Wild biocontrol on one of our roses

The hover flies have been taking effective care of the aphid population throughout the garden this spring but this particular rose (a David Austin I think) must have needed some special attention. The first thing to catch our eye where the aphid mummies up all the flower bud stems. These I think are the result of the aphids being parasitised by a wasp but we didn’t witness that part of the action.

aphid mummies

Mopping up remaining live aphids we found two species of ladybird (there are two side-on in the picture above).

The ladybirds we found and identified were the Transverse Ladybird Coccinella transversalis and the Spotted AmberLadybird Hippodamia variegata.

Coccinella transversalis

The Transverse Ladybird has V shaped markings rather than spots on it’s hardened wings (elytra).

Hippodamia variegata

The Spotted Amber Ladybird (or White Collared Ladybird) is an introduced species but does predate aphids. This ladybird was hard to identify because the number of spots varies. Our ladybird had 8 spots on its elytra but the pronotum and head markings  identified it.

We kept looking and found two larvae eating the aphids. The first we found was the larva of the Brown Lacewing Micromus tasmaniae and then the larva of a ladybird. We think the ladybird larva is that of the common spotted ladybird (Harmonia conformis) but we did not find this adult ladybird on the roses.

Micromus tasmaniae

The lacewing larva is eating a live aphid next to an aphid mummy.

The black and orange ladybird larva dominates the photo and it was only when Lexie studied the photo that she saw the lacewing larva.

The Brown Lacewing larva and the Spotted Amber Ladybird have been noted together by researchers and are being studied as possible biocontrol agents in brassica crops and greenhouses in NSW.   A web search found a few papers on the subject from CSU http://researchoutput.csu.edu.au .

Pearl Bush and Avens

The first two photos are taken of plants I saw flowering around Leura at Festival time and couldn’t initially identify. The Pearl Bush was identified as a street tree across from one of the festival gardens by the garden owner. The Aven caught my eye in a garden nearby owned by our friend.

Pearl bush (Exochorda racemosa), I assume pearl describes the buds which look like a string of pearls

Two different plants of what I think is the Water Aven Geum rivale.  The open flower may be a purchased variety and the other is a seedling reverting to the species

The Pearl Bush is a large shrub/small tree reaching 4m x 4m but there may be smaller varieties available. The Water Aven is a plant of damp places in the northern hemisphere. There is also a Wood Aven with much folklore attached and hybrids between the two.

Heuchra ‘Firefly Red’ flowering in the bluebell wood

Tiarella cordifolia, Heuchera micrantha “Sparkling Burgundy” and Fuchsia “Gartenmeister bonstedt” in the North Garden

Cistus x purpureus “Brilliancy” in the Margaret Stevens Garden

Margaret Stevens Garden Entrance

The current entrance  to the Margaret Stevens Garden is still approximately in its original position to the left of the Resort driveway entrance on Fitzroy St. Since Waldorf have been here we have repainted and renovated the pergolas and attempted to tame the Wisteria floribunda. This week we uncovered the old sign in the mower shed, glued it and Lexie has repainted it from the old Brunswick green to the current pergola colour (urban grey).  We have hung it from the front pergola. There are now 4 pergolas where there was previously one and the first pergola is closer to the drive than the original.

Entrance photographed by Bill Trow 1994

The conifers are Abies nordmanianna, Picea abies and looming at the back is Sequoia sempervirens.  They are all still there  as is the yellow flowering rhododendron. The roofing on the right is around the original reception area, now removed.

Entrance photographed by Michael Small 1996

Margaret Stevens Garden Entrance October 2015

Hover fly spring

Hover fly spring

For the past three weeks our gardens have been full of extraordinary numbers of hover flies. We are very pleased to have them as their larvae eat aphids.

A pink azalea festooned with a self seeded white Clematis montana down at the rock pool

Deciduous azaleas planted along the Fitzroy St wall

Giant ajuga and pink azaleas in the Margaret Stevens Garden

Dark lilac in the rain

Cersis canadensis in the rain

Lawn Recovery after the Festival

The festival has finished successfully with lots of appreciative visitors and money raised for the hospital.

We now leave the festival behind and head in to the wedding season. The lawns need to receive a pick-me -up and continue looking good. Water is a crucial component of a tonic in this dry month. On a foggy, damp day with 5mm in the rain gauge  we ventured out with our watering cans and distributed a weak solution of seasol and black strap molasses over the main lawns.  We did put the sprinklers on too because ideally the lawns need another 20mm of rain for full soil food web activity (as it turned out the light rain continued through the day and we ended up with a total of 23mm).

Part of the lawn after the festival

The molasses is a bacterial food and bacteria drive the soil food web. The increased activity should result in a measurable improvement in aeration and reduction in compaction. The seasol provides a range of trace elements and operates as a general tonic. All the minerals required for a plant both above and below ground  are present in a seaweed extract. Seaweed does not have a root system embedded in soil which is then left behind at harvest.  The seaweed in seasol is  beach cast bull kelp or sustainably harvested knotted kelp.

 

 

Possibly Ceratophyllum species and something that looks like moss

We brewed some actively aerated compost tea overnight and spread that onto the lawn on the afternoon following the rain. The tea was brewed in rain water using molasses, compost, fish hydrolysate and worm castings. The tea adds large numbers of a wide variety of microbes to the soil to aid the cycling of the soil food web.

We have a water weed in our Rock pool which I think is a Ceratophyllum sp. We clear some of it out from time to time and add it to the compost where it breaks down very quickly. I hope it may add complete nutrients as seaweed does.

In the Garden in Festival Week

The Leura Garden Festival started on Saturday 3rd October and runs until Sunday  11th October. 10 gardens are open and proceeds benefit chiefly the Blue Mountains Anzac Memorial Hospital. Our garden is one of the open gardens.

Light refracting through the elm in the Margaret Stevens Garden

Primula “Wanda” and blue Corydalis

The bluebell wood 2015

Tulips in the heat

Chairs set for the music in the Lady Fairfax Garden

Wisteria chinensis

 

 

Peter Jackson reminiscing in 2015

The brook with lawn right up to the edge. as Peter remembers mowing it with a cylinder mower

Peter was gardening at the Leura Gardens Resort from 1972 -1975. He was 16 years old when he started. Alan Kopp was the head gardener. Peter says that Alan came to the Resort after working with Ib Sorensen. Alan taught Peter all he knows about hedging. The many hedges were beautifully maintained and all with hand shears. They used cylinder mowers on all the lawns and had two, one for the putting greens and the front lawn and another for the rest of the lawns.

The hedges still carefully trimmed in 1996. Photographed by Michael Small.

 

 

The lawns and hedges took up a lot of their gardening time and were very hard work.

The North garden terraces were in place when Peter arrived as was the concrete path. The squash courts were built while he was here.

 

 

 

The espaliered Malus floribunda with extruded mortar terracing behind

 

The Director Ted Stevens  requested the bricklayer building the terraces leave the mortar extruding from between the bricks.

 

 

The big magnolia photographed in 1996 by Michael Small

 

The big Magnolia was in place when Peter arrived. It had been dug up by Ib Sorensen from another Leura garden and stored for a few months in sawdust at Sorensen’s nursery while the terraces were built.

 

 

Peter said he and a truck driver would go down to the Lawson chicken farm and load up the truck with chook poo for the garden. We still use chook poo on the garden in pelleted form.

Alan Kopp left the Resort a year before Peter. Peter then left to continue green keeping around the mountains golf courses. Peter is now the gardener at Mountain Heritage.

We have a typed list of “Plants of Special Interest” from this time with the manager listed as Mr Baverstock and the gardener as Alan Kopp.

 

 

 

In the Garden 2.10.15

Shady Lady

Paul Scherer, Curly Sue and Blue Diamond

Eschscholtzia Milky Way and yellow foxgloves

Malus floribunda

Liz with one of our guests,  an enthusiastic helper as we successfully dug out a stump