poppyde

Sept ‘08
G’day.
Our house block is 15m x 36m (50ft x 120ft)in suburbia.The gardens started off in the 70’s when I grew plants that that everyone else grew,what I call ‘normal plants’.Petunias,pansies,poppies,portulaca,primulars,roses, marigolds,anemone and ranunculas,all the pretty ones.We also planted 1 lemon and 2 orange trees,3 gum trees and some shrubs including japeneese maple,bottlebrush.NZ pittosporum and a few conifers (the last conifer came out in Sept 08).
We still have the citrus trees,some of the gums have been blown over and replaced with other native trees,all the conifers have gone,those shrubs have been replaced with mainly natives and I still grow some of the ‘pretty ones’ but they don’t dominate like they did once.
In 1980 a book came out called ‘Birdscaping Your Garden’by George Adams.This book changed the way I looked at gardens and really directed my thinking towards a more natual landscape in my little patch on the planet.
1984 was the year of the tree and this gave me the incentive and courage to start the big changes (well for me it was).Part of the lawn went as the garden beds were made bigger,more shrubby plants went in,woodchip mulch covered the ground and this was the beginning of my new wildlife garden.