Another Q&A packed with practical gardening advice, from curl grubs and sick olive trees to thrips, blueberries, wicking beds, Boston Ivy and growing your own passionfruit.
🌿 Plants Mentioned
Vegetables & fruit
- Tomato — Solanum lycopersicum
- Cauliflower — Brassica oleracea var. botrytis
- Blueberry — Vaccinium spp.
- Lime — Citrus × aurantiifolia
- Lemon — Citrus × limon
- Black Passionfruit — Passiflora edulis
Ornamentals & natives
- Olive — Olea europaea
- Lavender — Lavandula spp.
- Rosemary — Salvia rosmarinus
- Ornamental Pear — Pyrus calleryana
- Snow Maiden Grevillea — Grevillea 'Snow Maiden'
- Crepe Myrtle — Lagerstroemia spp.
- Banksia — Banksia spp.
- Boston Ivy — Parthenocissus tricuspidata
- Climbing Fig — Ficus pumila
Plants mentioned as companion/mulch options
- Pea Straw — Pisum sativum
- Lucerne/Alfalfa — Medicago sativa
- Pine — Pinus spp.
🐛 This Episode's Questions
Curl grubs: How to tell beneficial yellow/orange-headed grubs from root-eating black-headed cockchafers.
Olive trees: Supporting mature olive trees showing possible signs of Verticillium wilt, including irrigation, soil health and root support.
Cauliflowers: Identifying whether slugs, snails or earwigs are responsible for damaged leaves.
Rice hull mulch: Why Keith doesn't recommend it as a mulch and alternatives including pea straw and lucerne.
Thrips: Why Success isn't effective against thrips and how Eco-Oil and Eco-Neem can be used.
Blueberries: How often to repot, pruning advice and maintaining acidic soil.
Limes: Why ripe limes can turn yellow — and what happens to their flavour when left on the tree.
Grevilleas & Crepe Myrtle: Can they grow together? Plus designing a garden to provide succession of flowering and attract birds.
Wicking beds: Advice for hot climates, reducing watering requirements and automated irrigation.
Boston Ivy: Why it can take a year to establish and whether it can damage a metal fence.
Passionfruit: Growing black passionfruit from seed, protecting plants from frost and why grafted passionfruit can become invasive.
🧰 Products & Resources Mentioned
🏆 Plant Runner Giveaway: Congratulations to Gerry, this month's winner, for her question about her 18-year-old olive trees.
Happy gardening! 🌱
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