Gardening Australia

Australia’s number one monthly gardening resource, ABC Gardening Australia magazine is packed with step-by-step advice and stunning design ideas from its popular team of experts. Whether you are a novice gardener or have a green thumb and years of experience, you’ll find the advice you need.

welcome

Gardening Australia

PLANTS • This month’s pick of the bunch for garden lovers nationwide

BOOKS

PURPLE reign • Brilliantly coloured flowers are just the start of the tibouchina story, writes JENNIFER STACKHOUSE

NATIVE TIBOUCHINA

Sunny SIDE up • Closely related to camellias, the fried egg tree features distinctive white and yolk-hued flowers and a no-fuss personality, writes JANE EDMANSON

taking STOCK • En masse or in pots, stocks make an impact in the garden with their spires of flamboyant double blooms or delicate single flowers, writes JUDY HORTON

Top picks

BUSH beauty • With its straw-bale cottage and dryland plantings, Ross Burnett’s property in the Perth Hills is a superb model of simplicity and sustainability

TURN dreary INTO cheery • Low light doesn’t have to mean low interest. HELEN YOUNG recommends achievable ways to brighten three difficult shady spots

TOP TIPS for ADDING INTEREST

AUTUMN WEED blitz • Just when you thought you were on top of warm-season weeds, the autumn ones pop up. PHIL DUDMAN shares his favourite tools and strategies for dealing with unwanted annual visitors and persistent perennials, too

top tips to MINIMISE WEEDS

get rid of BULBOUS WEEDS

LONGING FOR lost lovelies • Ever lost a favourite plant, then gone to buy a new one... only to find it’s no longer available? JACKIE FRENCH bemoans a few of her lost treasures

keeping time • How do plants know when it’s time to do things, like grow or flower? TIM ENTWISLE studies what it is that makes a plant’s internal clock tick

a place to call HOME • Old, large trees – even dead ones – provide vital habitat for thousands of living species, and, if safe, should be preserved, writes LEONARD CRONIN

meet the grower DUSTY MOORE • This gardener has transformed a scrubby plot into a kitchen garden so prolific there’s plenty for his neighbours, too, writes SALLY FELDMAN

PLANT IT NOW • Get your celery plants in now, and find out why seedlings might go missing, writes PHIL DUDMAN

more to SOW & PLANT NOW

Who stole my seedlings?

well CONTAINED • What are the pros and cons of different types of pots? TAMMY HUYNH looks at what you can use for your movable feast

what I’ve learnt about... KALE • Don’t knock it until you’ve given it a go, because there’s kale and then there’s kale, writes SOPHIE THOMSON

THE NUTS & BOLTS

PLANT OLIVES • Whether you’re planting an extensive grove or just a single tree in the garden, TINO CARNEVALE demonstrates how to get olives off to a good start.

APRIL a month in the GARDEN • More than 50 jobs to do in your action planner

It's time to...

Top tip

Pest alert

Do it now

Edible garden

In the tropics

MAILBOX

write and win!

GIANT HYDRANGEA

WICKING BED SUCCESS

SMALL WONDER

Your Insta posts

radio • For more details about coverage in your area, phone 139 994 or visit reception.abc.net.au

TV • Gardening Australia is on ABC TV every Friday at 7.30pm and is repeated on Sunday at 1.30pm and on iview.

the big picture • Biennial plants grow predictably over a two-year period, but beware: if they get stressed they’ll break and bolt, writes MICHAEL McCOY