'Hey babe, it's holidays! I know, let's move 35 metres of mulch!'

I sure know how to have a good time. Well, it's actually quite satisfying, especially when you crack a beer and sit by the outdoor fire with sore muscles and a sense of satisfaction for a job well done. The thing is, we couldn't get beer because the truck dumped some on the front garden. Cunning plan, us. If you wanna shift a big pile of mulch, put it between yourself and the shops.

We asked for 20 metres but ended up with more like 35 metres. Must be AFL Grand Final weekend - oh hang on it is. So whilst people were watching footy, we were shovelling madly. These photos are for @wildhomesteading. He got his mulch for free - whilst we did get a about twenty metres off the regional Powercompany a few years back as we spotted them mulching the offcuts from freeing the powerlines of gum tree branches, no luck this year as they were putting it all by the river for the free RV park in town. I raised the money from mulch from selling all the garden stuff I no longer used or needed, including plants and chicken feeders.

We decided to rip out the succulent creeper from the front garden which I never loved, spray a good garden fertiliser down (tis superdry there and hydrophobic) and plant some natives. We also ripped out the yukka that we never really liked, and we suspect that hasn't helped with the dryness anyway as it sends lots of water sucking roots everywhere. It's all looking bare in this photo, but we've planted about ten natives in that front bed and around the place, and they'll soon grow up nicely for the birds!

To the west of that bed we have some really beautiful leucodendrons. They're originally from South Africa, but like the proteas, they grow well here. Not suprising since we were once all part of the same continent, a while back now. Many Australians count them as natives, and I'm fairly sure they now are.

So we're planting a few more of them sweeping into the bed, plus some grevillea and banksia, and some small kalbarri carpet, for those Aussie gardeners in the know.

I took a walk around the garden to take photos of the grevillea, which are just gorgeous. I particularly like the yellow one. The peaches and cream one is about to bloom - it's such an amazing colour but for now, it's just beginning to bud.

The banksia is the other native I love. The most spectacular ones have already flowered, but you get the idea of their shape. They do really well in the outskirts of our garden and like the grevillea, the bees love them. The cool thing about a lot of Australian natives is that they flower over Autumn when the European plants haven't begun to go for it yet, so we get colours and birds all year around. Some banksia have very spikey, wide leaves and some are more fine and delicate. Both have beautiful cone like flowers and there are hundreds of varieties from groundcovers to trees, one of which is below my feet in the following photograph.

These are more unusual and we just planted them. Very Dr Seuss!!! I just adore their orb yellow flowers. They're not so Seussian that they grow sideways - that's just down to photo voodoo malarkey - ugh. I need to get out in the garden to do Garden Journal September 2019 Post 3, so please just turn your head sideways for an interactive experience!

These are West Australian flowers related to the kangaroo paw - small tufty silvery grasses with wierd flowers. They're just about to come into full bloom so I'll make sure I send @melinda010100 a photo of them when I can, as their flowers are truly crazy!

I'm a huge fan of yellow so I do tend to buy yellow plants - they cheer me up. The gum nuts are about to burst into flower - aren't they cool? We are putting a lot of mulch around all the trees ready for summer. Still planting too, pretty late in the season but we were given a heap of free gum trees from a horticulturalist friend, so we had to plant them.

This time of year is really about pruning, mulching and fertilising the natives, making sure we provide home for birds and shade for other plants as well as provide beauty in our little paradise. It's kinda hard work keeping up with these three elements of our garden design - herbs (as you can see in yesterday's post here, the vegetable garden, and our native garden, but goddess of all growing things, I love it.

How's your garden growing?

What unusual plants do you have growing in your outdoor spaces?

This is my second September Garden Journal for @simplymike's challenge! There's just so much going on in the garden I kinda had to separate it out a bit. It's also an excuse to show @melinda010100 some of my Australian flowers that I love - I've been promising her a more dedicated post for a while, so this one should cut it!

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