How does your garden grow, August 2016

It's been awhile since a garden update, so one is long overdue I'm sure. Although it is still technically winter, my garden is very confused this season. Brisbane winter has ranged from the occasional single digit temperature up to almost 30 degrees, so it's no wonder my garden doesn't know what it's doing. Despite the confusion, there is a range of things happily growing away.

I've got some seriously prolific parsley happening (actually it's still the same plant from a year ago!). No matter how much I use, it just seems to keep on growing. The plants have huge stems and are spreading across almost half a garden bed. I keep thinking about cutting it back, but it's not woody, and it's pretty healthy looking, so I'll just continue eating parsley with everything! Perhaps another batch of parsley pesto is on the cards.

My in laws gifted me a couple of their hot chillies after I admired them at family dinner one time. I saved some seeds and planted them, and this hardy plant was the result. The chillies are lovely and spicy, and as you can see from the picture, despite being fenced off, the chickens also like them, and find a way to eat all the leaves they can reach. This plant is a great producer and I've been so time poor lately that I haven't been using all the fruit and sadly some has been left to dry on the bush. Probably it will self seed and I'll be overrun with chillies soon, which won't be a bad thing I'm sure!

Coriander shoots from seeds I'd saved from a particularly tasty plant have come up. They're looking lovely and healthy, and I've been sure to plant these far enough from the fence that they're definitely out of the chicken's reach. I love coriander on everything so I'll be pleased to have a source of it close by and on demand.

My eggplants continue to flower away. They're such lovely little flowers. I haven't had much fruit from the plants this year; I'm unsure if they're just not loved enough, or perhaps the weather has had a hand in it. I'm hoping these flowers will turn to fruit though, even though the weather is heating up significantly.

I threw a few bok choi seeds that I'd saved from last year's plants into the garden and had quite a few of them take. I snip the leaves as I need them, similar to lettuce, but it seems that something else in the garden is also a fan!

My little rough leaf pineapple plant looks to be sprouting a new pineapple. At the rate they grow, this one might be ready by Christmas. I used to have a lovely collection of pineapple plants, but the chickens got to all but this one, probably because it's tucked safely into a pot. Sometimes, laziness does pay off then (that, and those leaves are deadly and I decided it was happy where it was and I didn't need to unnecessarily cut my hands to shreds for no good reason).

My lime tree is covered in blossoms, new leaf growth, and what I suspect might be scale with those yellow leaves. Of all my citrus, the lime is the happiest, and is the only one that has ever given me any fruit. Perhaps my soil isn't suited for fruit trees in that location, but I remain ever hopeful.

My geranium has lots of little flower buds appearing. The trick will be convincing my children to let them bloom on the plant instead of plucking them at the first hint of colour as they're sure that mama needs flowers all the time.

Still to do:

• I need to pay some more attention to my compost heap and start preparing my garden beds for the change in season.
• I have grand plans to move around some of the front garden to make a feature section and tidy up the path. I keep putting it off as it's quite labour intensive and I can't decide exactly how I want it to end up yet though.
• I have some lovely heirloom tomato seeds I've been gifted so I'll have to start thinking about when and where to plant those beauties.

How does your garden grow lately? Is it confused like mine, or producing as expected? Any tips for getting rid of citrus scale naturally?