In the last couple of weeks Summer has struck us early. We've had a few days in the 30s which is not conducive to gardening! Yesterday I had 2 barrowloads of deadhead material from the roses. They had been gorgeous up to 3 days ago, but they got really crisp! I'm hoping there will be some blooms on Dec 2nd when the U3A garden club has its Christmas break - up here.

We have been adopted by 2 little Pacific Black Ducks. They came wandering through the garden while I was out there weeding. They are wild birds but obviously accustomed to humans as they have been here ever since. We buy duck pellets for them and give them a clean "pondie" at least once a day. They are incredibly messy and smelly so we had to locate heir feeding and watering station half way down the garden. They started off nearer the house but PHEW!! I have named them Jeremy and Jemima Puddleduck. Jemima laid an egg in the garage one night, we had shut them in there for their own safety as they seemed settled in the middle of the lawn for the night. The foxes are numerous round here and I didn't want to find a pile of feathers next morning! They disappear at night now, roosting in trees probably. Jemima may be sitting on eggs , as they rarely appear together now.

We have harvested and cooked our first artichokes, and I have to admit we weren't all that impressed. Perhaps they will get more fleshy later in the season. Perhaps I have grown the wrong variety!!!

I have some Cardoon seeds from a friend in NZ to grow, they are related to the artichoke. At the weekend we saw Cardoons in 2 open gardens and they get HUGE! Don't know where I'll grow mine!

We're also eating the carrots, broad beans, lettuce, mustard greens, rocket and basil now. The new bed I made for the tomatoes and salad greens seems to be a success.

I went to the Iris show in Mount Waverley on Nov 1st. Needless to say I came home with a lot - 14 for me and 2 for a friend. Amazingly one has now got a bud about to open! Speaking of buds, I thought I had lost all my Hippeastrum buds with the big rain we had, 4 of them rotted and dropped off. Surprise surprise a late one has appeared, and the flower is opening today!!

I went to a Cup Day party with some of my internet gardening friends, had a great day and came home with some plants. Red, black and white currants, youngberries, 2 irises, a Pepino, an Epiphyllum and a Bromeliad. Oh, and a little rose that a friend in Mudgee sent down for me. (Duchesse de Brabant)

I have done a strawberry makeover, weeded and fed them, moved some into empty spaces from other pots and mulched them. Also bought 3 more from a roadside stall.

We have been to 2 open gardens in this area, one of which was wonderful, called Girrawheen.

The highlight of this week was a bus trip to Mt Macedon. We visited Stephen Ryan's garden, he is the host of the Gardening Australia TV programme now, he replaced Peter Cundall. He greeted us there and gave us the history of his home and was very nice indeed. He was filming that day so we had to do a self guided tour but that was fine. he has a lovely garden, full of trees and shrubs underplanted with rare plants. Also there's a pond and a vegie garden, we all really enjoyed it.

We visited another open garden later on which again was really worth the visit. We went to the top of Mt Macedon to The Cross which is a huge war memorial in lovely grounds.