Ben Sims

March Proteaceae – same family as Proteas and Leucadendrons from South Africa (White/Orange) Acorn Banksia – Banksia prionotes is a beautiful large shrub/small tree. It is used allot on roadsides in Western Australia and will grow in sandy alkaline coastal soils as well as any other sandy soil and looks great providing bird attracting flowers when not much else is in flower. March is the least floriferous month for flowers in Western Australian bush.

September Goodeniaceae (Light blue) Scaevola porocarya is a plant that both Angus Stewart and I can’t understand why on earth isn’t a mainstream landscaping plant.

TOP 5 NATIVE WA PLANTS FOR GROWING IN POTS Do you have a small courtyard that is completely paved but would love to still be able to bring in some wildlife in the form of beneficial insects and even birds? What if I told you that if you chose just 5 plants and grew them in large enough pots that this would be possible.

Verge gardening is a great way to encourage nature back into your street and then into your garden. Verge gardens can look amazing and also be your main garden that adds allot of value to your home as some town houses or units don’t have a significant garden on their own and the verge can be a much larger area that can be used.

EDIBLE PLANTS FOR SUMMER Now it is warming we need to be planting things in your edible garden that will thrive in the heat. There are a huge number of things you could plant so I will just go through some of the more common summer edible plants to grow in your vegetable garden in Perth.

This is a question I get asked allot and my answer depends on whether you have a mains system or a bore. For a mains system without a doubt my favourite type of nozzle is the MP rotator nozzle which works the best at both high and low pressure.

Liquid Wetting agents and other products Perth has sandy soils and as everyone knows we have long hot summers. As a result, the sandy soils which many lawns are laid on get hydrophobic and do not allow water and nutrients to the root zone.

Here is the link to here some really interesting horticultural content on a wide range of horticultural topics and conservation and environmental topics. In episode 3 Ben talks about Landscaping with native plants.

So, the kids have moved out and you want to reduce the amount of lawn around your house or have you moved into a place with an abundance of lawn and little garden? Let’s encourage birds and beautiful native insects into the garden by installing a native garden.