A Winter's Tale

I love Winter, not just because it is the season of warm coats and hats and gloves, but because regardless of how cold it gets, the garden does not stop blooming.

Winter starts with the wattle, balls of soft yellow down into which you plunge your nose and drink in the soft honey'ed scent. Years ago we had a Mount Morgan wattle, its velvety grey leaves a perfect compliment to the mini pompoms and low hum of the bees who drown in the gentle scent. Now, the leaves are spikier, but the subtle fragrance still triggers idyllic memories.

In the orchard, the ruby jewels of the pomegranate have become less plentiful, the wattle birds and spiders welcome to the last of the decaying fruit that failed to survive the first of the rains. Their place is taken by the limes and oranges that hang in clusters amongst the dark leaves tempting you with ideas of fresh orange juice and lemon cake. 

In the front garden, the last of the roses are in bloom, an old fashioned rose of the softest blush within which a bee forages, cocooned by the full petals. 

Around the garden the bulbs are slowly making their presence felt, poking through the bed of mulch...

 ...before erupting into a profusion of highly scented jonquils and snowdrops.

Foraging though the rest of the garden, it's the native plants that capture one's attention. The spidery tendrils of a white grevillia at odds with its prickly leaves...

the pink flowers of a hardy ground-cover,

and the recognisable blossoms of the Geraldton and Albany Waxes that lines our roads.

Each plant vies for attention, the Silver Princess using the contrast of the powdery grey leaves with the bright red tendrils that appear as if off the pages of a May Gibbs book. Each flower would have made a wonderful gown for the little Ragged Blossom and her fellow gumnut babies. 

In the interim they provide ample attraction for the garden's bees.

Amongst the banksia the variation is just as spectacular. 

Only a grevillia is at odds with this delightful display, the flowers more reminiscent of the festive season with each cluster parodying the eye-catching baubles of the Christmas tree.

Watching over the garden, from the flimsiest branches of the Jacaranda sits another visitor, with perhaps more rights than any we can lay claim to. He's welcome here, so long as he ignores the frogs and worms, and sticks to the snails and slugs and slaters and mosquitoes and flies...

As darkness falls, a delicate fog may settle in, filling the depths of this sleepy hollow, while above in the crisp night air, the Southern Cross glistens down.