Ornamental pear

The Pyrus calleryana Chanticleer or ornamental pear as seen in the picture is very popular these days, being used in gardens as well as on nature strips.  At the moment the trees are bare after dropping their beautifully coloured leaves in autumn.  Two main reasons for growing this ornamental pear are for the white blossoms in spring and the shades of orange and red leaves in autumn.  The tiny fruits, smaller than a marble are quite useless.  This picture is of the twigs I saved after my sons pruned my ornamental pear tree about a month ago.  I had the twigs in water in the house and in the past two weeks the buds have opened up to leaves and flowers.  The tree in the garden is still bare as seen in the picture below.

My tree will not be full of blossoms in spring but it was getting too tall and too cluttered in the middle and had to be pruned and tidied.  I won an ornamental pear in bare root, at my gardening club, this month and I planted it in my friend's garden yesterday, in a position to be viewed from her sitting room.  I hope she will be able to enjoy the tree all year round, but especially in spring and autumn.

Mushroom

Two weeks ago I bought a box of mushroom planter with tiny mushrooms  showing through.  It is the Swiss brown mushroom.  Yesterday I harvested three large ones to stir-fry with some bok choi from the garden.  What is left in the picture will make a couple of good meals and I can see a few tiny buds coming through the compost.

 The box of mushroom sits underneath the house.  I can't quite stand up straight under the house but entry is easy and there is enough room in this dark area for the mushroom to grow.  The compost has to be kept damp so watering it is a chore I have to remember.  I paid $8.00 for the box at the Sunday market and I hope to get at least $8.00 worth of fresh mushroom, if not more.

Jack Frost

Early Sunday morning I found the lawn white with frost and delicate plants brittle with ice covering.  This is a clump of Californian poppy, tucked in a corner of one of the vegetable boxes.  All three boxes are so exposed not one plant escaped Jack Frost's nippy fingers.  I watered the garden to wash away the ice and some will recover but a few delicate plants are burned black.

This lettuce may not survive and I will have to put in more seedlings.  I suppose I would have to cover the boxes if frost seemed likely.

This was a healthy Cape Gooseberry bush full of flower buds but I would have to cut it back as the affected parts are limp and quite dead.

This Kashmiri chilli bush seems to have recovered but I will pick the chillies before they become frozen with the next icy morning.

The parsley and baby kale may look beautiful with the frosty edging but another attack will surely kill the plants.  The kale are looking good and I am hoping they will be providing me with leafy green in late winter and early spring.

These broad beans and snow peas have since picked up.  They will be the main producers in spring so I will have to cover them up next time the temperature is going to plummet.  We have not had this kind of frost in a few years.

Blackened and dead is this tall clump of white tree dahlia.  On the Saturday the beautiful white flowers were looking good against the blue wintry sky and they would have lasted another week or two of a good show but they are looking quite unkempt now so will be chopped down.  I expect a few more frosty mornings to come but so long as I remember to protect the delicate specimens before bed time, I should not suffer too many losses.