The Garden I Live In

(Misc.) Plants [and animals] at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney

skyfiery — Fri, 01 Jun 2012 13:52:48 +0000

Probably a noisy miner bird. It was sucking nectar off the flower.

A poofy adult kookaburra.

I have no idea what happened to this tree.

Daylily?

“Beauty berry”

Australian Ibis. There were so many of them there.

Flying fox colony occuping at least three large trees. They were crowded around the areas with sun, and seemed to be sunning themselves.

Flying foxes.

Suspected noisy miners perched on a bench.

View of the city and Opera House from the Botanic Gardens.

No idea what this plant is.

Look at how bloody thick the lemon verbena trunk is as compared with what we get back in Singapore! Grr.

HUGE lemon verbena plants…

Echinacea flowers in bloom.

Dogbane.

Large comfrey patch – I’m so jealous too…

Foxglove.

French sorrel.

Samphire.

Samphire again.

American arnica?.

Close-up of the flower.

Snakeroot.

Salvia lyrata.

No idea what plant this flower belongs to either.

Borage flower – it is utterly pretty!

Borage flower clusters.

(Misc.) More plants and random shots at Parramatta Park

skyfiery — Wed, 30 May 2012 12:38:26 +0000

A tree on fire.

Duchesse de Brabant rose.

Lady Hillingdon rose.

R. rugosa typica.

Marie van Houtte rose.

Reve d’Or rose.

Hugo Roller rose.

Archduke Charles rose.

Belle Villageoise rose.

Kookaburra. Probably a juvenile.

A view of a portion of the Parramatta River.

Trailing rosemary’s flowers.

Lavender flowers.

Australian magpie.

Magpie lark.

(Misc.) Rosemary and lavender hedges at Parramatta Park

skyfiery — Tue, 29 May 2012 08:09:00 +0000

I went for a quick recce at the park opposite my aunt’s apartment, and came upon a Rose Garden and another small garden section full of lavenders and rosemarys, open in honor of someone.

I shall be returning there tomorrow morning with my camera to take proper pictures. But for now, here are some of the absolutely heavenly-smelling plants.

Rosemary hedge comprising upright and trailing types of rosemarys.

Small lilac flowers of the trailing rosemary plant.

Lavender bushes! And the flowers are gorgeous!

Close-up of the lavender flower buds.

(Misc.) Banksia inflorescence

skyfiery — Sun, 27 May 2012 12:31:12 +0000

Saw this at Evans Lookout Point at the Blue Mountains today. My Australian uncle told me it’s the flower of the bottlebrush tree.

Correction: A friend who lives in Perth and who’s much more knowledgeable about native Australian plants said that it’s a banksia tree. She’s correct.

(Misc.) Pretty flowers at the ferry terminal in Parramatta

skyfiery — Sat, 26 May 2012 12:03:38 +0000

Saw these gazanias and other color variegations at the riverside in Parramatta. So pretty.

(Misc.) One-month hiatus

skyfiery — Thu, 24 May 2012 02:38:35 +0000

Will be in Sydney until June 22, so I probably won’t post until after that (unless it’s to share pictures of plants/nurseries I see in Sydney!)

My brother and partner have been tasked to water my plants…

Let’s hope there are no casualties.

(Article) Rosemary and sage boots freshener

skyfiery — Wed, 23 May 2012 01:41:57 +0000

Rosemary and safe boots freshener by Mountain Rose blog.

(In progress) Passionfruit daisy

skyfiery — Mon, 14 May 2012 11:43:35 +0000

iPhone-quality picture of the seedling which is growing its second pair of true leaves, I think.

Passionfruit daisy.

What’s that? I asked myself when I first read about it. I love the scent of the passionfruit, even though I don’t like the sour and tart taste very much.

I found out that it’s actually of the French marigold species, but Googling and some rather intensive research yielded no information other than it is “targetes spp.” Great help that is.

This particular targetes is actually and surprisingly slow growing, with a germination rate of 33% (I sowed three seeds and only one sprouted) as compared with the common store-bought targetes seeds. I’ve not been coddling it, but I am being careful in how I water it and how much sunlight it gets.

So, for now, I can only wait for it to grow to a much larger size before plucking a leaf and seeing if it really lives up to its name in being called a passionfruit-anything.

Also, I won’t be updating my blog until after June, since I will be in Sydney from the 24th of May until the 22nd of June. My dad has been tasked with watering my plants, but knowing him…well…I can only hope that there are no casualties on my end.

(Misc.) Henna and rudbeckia flowers

skyfiery — Sun, 29 Apr 2012 05:07:32 +0000

After about two weeks of tantalizing and teasing me with their buds, my henna plant has finally flowered. The pink flowers are quite tiny and cute. I wish I could find my macro converter so that I can take better close-ups, but meh, it’s lost in a black hole somewhere in the house.

Pink flower clusters on the henna plant - the flowers have an extremely subtle fragrance which is very pleasing.

Rudbeckia plants giving out more and more flowers - they're beautiful

(Misc.) Just for laughs

skyfiery — Thu, 26 Apr 2012 09:12:03 +0000

"ICEBERG, ICEBERG!"

This picture came from a Tumblr post. Not sure which. But definitely not mine.

Who gets the caption? *snerks*