Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Flowers for good insects.

It's good to have flowers in the garden at all times of year. It's not always easy, though. Some seasons are too extreme for flowering plants.
These flowers will attract and maintain hoverflies, lacewings and other useful insects in your garden.
Flowers: daisies, allysum, Queen Anne's lace, mint, thyme, tansy, lemon balm, santolina, caraway.
Vegetables: Gone to see vegies often have good flowers that will attract insects which are beneficial to your garden; such as parasitic wasps, killers of caterpillars.
Veg to let go to seed include: brocolli family of veg, mustards, fennel.
Buckwheat, a grain, is also good for hoverflies. It has blue flowers.

Monday, March 12, 2007

When will autumn arrive this year?

I haven't written anything of late, as it has been stinkin' hot and still very dry. There was a decent thunderstorm with some rain a couple of Mondays back, but apart from that we've had the hottest March day for 70 years or so, and it has just been hot and dry.
Most plant problems at this time of year in Perth are due to non-wetting problems.

Roll on a bit of cool weather, so I can plant a few veges for the cooler season.