Birds singing in the Sycamore Tree

Dream a little dream of me!

Here is what we have been told is our Sycamore tree. Previous owners had been poisoning it in an effort to be rid of this environmental weed. And we have seen evidence of its self seeding habits as the ground is covered with little sycamores and a few across the road as well. But I will remove them with a little cut and paint of herbicide. I do live near a National Park after all and we have enough invasive weeds around without adding to the number.

Here is M pulling down the dead Jasmine, grape and wisteria vines that were also poisoned, out of the Sycamore. They are sprouting up again from the ground, not dead yet and the Sycamore is also budding up. Must take a lot to kill.

We are actually happy it is not dead. M assures me they are a beautiful tree, he grew up with them in England. Can't say I know what they look like up close as I grew up in Western Australia and there are very few decidous trees in gardens there, they just can't take the climate.

So instead of worrying about what to do with a rather huge dead tree in the middle of our new garden be can relax and watch it return to life. We found on the ground next to the tree some post holes where we think a gazebo of sorts must have been many years ago. The garden must be more than 50 years old. We intend to bring it back to its former glory and maybe put in a gazebo of our own. It is a beautiful private place surrounded by glorious shrubs, some little paths, a pond and a bridge. Here are a few of the shrubs.

This looks a bit of a mess, but we have magnolias, rhododendrons, holly (another environmental weed), Camelias, Azaleas, Jacaranda, treeferns (indigenous), Sequioa, Irish strawberry, pieris japonica and a few others I don't know and plenty of space for more low growing things that have been grazed off over the years by rabbits and sheep.

This shot is overlapping with the one above.

Magnolia

This rhodie is hidden in the middle of the garden near to the Sycamore, it is glorious.

These tree ferns just come up anywhere, they are so amazing and huge. You can just see the little white bridge in this one

Some of these shrubs have lost their shape due to growing too close to other larger more vigorous plants, like the sequoia. It has ruined the shape of the magnolia. We trimmed it back a little yesterday to let more light and rain into the magnolia, so it may bush up a bit. You can see the giant sequioa in the blog heading photo, this delightful garden is under its wings. It will be an ongoing project to restore this old section of garden. Would be nice to find some one who used to live here and could tell us a bit about its history.
Will keep you posted.
Dayla