Been having lots of rain since last weekend, which is a very welcome, since we have had repeated heatwaves since beginning September & the country is experiencing a drought.
On my patio I am currently using an old wheelie bin with a missing wheel, propped up on bricks, as a makeshift rain barrel (it holds about 240 litres) and it has filled up twice since the rains started - I empty the water into buckets when it gets full, so that it can fill up again. I plan on buying a few more wheelie bins this year and then I'm going to place them next to each other and connect them with pvc pipes, so that I will have multiple "rain bins". It will work out much cheaper that buying proper rain barrels.
Unfortunately on New Years eve, the heavy rains caused a massive tree on the pavement outside my house to topple over from the base of the trunk at ground level. The uprooted tree fell over my gate, damaged my gate and palisade, tree branches damaged my son's car and the top of the tree ended up on my patio, covering most of my patio. Thankfully the gate supported the toppled tree, else damage would have been far worse and cars would have been completely crushed.
Miraculously most of my plants on my patio survived, but my prickly pear grown from seed lost 2 pads, some pads were damaged on the other prickly pears as well, but at least it did not break off completely. I'm waiting for the broken off pads to callous over, then I'm going to plant it in a pot so it can root. My goji berry plant, lemon trees & satsuma trees lost some branches and my pumpkins growing in the alleyway up the trellis, ended up loosing medium sized pumpkins at the top of the trellis. Shame and the tall agave flower stalk with its beautiful yellow flowers is no more, the falling tree broke it right off.
On a more positive note, plants in alleyway are growing nicely - quite a few turnips and gem squash ready for harvest & yellow and black mustard plants are in flower. On the patio the chilli peppers, tomatoes, herbs, fruits and everything else is growing nicely . I'm letting the mints and basils go to seed, so I can save some seed.
The water spinach (kangkong) grown from seed in September, is getting bigger (last year I ended up killing my seedlings) and I planted out sweet potato slips in a bed in the alley way as well. - will post pictures in a few days time.
On my patio I am currently using an old wheelie bin with a missing wheel, propped up on bricks, as a makeshift rain barrel (it holds about 240 litres) and it has filled up twice since the rains started - I empty the water into buckets when it gets full, so that it can fill up again. I plan on buying a few more wheelie bins this year and then I'm going to place them next to each other and connect them with pvc pipes, so that I will have multiple "rain bins". It will work out much cheaper that buying proper rain barrels.
Unfortunately on New Years eve, the heavy rains caused a massive tree on the pavement outside my house to topple over from the base of the trunk at ground level. The uprooted tree fell over my gate, damaged my gate and palisade, tree branches damaged my son's car and the top of the tree ended up on my patio, covering most of my patio. Thankfully the gate supported the toppled tree, else damage would have been far worse and cars would have been completely crushed.
Miraculously most of my plants on my patio survived, but my prickly pear grown from seed lost 2 pads, some pads were damaged on the other prickly pears as well, but at least it did not break off completely. I'm waiting for the broken off pads to callous over, then I'm going to plant it in a pot so it can root. My goji berry plant, lemon trees & satsuma trees lost some branches and my pumpkins growing in the alleyway up the trellis, ended up loosing medium sized pumpkins at the top of the trellis. Shame and the tall agave flower stalk with its beautiful yellow flowers is no more, the falling tree broke it right off.
On a more positive note, plants in alleyway are growing nicely - quite a few turnips and gem squash ready for harvest & yellow and black mustard plants are in flower. On the patio the chilli peppers, tomatoes, herbs, fruits and everything else is growing nicely . I'm letting the mints and basils go to seed, so I can save some seed.
The water spinach (kangkong) grown from seed in September, is getting bigger (last year I ended up killing my seedlings) and I planted out sweet potato slips in a bed in the alley way as well. - will post pictures in a few days time.
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