Trees

There are so many young trees that we've planted around the property and each one needs a little tender loving care.  If I've been away for a few days or get home from work well after dark, I like to take a walk around and check on each one, looking for small changes and signs of health.  On the weekend, they get some water and a bit more mulch if they need it.  As we are trying to create a food forest on our swales, I'm constantly planting new trees, either ones I've grown from seeds or I buy trees that I don't yet have to make sure there's lots of diversity.  So here's how they are all going at the moment.  This is a malabar chestnut where I'm trying to join the planting in the space between the second and third swale.

And next to it is this little mulberry

And next to that, a little tropical pear, then a tropical peach (which has tiny peaches already) and a tropical plum.  The second Davidson plum is also in this in between area.

Then the mango I brought from Sydney is powering along, and even trying to set fruit.  how cute is that!  It's so tiny but wanting to be like the big mango trees

Its closest neighbour is another Sydney transplant in the form of a dwarf nectarine.  It should probably be in a pot, but I thought I'd keep the Sydney trees together.And if you look carefully, you'll see the nectarine has set fruit again this year.

The last pic is of the mandarin tree that was already here.  Its prolific as is, but since its been in with the chooks, it seems to have taken off.  Annoyingly, the cockatoos too all the fruit off the top of the tree before I netted it.  Still, we were awash in mandarins for a couple of months and they were fabulous.  After we'd taken all the fruit, I gave it a good haircut and its responded well to that with lots of new spring growth

The only problem with this one is I can't keep any mulch on it as the chooks scratch it all away.  Ah well, at least its getting lots of fertiliser as its their favourite spot to sit (and poop) in the afternoons