Garden Management & Forum

[Giddy Goat]

But as I can see you are going to beat me into a pulp until I submit....

Pheww! Pulpo wouldn't have had the same romantic ring at all!

[Martha]

I would also welcome a gardening section.

Imagine the happy hours we can while away dissecting the pros and cons of different watering systems....

[Chianti]

Shame on Paolo for thinking we would beat him to a pulp, that's saved for the snails who nocturnally munch our precious plants and flowers. In my garden I show no mercy. Scorpions have a better chance of survival.

[pambon]

I would also welcome a gardening section.

Imagine the happy hours we can while away dissecting the pros and cons of different watering systems....

For those of us lucky enough to have a plentiful water supply

[Chianti]

Pambon
Are you that short of water and if so how do you manage? Do you not have wells?

For the 1st time in the last 4 years I saw water running in our streams, we've had torrential rains on and off for a few weeks, hence of course why we're "Green Umbria"

[pambon]

No Chianti, luckily this side of the island we don't generally have water problems - unless there's a guasto and they turn the water off for a day......

Rivers are just a trickle though; all winter rain is gratefully received. Even the melting snows on Etna, in the spring, help to irrigate the land.

[pepsipuss]

On the 'invading the property' front: we have to water every other day at least in summer as OH for some reason seems to be allergic to the idea of a watering system and prefers to wear himself (and myself ) out with dragging around hoses and cans . We combine the visits with pool cleaning and our T&Cs state that we (or our gardener/pool cleaner) will be coming every other day at a pre-arranged time in order not to disturb them. Works fine, no complaints. We usually go before they are even stirring as they tend to stay up late and sleep in and that way the plants get watered before it is too hot which is quite important when it gets up well into the forties out of the shade!

[Chianti]

Pepsipuss
How do your plants manage with watering every other day? Here it's in the 90's for most of the summer and a bit of September. If we only watered every other day, we wld have no garden. What did surprise me is that cutting down from 2 waterings a day to 1 seemed to make no difference.

[pepsipuss]

Hi Chianti
We got rid of pretty well everything that is really thirsty because when we first bought the place the water we had was from a well which was very salty and lots of stuff was in a very poor state because it didn't tolerate it that well. Now we have good but very expensive water and we collect water from the roof and the whole of the gravelled garden to the back of the house for watering. However as rain is very scarce we need to conserve it so we now have basically only the stuff that can survive with little or no water for a long time: Palms, Yucca, Olives, lots of cacti of various sorts.
The guests can usually be relied on to do the pots round the pool (and to feed the tortoises every day - they consider that really cool, especially the children). There are many plants which have a great ability to find water in desperate circumstances provided you make them work for it and do not make it easy for them - this is probably why changing from twice to one a day may not make a lot of difference.

[Chianti]

How clever of you, but then it's necessity. I'm going over to more succulents for the same reason, relying on plentiful water and the cost of pumping it up from the well is very expensive and time consuming. We do however have a lush garden for most of June and then it begins to look very tired by August, but picks up again at the beginning of October. We had zinnias in flower till the end of November. The flowers on our yucca are still out, unheard of normally. I'm not personally a fan of cacti but they are practical and some have wonderful flowers.

Do you get cold winters too as we do?

[pepsipuss]

Depends what you mean by cold, Chianti!! At Las Tortugas we are quite close to sea level and only about 6km inland as the crow flies, and we get a very rare ground frost, but most of the time even at night it doesn't touch anything like zero. Our new house is up in the mountains at more than 300 metres and about 15km inland. It is noticeably colder and we think that some of our more tender plants may not enjoy it too much. We had ice on a puddle the other morning, not something we are usd to!
Because Almeria is the driest place in mainland Europe, we feel that the desert look is very appropriate although I personally would like it a bit more lush. Up here we are surrounded by pine -clad hillsides and have a much greener outlook. We also now have a well so are going to be able to plant citrus and other fruits and have a lot more green round the house- can't wait. However the OH has banned anything that sheds leaves or petals round the pool area so that is staying gravel, cactus, yucca and palm!

[Chianti]

Pepsipuss
Your husband is dead right not having trees which shed their leaves anywhere near your pool. Raking is a major task even without a pool.

How wonderful to have citrus trees, one can have lemons and limes here but only in pots which one has to wheel inside for the winter, but we've all the other fruits. When my skills are better I may try lemons, but not yet as they need a lot of care.

You're quite right to to have desert sort of plants. With all of the pine trees in the area do you have wildfires? There were a few here 2 years ago because we have vast expanses of woodland, but luckily nothing major.

[pepsipuss]

Chianti
Fires are not unknown and rumour has it that it is not unusual for them to be been deliberate (people who own land on which they can't get planning permission doing it in the naive hope that the authorities might change their minds if it is no longer so pretty!). When we bought our land in 2001 a fire was deliberately started on a neighbouring plot, which we also wanted to buy as it completed a square for us, by a farmer who wanted it but wouldn't pay the price his niece wanted for it. We were not here at the time, but the nearest neighbour had his stuff in the car ready to make a run for it. In the event the planes and the helicopters got it under control without too much damage and it just left a swathe on one hillside destroyed. It is amazing how quickly things regenerate - unless you know about it you wouldn't notice it today.
However we have no pine trees too close to the house, just in case! Anyway the culprit had a heart attack while waiting for his court appearance (you can imagine that in such a dry area this sort of thing is taken VERY seriously and can carry a hefty jail term) and died without being brought to trial.
The main danger from the pines is the processional caterpillar which is poisonous to pets - our dog had a really lucky escape with one in spring this year.

[Martha]

We have the suitably Alpine problems of ferocious frosts (down to -20 on a regular basis) and damage from deer which has been particularly bad this year with the early winter - they come down because they're hungry and bark the trees!

[Chianti]

Pepsipuss
That's frightening, certainly in Umbria, can't speak for the other regions only the owner of agricultural land is allowed to build a house on it and it has to be for family use only so I don't think that we share that problem. Certainly Greece does as we all know.

I must say that the pine catepiller sounds really nasty and must be especailly worrying for pet owners, again I'm not aware of it here.

Martha
I presume there is nothing that can be done to prevent the damage to trees from deer unless it happens on private land where fencing is an option. Minus 20, no thanks, but I presume it's a dry crisp cold, not like here where it's foggy, and damp, much like in the UK.