Some gardeners are getting better ideas.

Ladybird larvae. They eat aphids and other tiny insect pests.
Working in a garden centre, I hear all sorts of funny ideas about gardening but sometimes I do actually encounter folks that have the right attitude toward organic growing. Sometimes this is someone who is aware of using minerals or knows about beneficial insects.
These days we sell minerals and soil bacteria to increase soil health. It's getting easier to advise people to use least-toxic methods rather than head straight for the poisons. I show them ladybird babies and parasitised 'aphid mummies' on the roses. Once the balance of predator insects is in line with the pests there will be less reason to use any chemicals on our food plants.

Water Corp sprinkler restrictions.

Water restrictions for Perth.
In this dry city it is still easy to find people that love to waste water. On the spot fines are being issued for people who use sprinklers outside of their allocated time.
Today it actually rained a bit, but not enough to fix our dry winter.

RIP my old dad

He died last week after a long time of diabetes, kidney and heart problems. We weren't close but I will miss him. I am studying like mad to keep from thinking about it; not sure if that's the best thing to do but it would be stupid to not keep up with my studies. I'm gonna have to make sure I can support myself in the future if I need to. Scary.

Get ready for fruit fly..organically.

Spring has seemingly come early and plants are being bothered by aphids, caterpillars and I suspect once flowering starts there will be many fruit flies about.
There are various methods of controlling them.I would be most tempted to use fruit fly exclusion bags, as sold at green harvest. Here is the link to some great organic pest and disease control, including the Mediterranean fruit fly.

Green Harvest Organic Pest Control advice.

Sunny winter's Sunday.

We have been having a dry winter this year in Perth, and today it continued to be pleasant and warm and sunny. The pleasant conditions had us out there repotting citrus and a dwarf fruit tree.
I did a species list and found that we have around 200 species all up including weeds, seedlings and sick plants. That's pretty excellent I reckon for a small suburban block. Plant horder, me! Out of 200 odd species about 33% are useful or edible and 24% are Australian (probably more than half those are fairly local species).
The birds certainly love it and we have no problems with pest species at all. Gotta love biodiversity and the balance that creates.