Frost is about to leap on us once more. The stars are twinkling extra bright, which means less moisture in the air and no cloud cover to act like a doona for the garden.
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Twinkle, twinkle little star
Frost is coming, blah blah blah
Any morning now summer's flowers and that final stubborn zucchini and tomato plant will turn brown; you will realise once again why scarves were invented, and the windscreen will be ice unless you have under-cover parking. (The crab apple tree I park my car under doesn't count.) Plus the hose will be frozen so I will need to carry a bucket of water from the house, and any pumpkin still left on the vine will partially freeze and promptly rot.
On the other hand, the frost will ripen any kiwi fruit the possums have left us; the medlars will soften; the winter apples like Democrat or Lady Williams or Pink Lady will turn sweeter, and the already sweet and juicy oranges will intensify in flavour in a way that you have never encountered if you have only tasted supermarket produce.
It's time for the "frost beaters", the ways to pretend we are in the subtropics even if our garden goes down to minus 9 degrees. Today, or maybe tomorrow, I will wrap the coffee bush in bubble wrap then stuff the bubble wrap with more bubble, which looks disgusting but we no longer have TV crews roaming the garden, nor, sadly, Grandma to remind me that the front of the house should always look immaculate.
I am 'Grandma' now, and that bubble wrap - or its equivalent in hessian stuffed with dead bracken - saves frost-sensitive plants even in the depths of winter. Try commercial water-filled 'frost jackets' if you want a neater look. Planting shelter belts - the protection of taller trees and wind-blocking hedges - is how we have a garden filled with ripe avocados, plus a new bunch of bananas ripening in the grove behind the house. I ate the last of the previous season's crop yesterday, the best bananas I have ever eaten even if we don't have Queensland heat.
The philodendron which has been enjoying a dappled-shade summer holiday needs to come indoors NOW, as its leaves are beginning to pale in the cold. The potted geranium/pelargoniums must move from the exposed garden table to the warmth of the window sill, where they will not only get reflected sunlight and warmth during the day, but the stone walls of the house will act like a heater for most of the night, hopefully keeping them not just green leafed, but blooming.
It is easy to beat the frost. Just remember we are Homo sapiens, the intelligent ape, even if we have that award to ourselves. (No wombat would ever compliment humanity. Dogs might. Possibly.)
MORE JACKIE FRENCH:
Humans invented greenhouses, including impressive wrought iron and glass conservatories heated by braziers. (NOT brassieres. Look up braziers if you don't know what they are). A giant wrought iron greenhouse of fireproof glass is the one luxury I still lust after.
Humans also invented "green houses" made up of rounds of Polypipe that can be covered with plastic, or if you hate plastic, paper-based anti-fruit fly sheets, which protect against at least four degrees of frost.
You can make cloches from old, or even new, windows, balanced on wood or brick surrounds, or even use old plastic bottles with the bottom cut out, stuck into the ground around young vegie seedlings you didn't get round to planting a month ago but want to be eating by spring, or the pansy or Iceland poppy seedlings you want to blooming in four weeks' time.
I love to plant by the large rocks that I pretend are a deliberate garden feature, but really are just too massive to haul away except with an extra large bulldozer. Their stored warmth keeps the daylilies blooming into early winter. Dedicated gardeners espalier fruit trees against the walls of their house, to prevent apricot and other early blossom being frosted off. Thick-walled courtyards were invented to grow warm-climate plants when it's cold.
Canberra's winters are glorious, particularly if you have thermal underwear. Its blue skies, and the sculptural elegance of leafless tree trunks. The best bit is weeds stop growing and crops mature slowly. Canberra gardeners get a rest while those in warmer climates are still hacking back the lantana and bougainvillea.
This week I am:
- Glorying in a million (give or take a few 100,000) mauve tree dahlias hanging down along our paths like something from a post-apocalyptic paradise.
- Picking oranges, early mandarins, limes, cumquats and lemons.
- Still hoping that someone will decide they really need 500 chokos and come and pick them.
- Putting out more European wasp baits for the queens, as well as traps for the workers.
- Filling vases with the first of the old-fashioned camellias that will stay on their branches for a week instead of dropping off after six hours.
- Trying not to think about raking and piling autumn leaves. Yet.