strange but true). Kevin & Margaret’s lemon was burnt by frost but carrots & parsnips growing  well (need fresh seed, keep it moist, don’t plant too deeply). David’s MG garden is going well & the VW garden is nearly done but the Holden FX frame needs to be replanted (we’ll be able to see all this at our Christmas party). He’s reduced their rose pruning because he reduced the roses from 30 to 4. Liz-Ann & Peter grew ginger successfully in the Blue Mountains this year and are happily cooking with it.

After our lunch (Anne’s delicious cauliflower soup, which Denzil topped with fresh truffles) Anne talked to us in the Truffle Shed about how she cleans, grades & packs the truffles. Our heads were full of the delicious aroma of the black truffles – much sweeter than the truffle farm we had been to in Provence a couple of years ago.  We then toured Anne & Denzil’s gardens – their citrus & other fruit trees are heavily covered with shadecloth to protect from frost. Anne said that Denzil is reorganizing her veggie gardens, with garlic growing well. Denzil has made very high raised veggie beds which gave us all ideas of how to save our backs. Wazza invited Anne & Denzil to our Christmas party, where they can sit back, eat & drink and chat with everyone about gardening or the world (just not politics), whichever appeals more.

Thank you to our friendly hosts, Anne & Denzil, for your warmth, hospitality & generosity. We really appreciated this opportunity and highly recommend the experience to you all www.taragotruffles.com.au . The Truffle Festival is still on around the Canberra region until the end of August www.trufflefestival.com.au . 

Our next meeting is on Tuesday 5th September at 10am at Ni & Alan’s place.

Article by Liz-Ann   

June Monthly Meeting

Thank you to John who traveled down from Sydney to open up their gardens for us. Yes he can boil a urn and heat pies in the oven.
After a hot cuppa and some nice morning tea, we gather around John`s fire pit to keep warm and discussed our gardens.
Joy read a letter from Carolyn all about her garden. We found the garden very neat and tidy with flowering hedges and roses.

Joy has Guave plants fruiting will save us some seeds.
Denise catching up with the pruning, has grevillea flowering. She brought some weigelia cutting.
Allen has roses still flowering and been busy planting bulbs.
Maria still planning  the foundation of the garden. Making a green wall on the north wall. She asked if she put blood and bone around her garden would the dogs dig it up. (Yes.)
Sandra still planting trees and digging weeds. Trees are doing fine.
Kevin says parsnips growing well, picked some  small butternuts, had a good supply of beans and tomatoes, also a medium jam melon and a few spuds.

Bruce planning a no work garden, still trying, (using a lot of Roundup.) Planted pumpkin in old chook house, started to run but spilt because of all the rain. Still having trouble with the Gum trees being attacked by the Christmas beetles. He had a glut of Kumquats, made marmalade.
Shirley cactus growing fine, wombat keeping the grass down.

Lloyd erected a garden shed- mounted strawberry pots on the back wall. Irene still replanting roses from the garden to pots.
Cheerio to Jackie who is having a spell in hospital.  
I hope John and Carolyn son is on the mend soon.
Our sincere sympathy to Thoreen & Ron on the passing of their daughter Deb.
Next meeting is at St. Barts church Windellama Tuesday 4th July starting at 10am to do general cleanup. Please bring your garden tools and some morning tea. If we get rained out again, we will meet at Lloyd and Irene's place instead.

Irene

May Monthly Meeting 2017

On May 2^nd the Willow Glen Garden club ventured into the ACT for an excursion to Canberra’s National Arboretum which is home to 94 separate forests containing over 48,000 trees including extensive collections of rare and endangered species from around the globe.

Everywhere you look art has been imprinted into the landscape, lit timber panels and glass etchings tell stories of plant evolution as they frame the entrance walk into the award winning ‘Village Centre’, Once inside the centre, you are immediately struck by the beautiful “Tree Ring” floor feature which has been skilfully crafted using mostly native hardwoods.

The Arboretum also houses many unique sculptural artworks such as the “Armillary Sphere Sundial” located on ‘Dairy Farmers Hill’ and ‘Nest III’ which is a stunning sculpture of a wedge tail eagle on its nest. the children’s playground is an artwork all of it’s own!

Pleased to escape the morning’s icy chill we congregated inside the architecturally outstanding ‘Village Centre’ lobby. While we waited for everyone to arrive we explored ‘The Curatoreum’ which is the Arboretum’s charming little gift shop and spoke enviously of Warren and Judy who were unable to join us this month as they were off gallivanting in warmer climates.

 Joy’s birthday the previous day seemed like the perfect excuse for coffee and cake so our rather small group quickly made our way to the café for an extended morning tea and catch up. With our president away, the lovely Irene stepped in to chair the meeting and ensure that we at least briefly discussed our gardens before heading off to explore the bonsai exhibit!  

What has been best described as “living artworks” The National Bonsai and Penjing Collection showcases around 80 specimens both exotic and native, each perfectly manicured tree or miniature forest of trees has taken many decades to create, some were over 60 years old which we were told was still fairly young for a Bonsai, with the oldest known worldwide having been handed down the generations for over 800years. 

We were lucky enough to see several of the tiny trees displaying magnificent autumn colours and we felt as though we were giants peering into tiny worlds as we wandered among the display; I half expected to see fairies darting about the little branches!

We then had a walk through ‘The Canberra Discovery Garden’ which is all about teaching sustainability, they have planted vertically and traditionally with several edible plants and vegetables within eye catching water efficient raised garden beds. The pansies and marigolds dancing among the aubergine and tomato’s also demonstrated companion planting beautifully as I noticed bee’s busy gathering pollen despite the cool overcast morning.

The National Arboretum is free to visit (although parking costs do apply) and makes for a lovely day out for the whole family, with plenty of picnic spots and the children’s acorn themed playground is amazing!  The ‘Sprout Café’ inside the Village Centre has great coffee and fabulous cakes. The Arboretum also offers the fine dining ‘Conservatory Restaurant’ with delicious and beautifully presented culinary delights that will tickle any taste buds, the portion sizes are generous and desserts are incredible; I highly recommend the chocolate sorbet with sour cherries, mmm!

There are always public events and free guided forest walks running and you can find out the latest happenings via their website www.nationalarboretum.act.gov.au . 

As always we welcome new members and please feel free to check out our blog www.whispersfromwillowglen.blogspot.com  or find us on Facebook!

Our next meeting is at John & Caroline’s place on Tuesday 6^th June at 10am for more information you can e-mail us at willowglengardenclub@gmail.com

April Monthly Meeting

Jackie & Doug greeted us with a nice warm fire on a cold & wet April day – thank you for such comfort before our hurried walks around your beautiful gardens in between showers of rain.

Our beautiful hosts, Jackie & Doug

Doug has made afirepit from old machinery, surrounded by garden seats, one of which is completely covered with thick lichen. Such a rustic garden corner and their garden of cosmos & roses is stunning.

Irene & Lloyd said they’ve had no zucchinis, squash or marrow due to flocks of birds attacking them (the veggies that is, not themselves). They have now netted their veggie garden from rosellas and the climbing beans are growing well. Jude &Wazza have produced some large pumpkins & huge zucchinis.

Liz-Ann stops to smell the roses

We welcomed Kevin and Margaret from Windellama, who said that their roses are finally beautiful after too much wind & hot sun nearly ruined them. They have had heaps of squash, zucchinis, a proliferation of beans and a bumper crop of figs.
They are hoping for a good crop of lemons with lots of them on the tree.
Katie’s family are still feasting on their crop of giant watermelons (one of which won at Tarago Show).

A bit of rain didn't dampen spirits

Caroline & John have just had to dig 200 large curl grubs out of a small trailer load of damp mulch (they fed them to the neighbour’s chooks) – almost more grubs than mulch. They’ve had heaps of beans, small green capsicums & huge zucchinis, but tomatoes have not been good this season.

Peter H said his main garden problem is that all of the many clumps of sparaxis bulbs in the backyard grass at home in the Blue Mountains have been dug out and eaten by what we believe are bandicoots – hard to believe our (very) old house is classified as being in a “wildlife corridor” between the highway at the front & the railway line at the back with a road between it and the bush.

Jack the horse

These pesky little critters have had to scurry across the road & the railway line to feast on the treasures in our backyard, leaving large holes and husks of bulbs everywhere. (Then to top it off, the very night we returned home a possum crashed through a skylight and we spent the rest of the night trying to get him out of the house!)

Now to Jackie & Doug – last month it was the Olympic athlete kangaroo jumping over their 6’ high fence and this month it’s Jack the Killer Horse. Jack was seen (from a distance) to kill a rabbit that was eating his feed – by holding it up in his mouth and shaking it up & down wildly. Jack put the now dead rabbit down when ordered to but then picked it up & repeated the shaking. Now as much as this does not sound too good, at least it was a faster death than baiting.

Jackie & Doug also have problems with magpies destroying their lawn – the maggies are creating large holes digging it up searching for curl grubs.

Hmmm....

In another garden area Doug has made a firepit from old machinery (see photo) and put some garden benches around it – one completely covered in fuzzy lichen – very rustic. They have had lots of tomatoes with more green good sized ones still hanging in there under cover of the shadehouse.

Ni &Alan had a good crop of apples – they picked them before the birds realized, haha. Shirley said wombats are enjoying her grass and stripping her roses – she’s now put them in the greenhouse to recover. Even the tops of her not very tall ballerina apple have been eaten.

Peter S said that following their “world-wide success at the Tarago Show” with their tomatoes, they are now left with lots of odd shaped tomatoes, but they still taste OK. He’s had to dig out some trees to make way for their utilities room, which is essential towards the completion of their house. Irene suggested moving planting locations for tomatoes each year or change the soil in pots, to ensure tomato problems do not continue in the same location.

Some of us had been to the funeral of Tarago’s Marianne Ronayne the previous day and we remember her fondly. Caroline had dug out irises & salvias for us to share and Irene brought us ‘evergrowing’ onions & hollyhock bulbs. Thank you for your generosity and for sending us back out into the cold wet weather to plant them.

Our next meeting will be Tuesday 2 nd May at the National Arboretum in Canberra, Forest Drive off Tuggeranong Parkway, Weston (parking fees apply). We will meet there at 10am for morning tea before exploring and maybe bring a picnic lunch or buy lunch at the café. Our garden club is all about friendships and everyone is welcome to join us whenever you can.

February Meeting 2017 The National Botanic Gardens

On Tuesday the 7^th of February, The Willow Glen Gardeners headed across the border into Canberra for a field trip to The Australian National Botanic Gardens. The overcast day brought a welcome reprieve from the recent heatwave and made for perfect conditions to stroll around some of the unique 35 hectare gardens.

Everyone gathered in the visitor’s centre to collect maps while they patiently waited for the late comers to finally arrive (sorry guys, traffic was terrible.) Of course the first and most important thing on the agenda was finding a place to have morning tea! The onsite café “Floresco in The Gardens” did not disappoint offering a variety of yummy meals, cakes and very good coffee. They even had tables large enough to fit the entire gang! 

The Botanic Garden Showcases a wide variety of native plants (over 6000 species) from all over Australia and offers guided tours as well as a variety of self-guided walking trails. There are themed garden zones such as the “Red Centre Garden” “Rainforest” and “Sydney Region Flora”. The gardens are open 7 days and entry is free but there is a cost of $3.20 per hour for parking.

We had our usual meeting over lattes and slices discussing our gardens. Weeds are of course a ‘forever’ issue, we discovered the group has an abundance of apples and Warren shared a great tip about putting paper bags over bunches of grapes to help them ripen more evenly, just be sure to cut the bottom corner to allow for drainage.

We headed off for our walk and couldn’t help but admire the large and beautifully made sculpture of a ‘Thorny Devil’ lizard residing in the ‘Red Centre Garden’; he made for a great photo opportunity sitting there surrounded by red sand and desert plant life with Black Mountain and the tower a stunning contrasting backdrop. 

An abundance of real wildlife also makes the gardens their home. We took turns spotting and photographing the well camouflaged water dragons that congregated around the rock garden waterfall. Eastern Spine Bills drank nectar from tiny flowering orchids, Fairy Wrens darted amongst the banksias and even a random ginger coloured rabbit was spotted hopping about the Eucalypt lawn.

We stopped for a quick chat to a member of their hard working staff who was in the process of mowing the vast eucalypt lawn - with a push style Lawn mower. She assured us that they did in fact usually use a ride on but it was out for repairs and she was just glad that it wasn’t 40C that day!

Slowly we made our way back out to the car park through the beautiful winding stone paths and boardwalks of the Rainforest Gully, the towering tree ferns above us creating a cool, leafy contrast to some of the dry harsh landscapes you find in other parts of the garden. 

We said our goodbyes and I drove away that day feeling very peaceful, Australia really is a very beautiful country with such amazing and diverse native flora; I am lucky to live here!