Rural Garden

These pictures were taken in March 2005 when the first landscaping commenced.

The house in the desert not long before we moved in. 

I love gardening and in every place we have lived there has always been a nice garden. When we purchased this property it was a 200 acre paddock with one dam and a parameter fence. Lots and lots of infrastructure had to be installed before we could even commence the house or even think of a garden. Electricity, access roads, sewerage and the most important water.
We decided to build a shed first so we could store stuff and have some shelter from the elements while building the house. That first year the weather was hot, dry, and very windy to say I was apprehensive about rural life was an understatement.
The weather in our district can be harsh with very strong westerly winds and freezing winter nights. Although we rarely get any snow. The house sight was chosen to obtain the best solar aspect. This means the sun comes into the house during the winter and the veranda keeps the sun out in the hot summer months. We moved into the house in November 2004 the wind was blowing a gale of dust and it was hot. The house was not finished missing a veranda and a few other cosmetic jobs. There was just the house in a 200 acre paddock with 250 sheep in what looked like a desert at the time.

Things are better six years after we started work on our garden. I decided the plant hardy plants and trees that were drought tolerant. I only water once a week in the dry times and never water the grass. It dries off in Summer and usually greens up again in the Autum

Kim and Jeff with the water cart that Jeff built. We used it a lot to water plants that we have planted in the paddocks.