It’s mid-July now and bleaker down here than we’ve seen it in our short time here. There’s wind whipping from the south and a constant shuffle of passing rain. The little pond scraped from the ruins of the old grease trap is full. The kettle barbecue base we set out as a birdbath on the huge bluegum stump by the beehive is brimming. The bees are huddling indoors, but duck out for poo flights when they must.
Even in the severity of these coldly grey days the beginnings of what will eventually be spring are everywhere. The spindly, spiny branches of ornamental plums are dotted with pimply bud swells. The extremity of every branch of pittosporum has a bright green plume of new growth. The first centipede blooms of the arching grevillia are out, drawing the flitting attention of dapper little eastern spinebills. The tangled branches of the japonica have their first pink rounds of blossom. The hellebores are in full show and the daffodils are up, in long slivers of waiting leaf.
The Cootamundra wattle is lit up like a living ice cream cone. It was a scrambly bushy thing when we came here, but I trimmed off the lower limbs and gave it a new form: slender trunk to a spreading crown, a crown that is now a blaze of yellow that holds every scrap of light. It almost glows on its own account.
I’m wondering whether wattle blooms are much consolation for wintering bees, but for the rest of us they are proof that things will bloom again.
Spring, winter ... the truth is a shifting sense of season not an arbitrary calendar moment. The new growing season will show itself over weeks and months, the first new leaves of storksbill showing bright green under the still-bare limbs of the dogwoods. A sweet scented splash of bright white daphne in a tawny sea of the Japanese maple’s dropped dropped and soggy leaves
In the vege patch I’m desperate to get potatoes into my new long potato bed but will wait another week or two. New rhubarb is slowly uncurling from the earth, the broadbeans are kicking on and the sprouting broccoli will. Any week now. Meantime, I’m despairing a little of the brussels sprouts. Healthy plants but in too late I fear. That timing is a killer. Seeds in October this year I think and then perhaps by early next winter ...
Beautiful cheering description in a bleak world
The tiny signs of spring amongst the gloomy proof of winter - the anticipation is exciting!