The End of a Garden

Latest books

Schedule for this Year

August in the Garden

what to plant in August

growing wattles and wattle seed Anzacs

growing chinnottos and chinnotto or cumquat cordial

Problem: how to control algae in ponds

Some Recipes

Alexander Downer's Confectionary Based Diplomacy, and a recipe for 'new generation' marshmallows

The Great Aphrodisiac Muffin

Hummingbird Cake

Chocolate Hedgehog

Queen Victoria's Winter Flim Flams

The End of a Garden

What is brown and grey, looks like a sumo wrestler and sits on the doormat chewing splinters off the doorstep?

Answer: one angry wombat.

Mothball is on the rampage again. The world is cold and dry and there's no grass and it's OUR FAULT! So far this week she's ripped up one large palm, in pot, two square metres of ginger lilies, three boxes, half a gum boot and pushed the seat the Club Coolers gave me for my birthday last year six metres across the paving to try and attract out attention.

Bryan kept saying 'No no, don't encourage her.' But he went to Sydney, so this week I've been feeding Mothball.

Not that she's grateful. She attacked Joan yesterday because her oats weren't there when she wanted them, and then savaged the broom when Joan tried to hide behind it. Luckily Joan escaped while Mothball finished off the broom- and I very, very cautiously put down her oats.

The whole garden is looking bashed and chewed at the moment- it's the refuge for many wallabies, roos, wombats, over a hundred birds and enough small creatures to fill this page. If the garden wasn't here the animals couldn't survive ... and suddenly, realising that last week, I decided that I was no longer a gardener.

I never was one, much. I love growing plants- love even more watching them grow in the bush around me. But I never have been one for beds of petunias, though writing the Women's Weekly column has led me further into flower growing, and for years we needed colour in the background for Burke's Backyard.

But now, suddenly, I realise I don't need to grow flowers- certainly not bash my head against the drought. There is no need now to make this place look 'pretty'.

There'll still be flowers here, of course- the ones I adore, japonica camellias, the rambling roses that survive anything the weather can throw at them, and possums and wallabies too, a few thousand hardy bulbs, grevilleas and other things I love. But no more colour for colour's sake- and if a wallaby eats them, I'll rejoice that at least it's had a meal, and no regrets.

There is something about this drought that's frightened me. Not the drought itself- despite all the evidence for climate change this drought still feels to me like a normal one, the sort this valley has had many times, and will again. Solar flares and sun spots usually coincide with greater heat and drought, and I don't feel it's a coincidence that this drought has been a period of greater flares and spots either. It will rain again one day.

It's not the drought I'm scared of, but what people are doing in it. There is zero tolerance for wildlife in a drought- the roo shoots, the poisoned baits for wallabies and wombats, which still goes on even if it is illegal- and usually the police, National Parks and the RSPCA are unwilling to take action, even when it can be proved. Birds are poisoned in their thousands.

Last month the young wedgetail eagle that used to fly over our valley was shot, and it's body left at the dump at Major's Creek. Its parents only have a baby every three years or so, so this is a major blow.

Every time I go to town there are more dead wombats by the road, lured out by the greenery that grows where dew condenses on the road and dribbles off into the verges. Three, four, six years of that- and how closer are we to a population that is too small to survive?

No one will take action against farmers in times like these- and mostly it's not even farmers, who rely on the land for their income, who do the worst, but people who have retired from the city, and see the animals eat their gardens, the birds their fruit and flowers. Maybe each one thinks 'It's not enough to matter.'

So what can we do? Talk about it. Don't let the police, the national parks, the RSPCA sweep the case underneath the carpet, just because they are politically sensitive. Dedicate land that's just for animals, and not for humans too. Because when times are bad, it's always humans who get the biggest share.

New books

. To the Moon and Back - with Bryan Sullivan, otherwise known as Him Who Mutters at the Wombat. This is the true story of Australia's role in the moon landings.

. Tom Appleby, Convict Boy

. My Dad the Dragon and My Uncle Gus the Garden Gnome

Coming soon!

Rocket Your Child into Reading

Pete the Sheep (with Bruce Whatley - and the rest of the team who brought you Diary of a Wombat!

Phredde and the Vampire Footie Team

Schedule for this year so far:

August 16, 17, 18 Book Week talks in Sydney. Contact Lateral Learning for details.

August 23, 24, 25 Book Week talks in Melbourne. Contact Booked Out for details.

August 25- gardening talk at Mount Eltham 6.30- 8.00PM Contact: Narelle Liepa, Environmental Projects Officer. Nillumbik Shire Council PO Box 476 Greensborough 3088 Telephone: 9433 3214

September 2 (Thursday) - free talk at Forest Primary School, ACT, on reading problems and how to get all kids reading (With maybe just a tiny bit on wombats) . Contact Forest primary School for more details.

September 11 (Saturday) -free talk in Braidwood on how to create and publish picture books. Contact the ACT Writer's centre for more details.

September 14,15,16 West Moreton Anglican College Festival of Literature, Karrabin, QLD. Contact Megan Daley, West Moreton Anglican College for more details. There'll be an evening talk on kid's reading problems too, and how to get all kids reading, plus talks on chooks, self sufficiency, how to build your own house, generate your own power and grow everything except chocolate.

September 30 : free Club Cool talk on WOMBATS!!!!, at one of Woden library Canberra, from 11.30-12. 30. All welcome! Contact the ACT library service or just come along!

October: Release of Rocket Your Child into Reading- how to fast track your kids to reading success

2 October (Saturday). Songlines Festival Blue Mountains. (No details yet but sounds wonderful).

17-19 October- talks at Bordertown, SA, and nearby towns, on everything from books to chooks

20 October: Bolinda School comes to visit! (watch out for a rampaging wombat)

November 1-5 Talks throughout New Zealand on Rocket into Reading and Pete the sheep

November: release of Pete the Sheep with Bruce Whatley, a picture book about a sheep who does things a little . . . differently

November 11-14 Ourimbah Campus Children's Literature Festival, Ourimbah NSW

Release of Phredde and the Vampire Footie Team- a story to eat with an orange at half time

November 21. Open Garden Workshops in our garden. Bookings essential through the Open garden Scheme.

November 25. Talk on herbs for the CWA Goulburn, NSW. 6.30- contact the Goulburn CWA for more details.

The August Garden

What to do in August

. Take cuttings of geraniums/pelargoniums, daisies, fuchsias and salvias

. Inspect your rose stems. If there are any blackish lesions, prune the stems off: the stem is infected with black spot and ma spread the disease in summer. If there are any suspicious white pest like bulges, spray with Pestoil.

. Catch snails by leaving flower pots on their sides around the garden. The snails will shelter there during the day - and you can squash them and add them to the compost (snails are great free fertiliser).

. Level off any bumps and lumps in the lawn- fill holes with compost or good soil, and sow lawn seed now. An even lawn means that your mower will be able to give a nice even trim. Bare patches can also be 'oversewn' now for a thick lush lawn throughout summer.

. Watch your azaleas for the first sign of pests (brown blotches or scurrying beasties); keep the soil moist but don't water the flowers - this may lead to petal blight.

. Mulch bare soil as soon as it warms up - if you mulch too early you'll slow down growth; if you mulch too late the weeds will colonise the soil before you get around to it.

. Prune fuchsias and roses in cold areas, and prune winter blooming natives everywhere after they've finished flowering. 'Tip prune' perennial petunias to make them bushier; snip off dead flowers from spring bulbs like daffodils and jonquils as well as pansies, poppies, primulas and sweet peas to keep more blooms coming.

Feed: Trees and shrubs for healthy fruit, leaves and flowers this summer.

What to Plant in August

Chokoes! The world's most fabulous investment has to be a choko vine. Choose a sunny spot where the vine can ramble over fences or trees, then plant a choko with its top just at soil level .

You'll get maybe 100 chokos each year in return- or more. What's that, a 10,000% return per annum?

Frost free climates

Good tucker plants: Fruit trees like limes, tropical apples, avocados, grape, choko, sweet potato and passionfruit vines, seeds of amaranth, artichoke, asparagus, basil, burdock, carrots, celery, chilli, corn , celeriac, choko, collards, eggplant, gourds, kale, leeks, lettuce, mustard greens, okra, onion, parsnip, parsley, peas, pumpkin, radish, rockmelon, salsify, shallots, silverbeet, tomato, watermelon, zucchini

Plants for beauty: any ornamental shrub in the nursery! Seeds or seedlings of alyssum, Californian poppy, calendula, cleome, coleus, gerbera, helichrysum, honesty, impatiens, kangaroo paw, marigold, pansy, petunias, phlox, salvia, sunflower, Swan River daisy, torenia, zinnia

Temperate:

Good tucker plants: any fruit tree, vine or shrub, bare rooted or evergreen, seeds or seedlings of baby carrots, beetroot, lettuce, parsnip, peas, radish, swede, turnips, celery, celeriac, leek, lettuce, onions, mizuna, mitsuba, seed potatoes, rocket, silverbeet, spinach. Pots of tomatoes or chilli plants can be grown on a warm sunny patio.

Plants for beauty: seeds or seedlings of alyssum, calendula, heartsease, lunaria, bellis perennis, Californian poppy, English daisy, evening primrose, Iceland poppy, love lies bleeding, primulas, pansies, polyanthus, Iceland poppies, viola. For a touch of early colour pots of petunias or impatiens should stay warm on a sunny patio.

Cold:

Good tucker plants: last chance this year for bare rooted fruit trees, gooseberries, currants, grape vines. Plant seedlings of onions, cauliflower, collards, kale, mustard greens, peas, salad greens like mizuna, mitsuba, spinach, also rhubarb crowns, artichoke suckers, asparagus plants and seed potatoes. Plant early tomatoes, zucchini, melons and pumpkins in pots on a sunny windowsill to give them a head start.

Plants for beauty: seedlings of alyssum, bellis perennis, calendula, Californian poppy, Iceland poppies, lunaria, primula, pansy, stock, sweet peas

Wattle

I'm never sure whether to love or hate wattle in the garden. Wattle grows fast and beautifully; it also dies fast and not so beautifully. Expect your wattle to be elderly at about 15 years old, or even less in hot climates - and to make a bally great mess when it has to be cut out of the garden.

The answer to this of course is to plant your wattles near the edge of the garden where they can be reasonably easily removed, and NOT near the clothes line, as even though wattle's reputation as a hay fever promoter is undeserved (you're probably allergic to the less visible weed and grass flowers blooming at the same time - wattle pollen is relatively heavy and doesn't travel far) many people are allergic to wattle's perfume, and wet washing is a great way to collect any nearby pollen too, so that you breathe it in from clothes and sheets.

Which wattle? There are wattles for every area of Australia. If you plant several you can have wattle blooming every day of the year.

One stunning new wattle is Australia's first red wattle, Acacia leprosa 'Scarlet Blaze'. A single red wattle tree was discovered by two bushwalkers in Victoria. Seedlings from the tree revert back to ordinary yellow, but cuttings keep the brilliant blood red-gold colour. Ask your local nursery to get one for you.

Wattle Seed Anzacs

50 gm butter

third of a cup SR flour

quarter cup rolled oats

1 tbs golden syrup

2 heaped tbs brown sugar

1 heaped tbs ground wattle seed (the edible not the poisonous kind)

If you can get wattle seed try this with ground hazelnuts- not the same, but still good.

Melt butter, sugar, syrup, oats and wattle seed together till well mixed. turn off heat. Mix in flour. roll into small balls, place on a greased tray and press down with a fork. Bake 10 minutes at 225C or till just brown. Leave on the tray, out of the oven, till cool. Store in a sealed container. Good to nibble on, surprisingly good with cheese.

Chinnottos

A chinnotto is a rather musty tasting cumquat, source of the Italian 'coca cola', or chinnotto drink. If you don't want to grow chinnottos grow cumquats instead and let them get mouldy before you make cumquat cordial, and you pretty much have the taste of chinnotto, which is only really good when it's very very cold and sweet.

Strangely though chinnotto marmalade isn't bad at all- the undertones go quite well on a bit of crisp toast, and candied chinnottos are a decorative addition to anything chocolaty or creamy and sweet.

If you don't want to eat them, they are worth growing, mostly for their elegance- they have neat tiny pointed leaves, and the tree/shrub is neater all round than cumquats, and doesn't grow as large- well, it doesn't here. Cumquats can look very very messy if starved or unpruned, but chinnottos keep looking good till they decide to die of neglect. Great tub trees.

Give your chinnotto a warm sheltered spot; keep it moist if you can- all citrus are water guzzlers. A tub on hot paving is perfect. Will also grow indoors by a sunny window, or take it indoors in the winter.

Chinnotto or cumquat cordial

layer sliced fruit and sugar, equal parts of each, in a large bowl. leave overnight. Most of the juice will have oozed out. Strain out the rest; heat it with 1 cup water to 1 cup juice and 2 tsp tartaric acid. Boil 3 minutes. Bottle while hot. Throw out if it ferments or grows cloudy.

Use with cold water, or mineral or soda water for a chinnotto fizz.

Problem: a garden pond of horrible green algae

Solution: You can buy copper sulphate mixtures at garden centres that will kill algae. But my preferred way is simple: I just have a layer of loquat leaves at the bottom of my pond! The acidity and tannin from the leaves stops algae forming naturally and even when our creek is thick and gungy, our pond is clear. (The wombats still feel the water tastes quite nice thank you.)

PS Most other leaves will work as well; but do make sure they are brown and dry before you add them to the water, or you'll make your gunge problem worse. Or just add a heck of a lot of old tea bags!

Some Recipes

Alexander Downer's Confectionary Based Diplomacy

I don't know about you, but I found Alexander Downer's description of the Philippines President as a marshmallow very inspiring. Maybe we'll now have a whole new world of lolly based diplomacy! If the Philippines President is a marshmallow, what is the New Zealand Prime Minister? A toffee apple perhaps?

Blair of course has to be a bullseye, and George Bush a big tub of caramel coated popcorn, with lots of butter. Bryan thinks John Howard is probably a Violet Crumble Bar, sticky in the middle and a bit old fashioned, and I reckon Mark Latham is definitely a cobber.

Actually, I wouldn't mind being a slab of chocolate fudge, with just a sprinkling of macadamias.

Anyway, just for Alexander Downer, here is a most superior recipe for marshmallow - either the kids version, or an adult's only one!

Marshmallows- for kids or the adults only version

Place one and a half tbs gelatine in a bowl; cover with half a cup cold water.

Boil one and a half cups sugar with three quarters of a cup water for three minutes, then pour over gelatine, and beat till it turns thick and white. Add a few drops of colouring and flavour, pour into a tray and leave for 24 hours to firm. Cut into squares and roll in icing sugar. Store in a sealed container.

Or..replace all of the water with grape juice, or orange juice.

Or...replace half the water with raspberry juice.

Or...replace 1 tbs water with rum, or vodka- the latter is great with raspberry juice!

Or...replace 3 tbs of the water with lemon or lime juice and another 1 tbs with gin

The Great Aphrodisiac Muffin

Note: it's the smell of these that has the effect, not the eating! Perfume companies go to great lengths to find what scents males find sexy, and spice ginger and chocolate head the list. Either lure male into kitchen (Come up and see my muffins sometime) or hang underwear by oven door)

Mix:

two and a half cups SR flour with 90 gm butter (use fingers to rub chopped butter into flour)

Add:

1 egg

one and a quarter cups buttermilk

1 cup brown sugar

1 tbs mixed spice

2 tsp ground ginger

1 cup dark choc chips

Optional: 1 tbs golden syrup or treacle (makes a darker richer muffin)

Place in patty cases, greased or non stick muffing pan. Heat oven to 225C for about five minutes than add muffins. Bake 20 minutes.

Hummingbird Cake

This is possibly even better . . . very rich and moist.

Mix:

one and a half cups plain flour

1 cup brown sugar

1 tsp ground cinnamon

half tsp bicarbonate of soda

3 eggs

three quarters of a cup bland cooking oil

1 cup chopped walnuts or pecans

2 cups mashed bananas

half cup crushed pineapple in syrup- don't drain

Bake one hour at 220C or till just firm. Cool then ice with lemon icing or leave plain.

Also makes great muffins!

Chocolate Hedgehog - (no baking)

about a packet and a half (about 350 g m) milk arrowroot, wheaten or other plain biscuits, crushed to pieces but not crumbs

1 cup macadamias, or walnuts, or pistachios, chopped

125 gm butter

4 tbs cocoa powder

1 cup brown sugar

1 egg

optional: 2 tsp ground ginger

Icing:

1 tbs cocoa

1 cup icing sugar

optional: 1 tbs rum or 1 tsp ground ginger

water

125 gm chocolate, melted with 2 tbs butter and 1 tbs rum

Melt butter and sugar, stir in cocoa powder, ginger, then add egg and turn the heat off; mix well for about 30 seconds, then mix in the biscuit crumbs. The crumbs should be just large enough for a few pale lumps to show in the hedgehog.

Press into a pan, either a shallow one for a slice or a deep one for a more loaf shape. Ice while still warm and leave to cool. Cut into slices and store in a sealed container.

Optional for a deluxe version: add a cup chopped glace ginger, glace cherries, or other glace fruit to the mix. Even better if soaked in rum or ginger syrup first.

Queen Victoria's Winter Flim Flams

Actually hers were made by Francatelli, Queen V's chef. I make my flim flams with fruit, but the Victorians were a bit wary of fruit - it might give you stomach cancer or colic and was really only safe stewed and made into pies- and then not much of it. Fruit was far too dangerous to give to kids!

Veg were a bit suspect too. Francatelli has a lovely recipe for cabbage boiled in beef stock for two hours, then pureed and simmered in butter for half an hour. He also gave a 'most amusing' recipe for a butter cake made to look like a ham, which must have been a real hoot at the royal banquet.

But the flim flams are really delicious- a bit like a fruit pikelet, or at least my version is.

Queen Vic's flim flams are made with vine leaves, dipped in boiling water for 30 seconds then soaked overnight in brandy, then with the stalky bits removed. But sliced bananas, kiwi fruit, sliced apple, sliced cooked pumpkin or thinly sliced cooked cauliflower, blueberries, raspberries or just about any fruit are far better. Orange slices soaked in cointreau or brandy are pretty good too. Stoned cherries are stunning. Soaked dried peaches or apricots also very good indeed- try covering with boiling water, with a few cloves and a stick of cinnamon, overnight. Cinnamon can be dried and used again.

1 cup Sr flour

quarter cup castor sugar, but not if using cauliflower

1 egg

three quarters of a cup milk

1 cup fruit or veg, as above, marinated or not- your choice.

Mix egg, sugar, flour, then mix in the milk.

Heat a pan; add just a drizzle of butter if not a non stick pan. Pour in 1 tbs mix then immediately place a tbs of the drained fruit- or a slice or two of the veg or raw fruit- on the uncooked mix. Turn the heat down to about half, wait till bubbles form, then flip over. Leave for about the same amount of time on the other side, then flip onto a plate.

Eat with lemon and brown sugar, or jam and cream, or ice cream, or yoghurt, or just as they are. Good hot or cold but best eaten the day they are made, and can be reheated.