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00:00Whoo-hoo!
00:05Hey! Hi!
00:14Hey, honey.
00:22Yay!
00:34Some are maybe behind us, but that doesn't mean that we have to stop enjoying and working in the garden.
00:42We've got a stellar line-up of everything you need when you're digging in at your place.
00:48Here's what's coming up. Welcome to Gardening Australia.
00:53I'm visiting a council-run environmental education centre encouraging residents to grow local plants for wildlife
01:02through their native nursery and demonstration gardens.
01:06Sandy soil in a coastal location is always going to be a challenge.
01:11I'm meeting an experienced gardener who teamed up with a landscape designer to tackle a tricky site.
01:18I'm getting all the tips for growing good-looking ornamental ginger at the Royal Botanic Gardens in Sydney.
01:25And I'm meeting an inspiring couple who have transformed what was a concrete car park into a thriving native garden.
01:42I've come to Sydney's northern beaches to explore a garden alive with abundance.
01:48And this small backyard is filled with all sorts of produce.
01:52Crops are climbing up structures, filling garden beds, and a bathtub is being converted into a productive pond.
02:01Any excess harvest is dried or fermented.
02:05Bing!
02:06Oh, hello, Costa!
02:08How are you?
02:08Hi!
02:09Lovely to meet you.
02:10Lovely to meet you.
02:11Look at your garden.
02:13Oh, and I can hear the chickens over there.
02:15I wore my chicken t-shirt.
02:17Oh, lovely, lovely, look too.
02:20The gardener behind it all is Dr Ping Yin, a scientist growing a healthy way of life.
02:26You know, it's all slowly built up and I never...
02:31anticipated they would go like this.
02:33You know, basically I could plant things like African blue basil and they are perennial.
02:41Yeah.
02:41They have really distinctive flavour.
02:44And I dry them and I use them in the soup and I make cookies with them.
02:51And I actually made some cookies.
02:53We can have some...
02:54Basil cookies?
02:55Yes.
02:55Yes.
02:56Yeah.
02:56But these flower so much across...
02:59Yeah.
02:59As a perennial, don't they?
03:00They are, they are.
03:01I actually do a lot of letting things go flower and I think it's really lovely to see the nature
03:06actually negotiate themselves and make your garden for you.
03:11Ping has a PhD in chemistry and in her professional working life, analyzes plants at a molecular level.
03:21It's influenced her approach to growing food.
03:24So basically I want to plant as many variety, diversity as possible because different plants offer different profile of chemicals
03:36that is good for us.
03:38So the more different food you eat and then the healthier your body can be.
03:43I don't spray anything and you observe and you don't tell.
03:50It's something I was trained as scientists and you just, you know, trying to work out how things are working
03:59and then use it to your best advantage.
04:02And here's my peanuts.
04:04And I started growing them last year and here's actually a flower.
04:10Yeah.
04:10Um, so last year I had a lot of problem with rat and I start growing more underground crop so
04:17that rat can't get them.
04:19And when I harvest them, I, I, I grown up eating fresh peanuts, you know, when they are just come
04:26out from poor.
04:28It's so sweet.
04:30I'm enjoying this nature walkabout.
04:33Oh, this is like a cubby house.
04:36So this is my Madagascar bean treatless.
04:39Yeah.
04:40Wow.
04:40It's, it's effective.
04:42The, the beans have really covered it.
04:44It's very prolific.
04:45And I love this bean because you can harvest them at different stage.
04:50So for instance, if you harvest, when they go sort of dry and they look like this,
04:58Oh yes.
05:00Ah, yes.
05:00So they're beautiful beans.
05:03And then if I harvest one, so this is my favourite stage.
05:09And when the pod is just start going yellow and, um, and they are plump.
05:16They are fully developing the flavour.
05:19So you don't need to soak it and you can just cook it straight away.
05:23Yeah.
05:23And then, so once it's been on there longer, it shrinks, it dries out.
05:28Yeah, it shrinks, it dries out.
05:29So then you have, if you are, sometimes I'm too eager to pick them and they look completely different.
05:36So for instance, this one, I think this one is going to be very much in white stage.
05:43They are still like quite baby.
05:45So they don't taste as good.
05:48And I love this archway because, you know, I, I read the book, uh, Permiculture for Beginner by Bill Morrison.
05:56Yes.
05:57And he talked about, I think that was really a changing movement is you actually have to build the structure
06:04to accommodate what you want to grow.
06:07So once you have that structure, you can just keep changing your crop.
06:12And I mean, it's, it's a very simple piece of infrastructure.
06:17It's just a piece of steel mesh.
06:19Yeah.
06:20Yeah.
06:21Arched over.
06:21Yeah.
06:22Screwed into a plank.
06:23Yeah.
06:23And it's perfect.
06:25So in this bed, I have asparagus, half the bed.
06:30They've been there for seven years.
06:32I love them.
06:33I, when I pick them in the morning, I just eat them before they go back to the kitchen.
06:38Uh, I don't really cook them.
06:40And they are so sweet and, um, they're beautiful.
06:43Yeah.
06:45So many plants in Ping's garden connect to her heritage.
06:53This in Chinese, we call it chun ya.
06:57Chun means spring.
06:58Ya means sprouts.
07:00And I have absolutely no idea what's called in English.
07:05And you cut it into very small pieces and you put in the egg, you make an omelet.
07:10And you just only eat it like a few times a year.
07:13It's something very special.
07:15What's the flavour like?
07:17Um, have a try.
07:19It's very distinctive flavour.
07:21Very fragrant.
07:24Mmm.
07:26Ooh.
07:27And kind of nutty.
07:29Yeah, very nutty, yeah.
07:30And then there's a bit oily, like, a bit fishy as well.
07:34Yeah, yeah, yeah.
07:35Um.
07:35It's very distinctive.
07:37Yeah.
07:37Wow.
07:38There's nothing I tasted like it.
07:40Mmm.
07:41It's truffle-y as well.
07:42Yeah, yeah.
07:43It's a little bit truffle-y.
07:44It's almost like green truffle.
07:46Because only for that certain time you have it.
07:49And it's so intense, the flavour.
07:51Mmm.
07:52And I love it.
07:56I grow the snake bean every single year because it's very much tied into how I grown up.
08:03And it's full of, uh, goodness.
08:06And we would, uh, ferment the snake bean when it's in peak season.
08:13Mmm.
08:14Or we can also dry it.
08:16And then we eat it all year round.
08:19We call it pao cai.
08:21Pao cai.
08:22Yes.
08:22After we ferment it.
08:24So, basically, pao cai means soaked vegetables with brine.
08:29That's, that's all, you know.
08:30So, so, so, brine, water, uh, you know, water, salt, and, and vegetable.
08:36So, I've been eating pao cai since I was born pretty much, you know, since I could eat.
08:42And I never, ever get fed up with it because the flavour is always different.
08:47So, it's like a sweet, sour, a little salty, and it's perfect.
08:53And a little later in the show, Ping's going to share the recipe for her perfect pao cai.
09:06Is loam the ideal soil?
09:08Well, we often aspire to it.
09:10And it certainly is fantastic for veggie patches or strawberry patches.
09:15Loam is an almost equal mix of sand and silt with a little bit of clay.
09:19And it's a sweet spot when it comes to having good drainage, water retention, and also good structure for roots
09:27and soil microbes.
09:28However, not everyone has loam naturally.
09:31So, that's where raised beds or even wicking beds come in because you can create a good soil structure.
09:37If, however, you have sandy soil or clay soil, don't worry about it because there are lots of plants adapted
09:44to your soil type.
09:45What is Core 10?
09:47Core 10 is a name for rusted steel edging.
09:50Now, it's commonly used to edge lawns, paths, and garden beds to keep everything neat and separated.
09:56Now, the attraction is that it develops a natural, earthy patina.
09:59It'll stand up to errant whippersnippers or mowers, and there's not many interloping plants that can penetrate steel.
10:07Now, even though it's quite expensive, it's long-lasting, versatile, and recyclable.
10:13Core 10 is often supplied raw and will take a few weeks to rust.
10:16But you can hurry this along by spraying regularly with water.
10:20Is seed saving hard?
10:22Not always, especially when your plants volunteer like this one has.
10:26It's a silverbeet that just popped up from the side of my main pathway.
10:30So, the soil is really compacted and pretty degraded, but it's flourishing and it's one of the healthier plants I've
10:36grown on my property.
10:37And so, I'm going to let it go to seed, harvest that seed, and then propagate my future silverbeet crops
10:44from it.
10:50When you start looking around and learning about the plants local to your area,
10:56you realise that there's so much to discover.
11:00Gerry's checking out a local institution in Kapalabar
11:04that's been helping residents on their gardening journey for years.
11:11I'm in Kapalabar, a suburb about half an hour east of Brisbane CBD, visiting Indigiscapes,
11:19an environmental education centre which features native botanic gardens
11:24and a nursery that celebrates local indigenous plants.
11:28People can come to a place like this, spend some time outdoors,
11:32and get inspired to use locally endemic plants in their own yards to attract local wildlife and keep things alive.
11:42And one of my guides, Ranger Stacy, will be a familiar face to those who remember Network 10's Totally Wild.
11:51So, what does your role involve?
11:54I am Principal Advisor Community Education.
11:57So, my role is a lot of really hands-on stuff.
12:01So, I've got this program that I do once a month called Ranger Stacy's Joey Club,
12:05and that's with little children, and I take them on a nature walk.
12:09We use our senses to smell and hear and learn about the environment.
12:14How long has Indigiscapes been around?
12:16This year is celebrating 25 years, so a big quarter of the century.
12:21There's 14 and a half hectares of natural bushland.
12:24It all began as a place for people to come and meet, environmental groups to come,
12:29volunteers to come and do their thing as well, and just for the general public.
12:33There are three main walking tracks, but they're all really easy.
12:37Elderly people can come down to enjoy looking out for turtles and bird life.
12:42It's also great for young mums with prams and also for wheelchairs.
12:47In addition to the walking tracks, there are seven demonstration gardens.
12:52All are easily accessible and designed to show how plants can be used in home gardens
12:58to attract local wildlife.
13:01Locally native plants mean they naturally occur in an area,
13:05but that's not to say it exclusively grows in that area.
13:09Some of our plants have quite a broad distribution from Cape York down to Tasmania and beyond.
13:14Ben Webb runs the operations at the centre's nursery,
13:18where you'll find locally sourced native plants.
13:22He's taking me on a tour, starting with a wildlife garden,
13:26which is deliberately planted out to attract pollinators.
13:30And my eye is drawn to this little pea down here.
13:34This cute little plant with the fern-like foliage is the smooth darling pea.
13:39It's super hardy, very adaptable to different soil types.
13:44It's a host to a number of butterfly species.
13:47As you can see, it's got quite a variation in its flower colour.
13:52I'm really impressed to see this growing here,
13:55because one of your missions is to replace invasive weeds with local native plants.
14:01Yeah, it's the best replacement for the weedy Easter cassia.
14:05This is the brush senna, a senna eclinus.
14:09It allows the lemon migrant butterfly, which came in with the weed for the air,
14:15to lay its eggs and continue its life cycle when we're removing the weedy Easter cassia.
14:20So what are the key characteristics of this that separate it from the weed?
14:25The native one lacks a golden ring around the edge of the leaf.
14:30The Easter cassia has a golden edge.
14:32And also the seed pods are quite flat on our native option,
14:39as opposed to the Easter cassia, which are much more inflated and circular in cross-section.
14:45Come and check this out, Joe.
14:48Oh, this is a Richmond birdwing vine.
14:51It is.
14:52The only local host species for an endangered butterfly,
14:56the Richmond birdwing butterfly.
14:58And the wildlife garden has a native beehive,
15:01so visitors have a good chance of seeing native bees out and about on warm, dry days.
15:09So this is the bush chucker garden?
15:11It is. And here's a peanut tree.
15:13Where do they come from?
15:14So they come from Northern Australia up to PNG.
15:19They're related to the Queensland bottle tree and flame tree.
15:23They produce beautiful big orange fruits, which split open to reveal black seed, which are edible.
15:30What do they taste like?
15:31Well, they taste like peanuts.
15:32They really do?
15:33They do.
15:33They do.
15:34There's also an impressive wetland garden.
15:38A big feature of our wetland garden includes the creek, which surrounding it features quite a diverse range of plants,
15:48including ferns, vines, sedges, lilies, and a number of trees, including the swamp box, scribbly gum, and broadleaf paperbarks.
16:01And these all provide really good habitat for our resident turtles, waterfowl, and water dragons.
16:13And the wetland garden borders a wonderfully healthy, typical rainforest display of tall trees, broadleaves, shrubs, and climbing vines.
16:22We've got quite a large native grape, otherwise known as kangaroo vine.
16:27It's quite a vigorous vine.
16:29I wouldn't recommend putting it in the early stages of a rainforest planting.
16:34We've also got Eupomacea lorina, known as the Bolwara, which has a lineage back to Gondwana.
16:41It's one of the early examples of a flowering plant.
16:45It has an interesting relationship with a particular weevil, which literally eats its flower, pollinating as it goes.
16:54And once it's pollinated, it forms a fruit that looks like a big gum nut, which has a nice sort
16:59of bubble gum flavour to it.
17:00Both the native grape and the Bolwara are really good options for an indoor plant.
17:09Indigiscapes has had a small, volunteer-run nursery on site from the beginning,
17:13growing plants for the gardens and selling any surplus to the public.
17:19It's changed a bit since we've seen you last, Gerry.
17:22It certainly has.
17:25In 2019, we were given the space to spread out, and we're growing a lot more plants than we used
17:32to be able to.
17:33Two to three hundred different species at any time.
17:36We sell a lot of our plants back to the public.
17:38Quite a few, more and more, are going to council projects.
17:42Yeah, people just keep coming back to check out what we've got, what's new in stock.
17:46Most of their stock is grown from seed, which Ben and the volunteers collect from patches of bushland
17:53in the Redland City Council area with a permit.
17:57Volunteers do all the hard work, the potting up, pot washing, seed sorting.
18:03They're really the heart of the nursery.
18:05A significant species growing in the nursery is the native jute, Corcorus cunninghammei.
18:12A rare, endangered native shrub occurring at only six locations across Queensland and New South Wales,
18:19the native jute is threatened by land clearing and weeds.
18:24By propagating and dispersing these plants, we're hoping to increase awareness about its conservation.
18:31A lot of gardeners may not know about a plant like the native jute, which would be a beautiful addition
18:37in their garden,
18:38with its slender, serrated leaves, red stems and clusters of bright yellow blooms.
18:44And it's a magnet for bees.
18:47There is a lot of space back in the suburbs for our rare and threatened species.
18:53It's quite important to protect the areas that are left.
18:58Community outreach and education is absolutely vital.
19:02Otherwise, the hard work put in by volunteers and staff like Ranger Stacey would go to waste.
19:08My favourite trail is the tallow wood trail,
19:12because there's this huge towering tree called the tallow wood, 400 years old.
19:18Wow.
19:19What do people think when they see this tree?
19:22I think people are in awe of the tallow wood.
19:24About 200 years ago, this tree was struck by a lightning bolt.
19:29And we can see the blackened scar down the middle of the tree.
19:32And when that happened, the tree took a different turn and it grew in a twisted fashion.
19:37Because normally, tallow woods are straight and tall.
19:41There are hollows in the tree, because as we know, it's so important to keep old growth trees.
19:46So it is like a multi-storey apartment complex, is the way I like to describe it, for the wildlife.
19:52We've seen a koala in that tree.
19:54Possums, owls would visit at night.
19:57It's a magical tree, really.
20:01Well, I think it's thanks to places like Indigiscapes that more and more people are appreciating the ecology around them.
20:10And it provides them with the means to do something about it themselves.
20:15I totally agree.
20:17It's a really special place, because there's something here for everyone.
20:21And it's also the people, the people that I work with.
20:24Everyone's so passionate.
20:26And I think we like to share our passion to the wider community.
20:30It generates its own joy.
20:32It certainly does.
20:33You put it well, Gerry.
20:41What's the difference between catnip and catmint?
20:44Well, unfortunately, those terms are often used interchangeably.
20:49They are all in the genus Nepeta.
20:51And that is in the mint family.
20:53Hence, it's got square stems and strong smelling foliage.
20:56But catnip is actually Nepeta catteria.
20:59It has white flowers and greenish foliage.
21:02Now, if you've got a cat, some cats react really favourably to it.
21:07It gives them a bit of a buzz.
21:08And they love to sort of get all smoochy and roll on it.
21:11However, as a garden plant, it does self-seed.
21:15So you need to keep it under control.
21:17Cat mints, on the other hand, are generally the ones that are wonderful to grow in a sunny border.
21:23They range in height from Persian blue, which is about 15 centimetres.
21:27My favourite is Walker's blue, which gets to 60 centimetres.
21:31But this one, Otway Towers, is over a metre high when it's fully grown.
21:35These ones have purple flowers.
21:37They're gorgeous.
21:38They love the sun.
21:39And you give them a hard haircut at the end of their long flowering period in autumn.
21:50If you live by the coast, you'll know that it comes with its own unique set of garden challenges.
21:57Sand, sun, sea spray are just some of the things you have to struggle with.
22:02But with the right design and the right choice of plants, you can achieve some incredible results.
22:10Josh is off to the beach to have a look at a beautiful example of what's possible.
22:20The garden has always been a special place in barrister Conrad de Curloy's busy life.
22:31I really enjoy getting out from under the desk and going out and just pottering around in the garden.
22:39I've previously gardened in sort of leafy green suburbs, which had roses and cottagey type gardens.
22:47This is a completely different environment.
22:49It was not an environment I knew anything about.
22:52We're right opposite the sea.
22:54I just thought I was so far out of my depth when it came to trying to pick the right
22:59plants for an environment that is incredibly harsh.
23:10This is Cotteslope, just north of Fremantle.
23:13And whilst it's an absolutely stunning part of the world, it required Conrad, the very experienced and capable gardener, to
23:22shift his mindset and call in the cavalry.
23:29Coastal gardening is where Robert Finney has carved out the bulk of his career in landscape design.
23:41The sandy soils in Perth are obviously a challenge, particularly the closer we get to the coast.
23:46But this site in particular on Cozlo is probably one of the harshest conditions that I have ever worked with
23:52in 17 years of designing gardens.
23:54It's a north-facing garden, so would receive a lot of sun all through the year.
24:03Particularly in winter, the south-westerly wind that really kicks in off the coast up through here just brings salt
24:09-laden winds and whips around the corner.
24:11When we enter at the front door, we are at ground level, but the natural topography of the site slopes
24:17down towards the coast, so it creates this elevation on the lower ground floor.
24:23The first floor, the main living space, was going to project forward over the landscape.
24:28Conrad, what did you want from the garden?
24:30What I wanted to see was something that actually was nice to walk around, nice to potter in, that would
24:39have seasonal elements.
24:41I wanted the garden to relate to the house, and I wanted to relate to the streetscape, and that was
24:47one of the reasons we deliberately decided we didn't want to put a fence in.
24:51We wanted to have a garden that could speak to the outside world.
25:01So the soil was very sandy, so there was a lot of good soil nutrients brought into the site to
25:07really help the garden establish certainly within the first 12 to 18 months.
25:11So the boulder element really enabled us to create a natural retaining moving up towards the footpath,
25:18and then likewise the planting was able to spill over and have a free-form effect to blend in with
25:24the boulders.
25:25The day that the boulders were being placed was a full day on site.
25:30There was a crane set up across the road through there.
25:32We literally had these close to a ton boulders hanging in the air on a finished building, so it was
25:38quite a hairy day, shall we say.
25:41The builder was having a number of heart attacks when the boulders were swinging near his pristine, rendered building.
25:53The plant palette we selected was really a combination of green tones and silver tones,
25:58and that is, the interest there is really echoing the coastal dunes beyond, so we're just trying to carry that
26:04through.
26:05We selected a handful of species which the foliage contrasted against each other,
26:11and then that selection was repeated up and through the northern aspect of the building.
26:15And so when you look back at the whole building, you get a connection from one part of the garden
26:20to the other.
26:21We used a lot of plants that hold their form all year round, which gives a structure to the garden.
26:27Things like Pytospora Miss Muffet, Carissa Desert Star, likewise, holding their form in the garden all year round.
26:33Santolina, the cotton lavender, so that's bringing a nice silver palette to the planting style,
26:38and also calanchoe copper spoons.
26:40A hardy succulent, being a north-facing garden, just looks fantastic all year round.
26:45And then things like some cactus species, San Pedro cactus, and some perennials like Limoni and Perez,
26:51just to really give a pop of colour through some seasonal change.
26:54I have occasionally asked Rob whether a rose would ever grow here.
26:58He's absolutely said, A, it probably would grow, but it wouldn't suit the environment.
27:03You've sneaked a fig in.
27:05I have sneaked a fig in because I love figs.
27:09So one is growing, and it has produced a couple of very nice figs.
27:17The garden doesn't take a lot of maintenance.
27:19On occasion I do the clipping of the topiary.
27:23We've used a native restringer, and Conrad's done a great job in clipping those into the form that they're in,
27:29which has a beautiful contrast against the stone, against the succulent species that we've used.
27:34Whilst they're in quite a wild environment, the topiary seems to anchor the otherwise free-flowing elements of the garden.
27:41I think it's a fun part of the maintenance regime, and it's sort of a once every six month job.
27:47So I've got a nice pair of secateurs and shears, and they do the trick.
27:55It's such a striking landscape, you know, from the street.
27:58Do you get plenty of positive feedback?
28:01It's a lovely garden to potter around in.
28:04It's a lovely garden to walk around.
28:07And what I enjoy particularly is doing the occasional maintenance work in the garden,
28:12and interacting with the people who walk past because they often give me very nice compliments.
28:18And so it's a way in which you can not only be in the garden, but also interacting with the
28:23neighbourhood.
28:23So the garden has worked, and the enjoyment I get out of the garden is the fact that it's very
28:29complimentary to the house,
28:31and it relates very nicely to the streetscape.
28:38Has your appreciation for this style of gardening developed as a result of your time here?
28:45Once you're living by the sea, you can see that it is possible to have a garden,
28:51but it's a completely different style of garden from one that you would see in the hills or in the
28:57leafy green suburbs.
28:59So it is a different style of garden, but it's still a garden,
29:02and it still has wonderful elements of green, grey, leafiness, seasonality.
29:09And I do like actually that the flowers have come off of that.
29:12Rob's done a great job because the plants have survived, thrived.
29:17It's a beautiful garden.
29:24Still to come on Gardening Australia,
29:27Hannah gets a head start on the chill.
29:31Clarence checks out some gorgeous gingers.
29:35And Millie heads west to check out a land of sweeping plains.
29:46Earlier in the show, I explored Ping's productive organic patch.
29:51I grow the snake ping every single year
29:54because it's very much tied into how I've grown up.
29:59And it's full of goodness.
30:01And now, Ping has a recipe to share that she's been eating since childhood.
30:07We're going to do some pao cai.
30:09Out of the snake beans?
30:10Yeah, out of the snake beans.
30:12And actually we'll call it pao jangdou
30:14because the snake bean in Chinese is called jangdou.
30:18Jangdou.
30:18Yeah.
30:20Use a sterilised jar that's got a good seal.
30:23And we're making brine.
30:26250ml of water with a salt content of 5%.
30:29So we're weighing 12.5g of salt.
30:34Use only pure salt.
30:36Avoid iodised salt or anything that's got an anti-caking agent.
30:41And you can...
30:42Oh!
30:43Look at that, perfect.
30:44Yeah.
30:45So really the salt concentration is, you know, it's roughly.
30:48And so it's, you just get it going and you will find a perfect recipe for yourself.
30:56Yeah.
30:56So what you're telling me is that your Chinese cooking heritage is a bit Greek.
31:02Because it's like, yeah.
31:04Yeah.
31:04Just near enough.
31:05Yeah.
31:05Yeah, yeah, yeah.
31:06This is...
31:06Your laboratory science background is not so discerning when it comes to making your cooking.
31:13No.
31:14No, no.
31:14I like that.
31:14Because I never grown up with any recipe.
31:17So we just sort of...
31:18It's a lot of intuition, lots of trying, and tasting, and lots of tasting.
31:25Yeah.
31:25Yeah, yeah, yeah.
31:26And with the water, I just use tap water and I pre-boil it and cool it down.
31:33When you boil, it evaporates the chlorine, so the bacteria will not like chlorine.
31:42So now we wait this dissolving.
31:46The snake beans are washed and thoroughly dry.
31:50Ping cuts the beans to the length of the jar, and this way they all get the salt evenly.
31:56Just cut like this.
31:59And you can help to put in.
32:01Oh, okay.
32:02Oh, look at that.
32:03That's starting to look good.
32:07Yeah.
32:08What do you think?
32:10Yeah, perfect.
32:11Perfect.
32:12So then all we need to do is we just need to pour this in.
32:19So the key is you need to keep everything clean.
32:23That's number one.
32:24And number two is all your vegetable has to be immersed into the liquid.
32:30There will be a little bit of air on the top, and you could always make a little bit brine
32:35to sort of rise it.
32:37And, but also you can just push it down because when the vegetables start to come liquid, it will actually,
32:46the liquid level will rise.
32:47Yeah.
32:49So that's it.
32:50So then you just close it really tightly.
32:53Okay.
32:54Okay.
33:23I'm pumped to try this at home myself.
33:25It's really simple and healthy.
33:27And now it's time for a cuppa and taste testing Ping's home-baked basil bickies.
33:33It's my recipe from back from home.
33:37So this is like my sort of biscuits.
33:40And it also has such and pepper in it.
33:43So it's more sort of towards savoury.
33:45Savoury.
33:46Yeah.
33:47Yeah.
33:48I've got the pepper.
33:50Oh, I can smell the basil.
33:52Mm.
33:53Mm.
33:53How important has this garden journey been for you?
33:57And well, it's really life changing because there's so many things to discover.
34:03It's just always something new.
34:05Yeah.
34:05I love it.
34:07Well, I also love this garden and wandering with Ping through her wild, productive and homely patch.
34:23If you've ever tried growing kale over the warmer months, you may have noticed that it does not love the
34:28hot weather.
34:29It gets impacted by all sorts of things, including pests like aphids and cabbage moth.
34:34But I'll still plant it in my summertime and I'll nurse it through so I can get a head start
34:40on my autumn and winter greens.
34:42I just surrender to the fact it's going to look pretty bad.
34:45Right now, these babies are being eaten alive by the cabbage moth caterpillar and it does pain my heart.
34:52But all I do is I come around and I harvest off all the impacted leaves, which is most of
34:57them.
34:58As long as there's a few, even one baby leaf left in that plant, it's going to drink in that
35:03sun.
35:03And when the autumn coolness kicks in, it's going to boom and come back to life beautifully,
35:08making sure I can get my greens nice and quickly as the cool weather creeps in.
35:20There are some plants out there that really punch above their weight when it comes to giving your garden a
35:27certain feel.
35:28Clarence is checking out one of my personal favourites for creating that tropical vibe.
35:39Today, I have the privilege of finding out all about growing ornamental gingers with Sheila Buchan,
35:45one of the Growing Friends volunteers here at the Royal Botanic Gardens Sydney.
35:49Plants propagated by the volunteers are sold on at the Growing Friends nursery.
35:55The funds raised support conservation projects and research at the gardens.
36:00Is this a very tropical little area in here?
36:03Oh, it's fabulous.
36:07What's the thing you like about ornamental ginger?
36:09Well, they're a very good plant for understory because they do like partial shade.
36:15And they just make a whole fabulous ground cover.
36:20They're very easy to propagate.
36:24They have very little pest problems, if any.
36:28And the flowers are just so spectacular and so different across the selection.
36:35They're just stunning.
36:37So what are some of the plants in this bed that might be referred to as ornamental ginger?
36:41Well, we've got the Costas, we've got some Globbers, Curcumas, Zingibers and Alpinias.
36:51And they're all mainly clump-forming perennials.
36:56Sounds like an episode of Harry Potter, Globbers.
37:00It's quite interesting. I'd love to see those.
37:03Yeah, the Globbers are lovely. Common name is Dancing Ladies.
37:07Yes, the lovely purple flowers are these yellow.
37:11Just gorgeous.
37:12I can see the Dancing Lady.
37:13Hence the Dancing Lady nickname, yes.
37:17Wow.
37:19Ornamental gingers thrive in tropical and subtropical climates,
37:22but grow as far south as Sydney as long as it's cross-free.
37:27We're taking a look at some of the Costas species.
37:30Well, these would look great in a home garden.
37:32Yes, this one here is Costas Belize Yellow.
37:37And this is as high as it will get.
37:39And they flower constantly during the warmer months.
37:43Nice.
37:44Lovely.
37:45And this on the left, this is Costas Dwarf Orange.
37:50Fabulous ground cover if you've got a shady spot in your garden.
37:54It's perfect.
37:56And over here we have Costas Erythrophyllis,
37:59which has this beautiful deep red leaf colour on the back.
38:03And the contrasting light orangey-yellow flowers.
38:08I feel like there should be another presenter here doing this story on Costas.
38:12Well, yes.
38:13Yes.
38:22This is a really interesting looking plant.
38:24Yes, this is Costas Buda belly.
38:28It's really interesting in that some of them grow straight up and have this gorgeous stem.
38:35And then there's a lovely backing on the leaves for the colour.
38:39And then it also grows round in this really twirly spiral.
38:44It's absolutely glorious.
38:46It's such a big contrast, isn't it, between the back and the front.
38:50Yes.
38:50And when they sort of blow in the breeze, you get the colouring.
38:54And we take cuttings of this by stem cutting.
38:59We cut it as close to the base as possible,
39:02which invigorates the plant to send up more shoots.
39:06And it also gives us plenty of material for lots of cuttings.
39:11Probably get about eight out of this one stem.
39:14Nice.
39:15We have to have pre-approval for any cuttings that we take from any plant.
39:21And we have a special list that we all adhere to.
39:25Now, we're also going to get some propagation material from one of the ornamental Zingivas,
39:29also known as beehive gingers.
39:32They have lush foliage, bizarre bracts rising up from the ground,
39:36and small, stunning flowers.
39:38And to get the plant material,
39:40a horticulturist here at the gardens is lending a hand.
39:44Now, this one, Clarence, is the Zingiba giant orange,
39:49and we propagate and sell this in the nursery.
39:53Andrew, who's the hort in charge of this area of the gardens,
39:57is very kindly going to dig us up a rhizome
40:00because we don't do digging up in the gardens.
40:04So we're going to take the entire section here all the way down to the rhizome.
40:08Yes.
40:09Plenty of options now.
40:10Yes, definitely.
40:11We'll get quite a lot of cuttings from the stem and the rhizome.
40:16Nice.
40:17Now we have the Costas and Zingiba cuttings.
40:20Sheila is going to show us some propagation techniques.
40:25Right, so what we generally do is we start at the bottom,
40:31we do a straight cut,
40:33and then we count up one, two, three, I'd say four,
40:37and we do an angled cut.
40:40So here, Clarence, you can see on the stem all the nodes that are marked,
40:45and the fact that we cut it straight at the bottom,
40:47that's the end that goes in the pot,
40:50and an angle at the top.
40:51So we just continue cutting in the same manner all the way up the stem,
40:57angled straight across.
41:00Now we just pop the cuttings in round the edge like this,
41:04just spacing them out round the outside of the pot,
41:09and we're using a good quality free-draining potting mix
41:15and keeping them towards the exterior of the pot.
41:19Yeah.
41:19They seem to do a lot better than being put individually in pots.
41:23Press the potting mix down and then give them a little water in.
41:29I've got the water in here. Brilliant.
41:31I feel like I've got the easy job.
41:37And then these are actually some we did about six weeks ago.
41:42This is Chila Costa's pink shadow,
41:44and you can see just in that short length of time
41:48all the new plants that are coming up.
41:51The stems die off and we just break them off,
41:54and you can see the root system coming through the bottom of the pot.
41:59It's amazing. Six weeks. That's incredible.
42:01They grow faster in spring and summer.
42:04Yeah, yeah.
42:05Slow down in the winter.
42:07You can also propagate Zingivas using stem cuttings.
42:10But for this demonstration,
42:11we're taking a closer look at the rhizome.
42:15These Clarence are the plants that Andrew kindly dug up for us.
42:19And in this instance, we're just going to plant the rhizome.
42:24And interestingly, you can see all the little points
42:27where the new plant might come out from.
42:30Yeah, yeah.
42:30So probably about four shoots coming out of this piece here,
42:34so it's off to a flying start.
42:37So a benefit, yeah, of the rhizome rather than those stem cuttings
42:40is the one rhizome, multiple points where we hopefully will get new plants.
42:45New plants, yes. And very quickly.
42:47Yeah.
42:52And then we just pop this in the middle here, and it's the same premium course potting mix that we
43:00use.
43:01And all going well from those nodes on the rhizome.
43:04Yeah, hopefully we'll get about four new plants popping up from there.
43:10And we just give it a little water in.
43:12Beautiful.
43:13And it's set to go.
43:15It's like a rain.
43:17I thought you were going to drown it.
43:19That's a good watering can.
43:20Yeah.
43:20So we've got a rhizome in there.
43:23We've got stem cuttings.
43:24If you're going to keep it in a pot or put it in your garden,
43:28I'd wait till the signs of roots coming out the bottom of the pot.
43:31And then you can either pot it up into a bigger pot,
43:34if you want to keep it on the balcony or a terrace,
43:37or it can go out into your garden.
43:39And then in the spring, I would start giving them a high potassium fertilizer,
43:44which will encourage flowering and probably do that over, say, September, October, November time.
43:50And keep them watered.
43:53Oh, yeah, water.
43:54Very important.
43:55Yes.
43:56Don't drown them.
44:01I reckon ornamental gingers are eye-catching in any garden.
44:05They're perfect for a lush, layered, textural planting design.
44:19My favourite types of gardens are the ones that speak to and connect with the landscapes they're in.
44:26With the right plants in the right place,
44:29you can create something that not only reflects where you are in the world,
44:35but the way you see things.
44:37Millie's off to check out a home garden that knows exactly where it sits.
44:47West Footscray is on Wurundjeri and Bunurong Country.
44:50An inner city suburb on Melbourne's west, it's long been the industrial heart of the city.
44:56But as industry moves out, more and more people and gardens are moving back in.
45:02My professional gardening life started here in the western suburbs of Melbourne.
45:07And Footscray still feels a little bit like home.
45:10And today I get to meet a couple who are transforming a little piece of this urban area into a
45:17beautiful garden,
45:18using the plants from this place.
45:22The idea was that we would bring some of these indigenous plants back into what is a fairly typical suburbia,
45:30that we would create or recreate habitat for some of these animals that have been lost.
45:35But apart from, I guess, creating habitat for potential critters, I also want it to be very pretty.
45:43And so the foliage mattered a lot, especially for the non-grassland type plants.
45:49And the flowers mattered a lot.
46:00This is a young garden.
46:02It's around three years since Janet and Pierre totally transformed the front of their 450 square metre block.
46:09When Pierre first moved here 17 years ago,
46:12the piece of land was split between three small one-bedroom units
46:15with a communal concrete car park at the front.
46:18More than ten years later, he and Janet managed to buy the other two units,
46:23which enabled them to knock down some internal walls to create a two-bedroom home.
46:28And very importantly, to completely redesign the garden.
46:32We don't own a car, so we didn't need three car parks.
46:37We've kept one for visitors.
46:39The transformation process was quite dramatic.
46:42We had an excavator come in and remove the concrete car parks and the shrubs,
46:46and we found that we had actually quite a large bit of front yard that we knew that we could
46:52do something better with.
46:53You've packed in so many different features.
46:55How did you go about having this slope from the house?
46:58Was it always there, down to the street level, or have you actually created that?
47:02There is a slight natural gradient, but we accentuated it using some of the hardscape designs and some of the
47:08plant choices.
47:09The pond is connected to our stormwater system.
47:12So when rain hits our roof, that runs off into the pond and tops it up.
47:17And if it rains a lot and the pond overflows, it overflows into the dry creek bed.
47:21Right.
47:22Just again to sort of accentuate the natural gradient of the land.
47:28Little pops of yellow come from billybuttons and clustered everlastings.
47:33More colour comes from white and yellow paper daisies.
47:36Soft mauve brackish combs that grow in small clumps.
47:40And some bright purple from tactile feathery thylotus.
47:44My favourite is the bluebell, the Wallenbergia.
47:48Seas of blue flowers that only come out when the sun's out.
47:51It is such a beautiful colour, but also such a magnet for insects.
47:56Yeah, so watching the native bees dive into a bluebell and disappear for a moment before flying out again.
48:02Covered in dust.
48:03Is a joy.
48:04So I'll sit down with my kid and we'll sit on a rock and we'll just watch the insects dive
48:08in.
48:13Myoporum pavifolium or dichondra are being trained to give the paths a soft, curved edge.
48:20Eremophila calabari carpet and a local form of pig face give the birds and insects even more reason to stop
48:26by.
48:27What is it that you really wanted from the garden?
48:29I think, for me, I wouldn't really find a lot of enjoyment in just completely replicating, say, a native grassland.
48:37It's not aesthetically too interesting to me, which is why I think I convinced Pierre to allow me to introduce
48:46some non-indigenous things into our garden.
48:49I think our gardens are many, many things.
48:52Like, they are places for biodiversity, but they're also places for creativity and personal expression.
48:58So it's important to have those little points where you get to plant what you want.
49:03Yeah.
49:04I really thought about the texture of the foliage and the colours of the foliage just to give the garden
49:08interest when things are not in bloom.
49:11And so when the wind blows, it's very kinetic and that's really nice.
49:22I love that on a relatively modest block, you've managed to jam in lots of little trees.
49:28Yeah, I think we've got seven gum trees here and three golden sprays.
49:33We wanted that height, but it's not the biggest yard in the world.
49:38And we didn't want it to be overwhelmed by having one or two really big gums.
49:41So we've selected some species that grow to a maximum of six or seven metres, yellow gums, snow gums of
49:48various types.
49:49And there's a eucalyptus povrilenta, a baby blue, which is just gorgeous.
49:53So evocative, so Aussie.
49:55You know, it looks like juvenile eucalypt foliage.
49:57It's such a great plant.
49:58Yeah, it's a beautiful plant and one that, you know, can fit in, you know, relatively small spaces.
50:04I love the way you've displayed the grasses, not only in the garden interspersed, but also on the verge.
50:10It's almost like you've got a little shop for people to walk past and choose which one they like.
50:13That was the idea that we would have little, you know, metre long squares of different kinds of grasses.
50:19It just allows people to go, oh, I really like the ostrosteipa or I really like the plume grass or
50:25the kangaroo grass.
50:26And then the idea is that they can, you know, pick that species and take it into their own gardens.
50:33So you had this vision for creating a really open garden to the street. Why did you want that?
50:40We want to encourage more gardens like this.
50:43So we left it open so it's just as enjoyable from the street as it is from our own house.
50:48There's a house a couple of streets down from us that we walk past quite a lot on our daily
50:53walks around the neighbourhood.
50:54They have this front facing garden, no fence and ginormous boulders and native plantings.
51:01And we looked at it and there was nothing that was quite like that anywhere.
51:06And so I think that's where we started going past their house every time we went for a walk.
51:11And then one day...
51:12Looking and pointing at their front yard.
51:14One day they poked their heads out and they're like, what are you doing?
51:19Are you casing the joint?
51:22And then we started talking about their garden and then they invited us in and they introduced us to their
51:28designer.
51:29And it turned out to be a designer, academic Ross-Uwe gang who's been in your show, I think, a
51:37few times.
51:37And then we went to visit him and then that's when we started coming up with ideas of how we
51:43wanted our garden to be.
51:45I mean, you yourselves were inspired by seeing what someone else had done in their front yard.
51:50And you'll never know how many people formed a little idea simply from walking past your garden and maybe having
51:57a chat.
51:57There are more and more native gardens popping up everywhere around us.
52:00And I think a lot of it is you get inspiration from what other people are doing.
52:04And then you jump on the bandwagon and then hopefully that stream of plants provide some sort of refuge for
52:13critters.
52:14For instance, I would love to see fairy wrens in the garden and that might be a multi-decade wait.
52:21But as more and more people plant indigenous gardens in the area, you know, there's a chance that these little
52:28beautiful creatures might make their way back into suburbia.
52:40Time to roll up your sleeves and dig right in. It's your jobs for the weekend.
52:45Watch out for those bindi's though. Do you need a hand?
52:53Cool temperate gardeners propagate some indoor plants this weekend.
52:58Take cuttings from climbers like potos, ivies, sweet potato and pups from spider plants
53:04and strike in water. Simple.
53:06It's crunch time for celery.
53:08Preferring full sun and a deep fertile soil, plant celery seedlings in deep trenches.
53:14Feed fortnightly with fish emulsion. The faster they grow, the better they taste.
53:19If your camellia is all bud and no bloom, spend some time removing excess buds.
53:25Ideally there should be no more than two buds per cluster, which should see a fab floral show in spring.
53:33In warm temperate gardens, propagate some strawberries from runners, the long whippy shoots that appear after fruiting.
53:40Gently remove these from the parent plant and pop into some soil.
53:44Cuttings can be taken now of grey leaf plants like lavender, catnip and helichrysan.
53:50Strip lower leaves from healthy non-flowering shoots, dip in honey and plant in propagation mix.
53:57Bring some colour to your patch and plant out some pansies.
54:01These awesome annuals are dead easy to grow, come in all the colours of the rainbow and the white ones
54:07can deter cabbage white butterflies.
54:11In subtropical gardens, clean up your act and harvest your loofah before they get mouldy.
54:16Harvest while the skins are still yellow and beginning to slip.
54:20Remove skins and seeds and allow to dry.
54:23With cooler weather on the way, make sure you raise the level on your mower blades the next time you
54:29love your lawn.
54:29This helps the grass stay healthier, look lusher and out-compete weeds.
54:35Bring in the good bugs and bees and sow some cornflowers.
54:39Their blue blooms brighten up every backyard.
54:42The flowers are edible and they're great garden companions.
54:47Tropical gardeners keep an eye on the stems and foliage of plants for scale.
54:51These small, solid looking sap suckers can be squashed by hand, but heavily infested parts should be pruned and binned.
55:00Plant some seeds of Amaranthus tricolor in your patch.
55:03This lovely looking leafy annual is edible.
55:06The young red and green foliage being tender, tasty and full of vitamins and minerals.
55:11They may flower almost all year, but perennial pentas need a prune.
55:17Pruning around 30cm from their overall height will help them retain a compact shape and they'll flower again in no
55:24time.
55:26Stressed and heat damaged plants are not uncommon in arid gardens.
55:30It's tempting to tidy them up, but don't cut off affected foliage until spring as it's protecting the growth below.
55:37Kale can fail when sown directly, so start them in punnets.
55:43Use good quality seed raising mix, fill punnets to three quarters, spread seed generously and cover.
55:50Thin seedlings as required and plant out in June.
55:54They're generally good bugs, but slaters can cause problems by ring barking young seedlings.
56:00Placing hollowed orange halves in garden beds traps slaters, which can then be fed to the chooks.
56:06They love them.
56:07Have a wonderful weekend in the garden wherever you are.
56:10Remember to head to our YouTube channel to catch up on clips and tons of top tips.
56:22Well, we're all done for this week, but don't worry, we've got plenty more lined up for next time.
56:29While you take a look, I'm going to kick back with the paper.
56:34Bark!
56:37I'm meeting a farmer who's going to take us through the ins and outs of a fruit that he believes
56:41should be on more plates and grown in more backyards.
56:45I'm reconnecting with a bush fruit expert who we've featured before.
56:48Now, always make sure that, you know, the information is shared before you start eating and picking things in the
56:53bush, just to make sure that we can actually eat it.
56:56Her life has changed dramatically and her garden has never been more important to her.
57:02And the Wollongong Botanic Garden is home to a recently donated collection of cycads.
57:07I'll be finding out what it takes to transplant these endangered prehistoric masterpieces to their new home and how to
57:14look after them.
57:15.
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