Hallson Gardens

It's a Tanyosho Pine & it's been in place for about 6 years. Until this summer it's grown vigorously and it's needles have all been a good healthy dark green. Now they've suddenly faded and half of them have turned pale brown and are falling off. I'm wondering whether to dig it up & throw it away, o...

Nicely done, George. It reminds me of a Japanese garden a few miles from Victoria, where a man has laid down a "stream" made from concrete - and he's painted various Koi on the concrete so that it looks like the stream has fish in it. Here's a picture of it -

Your pictures are fascinating. It sounds like you may be somewhere near Garstang - I think the climate there's pretty well ideal for a Japanese garden.

......or so some monks in Kyoto fear. However, bearing in mind the Buddhist precept that everything changes, maybe it shouldn't be thought of as a disaster, but rather as an opportunity to be creative? http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/japan/2660948/Kyoto-protocol-fails-to-save-the-Japa...

Some people call this sort of sieve a 'screen'. For years I'd been using the sieve by picking it up by the handles and agitating it over a wheelbarrow. That's become hard work, so today I added the four stubby little legs at the corners of the sieve. They keep it in place over the tub while I move t...

The small shrubs next to our lawn need to be kept trimmed to shape otherwise they begin to look very untidy. It's easy to do this with an electric trimmer so I do it myself. The Flowering Plum tree and the Holly trees are an entirely different matter. I'm not as agile as I used to be, and don't clim...

Q.A. - They've been there about 5 years. There were only a few at first but they've multiplied & spread to the point where I think I'll soon have to dig some of them out - my guess is that there are now four times as many as when I planted the first ones. I hadn't heard about their having a tendency...

The temperature has been around 13C all afternoon & it's been drizzling, but it had eased off a bit when I managed this picture. I've always liked Azaleas clipped into a low domed shape & I've been trying to keep these shrubs trimmed similarly. None of these is an Azalea though - the one with the sc...

It looks like a Fugu. Very appropriate for a Japanese garden.....

In July, not many of our shrubs have flowers. In this picture there's a sasanqua Camellia at front centre, a Rhododendron 'Etta Burrows' at top left, a tall Cotoneaster at top right & at the back, behind the Camellia, there's a Flowering Currant, but none of them is in flower. The red flowers are al...

I've no idea why our Pieris died - the only things I can think of are some obscure disease or else I'd mistakenly planted them in earth that had previously had bone meal added to it. Your mention of 'Mountain Fire' reminds me of a similarly named Kalmia - 'Olympic Fire' - quite the best-looking Kalm...

Henrik - Spider has the right idea. It's exactly what I did with the latch on our other gate about 3 years ago & it's still working fine. I'd better not try to advise you about growing Pieris. All my attempts to grow these have ended in their deaths. For what looks (to me) to be a somewhat Chinese-l...

Even though we're only a couple of miles from downtown Victoria & consider our location 100% urban, we have constant trouble with these beasts coming in at night and eating things - often whatever we value most. A couple of years ago I rigged up a ramshackle sort of Deer chaser, based on the Japanes...

Hi, Henrik, Nice to hear from you again! The gate does have a small latch, but it's inconspicuous. Here's a picture of it - it's the rusty old latch from the gate as it used to be, but it's simple & it works very well - just push the gate closed & the latch holds it. I think that the light grey colo...

I know nothing about Lilies - only that my wife bought this one yesterday in a supermarket, and this morning's early sun, lighting it up from behind when we were having breakfast looked (we thought) rather nice - http://www.pbase.com/mtu_fulani/image/97513593

About a year ago these first showed up in our garden. I'd no idea what they were, & several people on this forum identified them for me. They mentioned too that Star of Bethlehem spreads & shows up in all sorts of places. This year I've noticed how very true that is. I even found two clumps of them ...

This is a laugh - was I ever mistaken. It's turned out to be not a grass of any sort.

It's now, in the first week in May, putting out some Purple flowers. After asking around, I've learned that it's SALSIFY!

I'd like to get rid of it/them, but there are two problems. First, you need a magnifying glass just to see one (the picture is a macro & is several times the actual life size, and The City of Victoria is proposing to ban the use of pesticides in peoples' gardens. Maybe I'd better lay in a big supply...

DryGulch,

Thanks - I've just looked up Salsify in Google images & I'm persuaded that it's Purple Salsify. Next step is probably to try the root to find if we like it as a vegetable....

Herb

Insects don't often sit around for long so they're difficult to photograph, especially very small ones. I was taking some pictures of Forget-me-nots & didn't even know that this insect was there. I only noticed it after I'd I downloaded the pictures onto my computer. I wonder what species it is?