The chief programming boffins at TVNZ are clearly not gardeners. No matter that every leisure survey in this country puts gardening at the top or close to the top of favoured activities, TVNZ has done its utmost to ignore it in recent times. Since the demise of Maggie’s Garden Show several years ago, there has been nothing memorable in the way of gardening programmes.

But wait. Suddenly we have a new gardening programme. Alas it has been banished to the wasteland time of 9.30am on Saturday morning. It is not even morning coffee time. And with nary a trailer to be seen promoting it, my guess it is has entirely bypassed most gardeners. Ah ha. Proof positive to the programmers that there is no demand for gardening programmes on the main channels.

It is called “The Road to Ellerslie” which may be a little off-putting for non Christchurch or southern viewers but is probably indicative of who put up some of the money to fund its making. For readers not in the know, Auckland’s well known Ellerslie Flower Show (which hadn’t actually been staged at Ellerslie for many years, having moved to the Bot Gardens) was sold to the highest bidder, which happened to be Christchurch.
Auckland of course sprang into action with its new flower and garden show last spring and Christchurch moved its dates to autumn. Hence this programme.

But the episode we caught last week was not just about the Christchurch version of the Ellerslie Flower Show. It is magazine format for those of us whose concentration spans can’t cope with more than a six minute sequence but overall we gave it a creditable pass mark. There was a profile of an attractive garden on Banks Peninsula. It was a shame about the dreadful camera work which panned around so quickly that it was impossible to focus on the bigger views that were shown, but other than that, it showed a garden and gardener of some merit. We then went to the garden of a Christchurch landscaper who is preparing an exhibit for the flower show. Her own garden was pretty rough and not remarkable but the coverage of her planned exhibit was interesting. We then had a brief segment by another local landscaper giving us ideas and principles for our own gardens. Nothing memorable but a good format idea. Then to broaden the appeal, we had Aucklanders Lynda Hallinan on building a worm farm and Tony Morel on watering tips. Lynda goes from strength to strength in the New Zealand garden scene. She has a lot of experience now and she walks the talk, being genuinely interested in plants and hands-on gardening as well as having an engaging personality. Tony’s section was a little too brief and short on detail, but he too has amassed a lot of experience in recent years and his enthusiasm is infectious.

We will be having an early coffee to catch another programme tomorrow morning. It is so nice to see something home grown in gardening TV.
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A friend reported that he had no choice but to make the sad decision to euthanase three zucchini plants.
He had simply run out of ideas to use the rampant produce, having done every vegetable alternative in his repertoire along with muffins, pies and even chocolate cake with grated zucchini (pleasantly moist and good keeping). He had to take drastic steps to slow the harvest, having run out of room in the vegetable crisper.

Turn your back and a zucchini can turn into a marrow overnight and marrows are a challenge to turn into an appetising meal. In days gone by, I have tried to use them by cooking stuffed marrow but the bottom line is the stuffing tends to taste better without the marrow casing. I am not so desperate these days that I feel obliged to use up every marrow. But faced by a small mountain of overgrown zucchini bordering on marrows here too, I dug out the juicer. We only found the juicer recently, stored by one of our overseas daughters in her wardrobe at home and it is quite a remarkable piece of equipment. She says she bought it from Cash Converters for $25 (or maybe it was $40) so I am guessing that juicers are somewhat like bread makers – the thought appeals but the reality ends up being that yet another appliance sits unused in the cupboard. But it did a splendid job on the zucchini and a veritable torrent of fresh, pale green liquid emerged. If we were into chilled soups, I could see an instant use for fresh zucchini juice. But alas, although my Mark is a relatively adventurous eater, he draws the line at chilled soup. So what was I to do with around four litres of zucchini juice? I froze two litres in the hope that it may last until the hot soup season returns. The remainder I mixed with fresh squeezed orange juice to see if that would make it more palatable. It did, although Mark was a little underwhelmed by the orange and zucchini combo with his breakfast. I know he would prefer the OJ without the vegetable addition but variety is good for us, I am sure and I rate it as refreshing.

While on a mission to deal with the avalanche of zucchini, I also tried stuffing the flowers. I have been served these in an expensive restaurant before and they were divine. The usual filling is a simple mix of ricotta cheese (firmer than its cottage cheese cousin), parmesan and fresh herbs. The whole is then dipped in a light batter and deep fried quickly. I never deep fry anything and sadly shallow frying does not really work. While the result was very tasty, it certainly lacked the visual oomph as my flower bundles collapsed. I shall try the oven baked version next time. It is worth perfecting the technique if you are growing your own but keep to the larger female flowers (you can even pick them just as the tiny zucchini are forming at the base) because the male flowers (which do not set fruit) are a little too small.

If you are wondering about the difference between courgettes and zucchini, I read somewhere recently that the former are so-called by the French while the latter is the Italian term. I am guessing that the English were a little slow to catch on that they are best eaten at the juvenile stage so maybe they can lay claim to the term marrow.

There is something charming and reassuring about our elder daughter coming home from Australia for a few days and deciding to repot the orchids. Working alongside me at the potting bench, she marvelled that the last time the orchids had been repotted was when she did them in 1995. They have been fed and watered regularly in the intervening years and there was an element of survival of the fittest, but it is a remarkable genus that can gently tick along while in the same sized pot and in potting mix that is coming up to fourteen years old.

When said daughter was about twelve, she developed an interest in orchids. She is inclined these days to smile wryly and observe that she always was a bit of a geek. Naturally her father was absolutely delighted and encouraged her interest with a joint membership to the Orchid Society. They would trot off together to monthly meetings where Mark used to joke that he was half the age of most of the members and she took the average age down further by several notches. But to this day, they both remember how very encouraging and generous the members were to them both, but especially to our young J.J. Over the years, Mark has been a member of various horticultural interest groups and he has always been impressed by the depth of knowledge shown by pretty well all the orchid enthusiasts – a far greater technical knowledge than is the norm in most special interest horticultural groups. And in terms of complex plant genus, orchids take the top position for having the most individual and diverse species of any plant.

Passionate plantspeople tend to be either collectors or gardeners. Mark is first and foremost a gardener. His motivation is to find the widest and most interesting range of plants he can grow in our garden here. But for some others, collecting a plant and finding out about it is more fun than actually growing it in the garden. So learning about orchids for Mark was primarily aimed at discovering which varieties are suitable for naturalising in our conditions here.

Our J.J is more of a collector and in that she has more in common with most orchid aficionados who tend to be collectors and enjoy the whole showing and sharing process more than practical application to gardening. It is probably that whole process of showing and sharing which means that the Orchid Society still exists in New Plymouth and with sufficient support to mount regular displays at a time when many other similar groups are folding in the face of declining membership. They have clearly remained as generous with their time, expertise and passion for the genus as they were 15 years ago and they have their annual summer show on this Saturday and Sunday at Highlands Intermediate. It is apparently the only summer show in the country and attracts exhibitors from outside the region. You can be assured of seeing orchids in flower which you may never have seen before, including displays of disas. Orchids being such a complex plant group, if you are keen to learn more, it is certainly easier to make contact with the local enthusiasts than to try and muddle along alone.

For the record (and I am sure I have written this before), the successful garden orchids we have here in mild conditions include cymbidiums (the classic orchid used in floral work and with a very long flower life), Australian dendrobiums, pleiones (sometimes called the teacup orchid), calanthes and dactylorhiza. And yes we do have native orchids in this country too, though the pterostylus are so modest and understated that only those in the know would pick them as belonging to the orchid family.

On another topic, along with much of the rest of the developed world, we have been gently drifting back into a more home-grown self sufficient lifestyle (easier with only two of us left at home) but we hit a new watershed on Saturday when we sat down to a dinner when I bravely served up rabbit with home grown vegetables. I know many people around the world eat rabbit. Our J.J. used to travel regularly with an Australian bus driver who would follow up all the rabbits advertised in the Pets column and take them home for the larder…. But I have always had my reservations though I can still hear the inimitable Kim Hill’s words ringing in my ears: “Take their little blue jackets off before you cook them.” We have been inundated with rabbits here, despite the cat doing her best. I have seen her eat Flopsy as a pre-breakfast snack, tuck into her serving of Mother Rabbit for breakfast, return with Mopsy for morning tea and then eat Cottontail for lunch. Mark is also shooting them in quantity and has been suggesting we should be eating the best of them.

At last I found a recipe (in a review book on Italian cooking) which clearly disguised the origin of the meat. It did involve Mark in some extensive micro surgery to bone out the carcase and I then rolled it with a pistachio, mushroom, lemon and thyme stuffing and wrapped it in bacon. It was delicious and the resulting meal served with potatoes, green beans and roasted Florence fennel owed a debt to the supermarket only for some of the stuffing ingredients and the bacon. I need to ease my way into rabbit gently as a regular addition but it could have been mistaken for chicken or pork.

Mark is now suggesting that we should be learning more about edible mushrooms. We have been so ingrained with the mantra that only the field mushrooms are safe to eat in this country, that we ignore a range of fungi which grow freely here and are valued in other parts of the world. Good identification is required because we also have fungi which are hallucinogenic and so toxic they can be fatal, but making the move to eating puffballs and pig’s ear fungi is a mind shift like the rabbit.

We are rediscovering the hunter-gatherer instincts. It is undoubtedly much easier in rural Tikorangi than in Central London where Second Daughter was much amused to see the local technical institute in Maida Vale offering a course in hunter gathering. Beyond squirrels and the occasional fox, we weren’t sure what there was to hunt in Central London and the gathering opportunities seem extremely limited in an environment where even the common sparrow is dying out for lack of food. But it is certainly quaint that in one of the world’s most urban environments, the hunter-gatherer instincts live on.

In between the excesses of food and alcohol which mark the current festive season for many of us, New Year is traditionally a time for reflection and resolutions to do better in the coming year (or weeks, sometimes only days!). So too, have we been reflecting on directions in gardening. It feels like such a short space of time since I used to write deploring the horrors of the pretentious minimalist garden and the clonal aspects of many gardens which used an identical palette of plants and a very narrow palette at that. The minimalist garden is just so passé now that it is consigned in history to the same category as the 1970s conifer garden planted under a mulch of black plastic and either pebbles or scoria. Fad gardening.

But the rise and the rise and the continuing rise in popularity of the vegetable garden and growing fruit trees at home has taken pretty well every professional in the garden and horticulture scene by surprise. Who isn’t growing at least a few lettuces, herbs and mini toms at home these days? Those who have been doing this all their lives will not be surprised at all but are possibly basking in the wholesome glow of virtue. Novices will be discovering that it takes hard work and time to be anywhere near self sufficient and there is no guarantee that it will save you money until you are a great deal more competent and experienced, but the beauty of veg gardening is that there are repeated minor triumphs to encourage you along the way. Intermittent or random reinforcement, it is known as in psychological jargon – the most powerful form of behavioural reward there is.

It is likely that the global economic crisis and the global panic which has yet to hit New Zealand as hard as the UK and USA but which is waiting like the wolf at the door will serve to encourage this desire to be a little less dependent on the supermarket and fruiterer this year at least. And when I think about the books I have received to review in the past couple of years, publishers must have been picking this growing interest in thinking local, eating according to the seasons and producing one’s own food. Both gardening and cookery books have been dominated by these themes in recent times. Yes this is fashion, but not fickle fad of the trite nature of minimalist gardens. And it is very positive garden fashion.

The other underpinning theme that is starting to come through gardening internationally is sustainability. That will, I predict, become the buzz word that will replace organics. Historically, the home vegetable garden and orchard has been practiced reasonably sustainably through the centuries from when our forbears made permanent settlements and moved away from the early slash, burn, crop and move on to fresh ground regime. But ornamental gardening has by no means been a champion of sustainability. In fact it has roots firmly in wealth, power and status and good environmental practice did not even feature on the radar. It still doesn’t, in many cases, but the tide is turning.

The worst excesses of the use of chemicals in the garden have been curtailed to a large degree by government regulation and a jolly good thing too. It is not that long ago that Paraquat used to be seen as a super quick acting alternative weed control to glyphosate. In terms of a heavy duty chemical which was extremely dangerous to humans and all round bad for the environment, Paraquat ranks right up there. And it was only one of many that the toxic generations of gardeners from the 1950s to the 1990s saw as progress but which are now widely deemed unacceptable.

For some time now, I have been advocating a reduction in the application of chemicals in routine garden management, and moving away altogether where possible and I am certainly not a lone voice. I am just reflecting a growing body of opinion which is saying that we gardeners need to be more responsible in how we manage our garden environment and to question some of the very dodgy practices embraced in the past and which some gardeners still follow. The perfect swathe of lawn (in my experience invariably achieved by environmentally bad practice using frequent applications of some pretty heavy duty sprays and chemical fertilisers) may come to be seen as dodgy in the extreme sooner rather than later. As embarrassing as an SUV, in some quarters at least. We have already seen the move away from the mono culture of the rose garden where perfection is achieved by fortnightly spraying. In nature, it is rare to find a mono culture (where only one plant variety grows) and in gardening, mono culture or mass plantings of single varieties is not sustainable either.

Mark is reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma which is both illuminating and somewhat scary, causing him to rethink some long held opinions. No longer can we assume that organics = good for the environment and the planet = more healthy and sustainable. The growth of industrial organics (mass production of food which meets organic regulations to satisfy consumer demand – even frozen organic TV dinners, for goodness sake) can leave a carbon footprint larger than conventional food production, requiring even higher usage of fossil fuels in production. There is a charming and naive association that goes on in most people’s heads whereby organic food evokes images of local, small scale and seasonal production which respects the environment , all typified by the farmers’ markets. This may still be largely true in New Zealand but it is certainly not true in the increase of organic food production overseas which is managed just as cynically as conventional large scale production of anything else. So too with anything labelled natural, which we have been conditioned to accept as superior to unnatural or synthetic and therefore all good for us and for the environment. If you pause to think about it, there are many naturally occurring substances which are not at all good for us or for our planet so all we have done is buy into a marketing term.

I suspect we are seeing a devaluing of the term organic. Watch instead for the term sustainable which embraces most that is good about the organic movement but takes it all a step further philosophically. And as 2009 looks destined to bring us both economic and environmental crises on a scale hitherto unseen, the human response to such massive problems will often be to think smaller, to think locally and to take more responsibility for our own patch where we can influence what happens. That is where sustainable practices in gardening and food production start.

After a brief flurry of distinctly warm days a few weeks ago when Mark and I were lured into the swimming pool for the first time this season, we appear to have cooled down again and have had plenty of grey days since. But unlike some places, we can be confident that summer will arrive here and at some point we will get a protracted period of bright light, comparative heat and dry…

Unlikely though it seems to us here, there are parts of the world where you put your garden to bed for winter because there is a period of some months when the ground is too cold to work and the days are too short. Most of the UK falls into this category, as do inland areas in Europe, the US and Canada where the ground can freeze or remain under a blanket of snow and ice. Not so here. Winter in Taranaki is a pretty busy time for gardeners and we are so mild that even the grass continues to grow. Instead, summer is the time when we batten down hatches and prepare for harsher conditions. But only relatively harsher. My late mother used to hate summer. Her beloved Concert Programme got taken over for interminable cricket commentaries and there was very little she could do in the garden. Boredom set in for her and she couldn’t wait for the cooler temperatures and autumn rains.

Forget planting trees and shrubs now. All you will do is stress them badly and it can take quite a while for stressed plants to pick up lost growth. You can dig and divide clumping plants (perennials, grasses and the like) as long as you water them in well but it is best to do this after a bit of rain or they can wilt and sulk and look very sad.

Forget sowing lawns, even if you think a sprinkler is justified. Wait for autumn or spring for this activity.

There are few plants that are best pruned in summer. While roses benefit from constant light pruning, cherry trees are the big exception to the winter and spring pruning rule. In fact, the time to get out and prune your cherries is right now. Where you have patches of dense foliage, it is likely you have witches broom and the entire section needs to be removed. You won’t get flowers on witches broom and, left unchecked, it will take over the whole tree. Beyond that, you can summer prune to shape plants and to remove dead wood, but be very careful not to remove too much foliage because most plants only make a spring growth and are more likely to die if you leave them hacked about at this time of the year.

Container plants will need watering every single day, and more than once a day if they are overplanted hanging baskets or congested pots where it is difficult to keep the required moisture levels high. Don’t be fooled if you see water running out of the bottom of a dry pot – it does not mean you have soaked the plant. All that is happening is that the water is finding an easy path straight through and the roots and potting mix can remain bone dry. If it is really parched, you need a surfactant to encourage the water to penetrate. A squirt of dishwashing liquid will suffice. Unglazed pots such as terracotta and wire hanging baskets dry out even faster and will need more attention. Repotting root bound plants to larger containers makes it easier to keep them watered but make sure you soak the root ball until it is wet through before you pot it. I have put most of my pots to bed for summer – brought in under the nursery irrigation system. I will get them out again in autumn. Lacking an automated irrigation system, home gardeners may have to resort to moving their container plants to shady positions, preferably near a garden tap so that it makes watering easier…

You should have had mulch laid on your garden six to eight weeks ago. Mulch works both ways – it retains existing moisture levels but conversely, if your soil is already dry, it stops any moisture penetrating from above. So there is no point in mulching dry garden beds. And if you think a good soak with the garden hose will get the soil moist enough to lay mulch, try it in one spot and then excavate to see how far the water has gone down. In most cases it will only be a few centimetres which is nowhere near enough. Consign the idea of mulching to the “must-do-next-year basket”. Good gardeners mulch. It is not exciting. It is not spectacular but it is good routine practice.

Experienced vegetable gardeners know that soil which is worked to a fine tilth holds water better than compacted soil. While the top layer will dry and form a crust, it is protecting the moisture levels underneath. It should be possible to develop gardening practices which avoid the need to pour on large quantities of water to the vegetable garden in all but the sandiest of soils. Enriching your soil with humus encourages water retention. Raising beds so that you can flood narrow channels between the rows directs water to the roots where it is needed. Always remember that it is the plant’s roots that need the water, not the foliage. And because you want the roots to go deep, rather than stay on the surface, you want to direct water deeply and not just wet the top which does little more than keep down the dust.

There is some amazement right through the nursery and plant retail industry at just how vegetable gardening has taken off this year, along with the planting of fruit trees. Sure some more desultory gardeners may fall by the wayside, but others will now be enjoying the fruits of their labours and finding that it is enormously rewarding to be able to wander out the back door and pick fresh herbs, vegetables and fruit. It is by no means a certainty that it will save you money, especially not at peak times when there is a glut on the market. You need some experience to be able to work your way into a position where growing produce at home seriously impacts on the food bill. And you need time – quite a bit of time if you are going to do it on a larger scale or to aim for self sufficiency. But the rewards are well and truly there for the converted and the ever increasing number of books on home produce and self sufficiency are an indicator of growing interest in this wholesome activity.

The good news is that at this time of the year, vegetable gardening dovetails in nicely with ornamental gardening. At a time when there is not a great deal to do in the flower garden beyond ongoing weeding, deadheading and general light maintenance, the veg garden is calling loudly. This is a time for intensive input with the start of the summer harvests and the preparation for winter crops. In our household, the call of the vegetable garden always gives Mark a perfect excuse for escaping from the house (sometimes, horrors, even from guests) and hiding out, all the while still feeling busy and virtuous. I wonder if this has any bearing on his recent expansion of the vegetable gardens to two further plots a goodly distance across the property?