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NSW budget unlikely to allocate extra funding for long-promised great koala national park

‘People will see that we’re making progress on it,’ treasurer Daniel Mookhey tells Guardian Australia

The long-promised great koala national park is not expected to get any additional funding in next week’s New South Wales 2025-26 budget despite being a centrepiece of the state government’s environment policy.

“When it comes to the great koala national park, people will see that we’re making progress on it,” the state treasurer, Daniel Mookhey, told Guardian Australia.

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Kyle’s Sacramento garden

Kyle’s garden was the first stop on my whirlwind trip to Davis, Sacramento and the greater Bay Area late last March. To refresh your (and my!) memory I landed in Sacramento on Thursday afternoon, March 27th. Gerhard picked me up at the airport and as soon as he parked the car we were out walking his garden and I was snapping photos (hundreds, which I narrowed down to “just” 56 for this post). Friday morning we were up early and on the road. Gerhard’s friend Kyle was heading out of town for a camping trip, but kindly let us stop by and tour early. 

Since I’m a faithful reader of Gerhard’s blog, I’ve virtually toured Kyle’s garden many times (for example) but seeing it in person was an entirely different experience. The plants were all pristine, so well grown! Everything was top notch…it was even better in person than I thought it would be.

Agave ‘Kissho Kan’

Looking at these images I realize I was trying to avoid getting the trailer in my photos, as it was being loaded up as we toured the garden and I didn’t want to capture private business. Now I wish I would have focused on it because it was so darn cute! This is the best I’ve got though, just a bit of the back side…

And back to the plants… oh the plants!

Mangave some somebody. I’m not going to worry about getting ID on plants that I don’t know the specifics of. I can’t grow most of them anyway, I was just there to appreciate how well someone who can grow them was doing so.

And how tidy the garden was. My gosh… I am in awe of that!

Agave titanota growing off the side of a rock cliff, or, well, a couple of well placed rocks anyway.

Kyle is a geologist by trade, so this love of, and use of, rocks comes naturally.

Hechtia texensis partially obscured by a poppy.

Everywhere I looked there was an interesting, photogenic, vignette.

Mangave ‘Praying Hands’

That’s got to be an Agave ovatifolia…

Working our way around to the back garden now, and passing Kyle’s truck bed nursery…

Core samples and a piece of metal make for a unique statement piece… 

Agave ‘Blue Glow’ lined up along the wall.

I do love it when a gardener makes vertical planting opportunities.

Especially when they’re as fabulous as this!

Mangave ‘Racing Stripes’ 

I cannot remember the pups names, but they were having a grand time running about. They tried to get me off course and on to the patio out of sequence. 

Luckily I resisted and got back on track.

Ferraria crispa, so GOOD! 

Kyle’s home office/shed in the distance, we’ll get closer soon.

Looking back to the corner opposite the “shed” and one of several seating areas in the garden…

Pavers heading to the patio and potted plants…
A close-up of the potted plants.
Turning towards the back fence.
I want to call that lush tree a podocarpus, but I’m not sure if that’s correct. This photo is one of my favorites from the visit. The layers are so expertly planted and cared for.
Patio/seating area shot…
Looking the other direction. Isn’t this just a gorgeous area?
Aloe erinacea
Agave ‘Sun Glow’ or something similar.

The office porch…
And one last view towards the back of the house. Truth be told, as the weekend progressed and I saw one fantastic garden after another I almost forgot about the first visit that kicked it all off! It was a pleasure to look through my photos again and relive that morning. Thank you Kyle for making the time for us to stop by when you were just trying to get out of town!

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All material © 2009-2025 by Loree L Bohl. Unauthorized reproduction prohibited and just plain rude.

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Lithuanian hunters refuse to kill bear that ambled around capital for two days

Government issued permit to shoot young female who entered Vilnius, despite only small number left in Baltic country

A young female bear caused a stir after wandering out of the forest and into the leafy suburbs of the Lithuanian capital.

For two days, the brown bear ambled through the neighbourhoods of Vilnius, trotted across highways and explored backyards – all while being chased by onlookers with smartphones and, eventually, drones.

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Roses In The Garden – a book review

by Ngoc Minh Ngo
Photographer Ngoc Minh Ngo celebrates rose gardens throughout the world in this beautifully produced book. 
The author photographed a total of 11 gardens across the globe (Italy, Morocco, Spain, USA, UK, and Japan). Beginning with the Italian garden Ninfa (often referred to as the most romantic garden in the world), her photographs have a dreamy quality that transports the reader to these exotic locales. Closer to home, Floret Farm in Mount Vernon, Washington, is included in one of the chapters.
All types of roses are included in the gardens but the majority feature old rose varieties. Many of the gardens have roses growing in wild abandon, intermingled in hedge rows, spilling over walls and fences and surrounded by pastures and rolling hills. A pictorial index lists all the roses and the gardens where they reside.
This stunning book was published by Rizzoli Books and is available on Amazon and in bookstores.

Text and photos by Phillip Oliver, Dirt Therapy

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Digging a hugelkultur along a fence line?


I have a very rural lot with poor draining soil comprised mostly of clay. I’ve been improving the drainage (and putting to use lots of woody debris) with some swales and hugelkulturs and it’s done wonders and made for some great garden beds.

I’m currently working on putting up a fence perimeter around my garden: 8′ round posts (1.5′ buried) with welded mesh wire stapled on. I was wondering if I could dig a hugelkultur along the fence line without affecting the integrity of the fence, and if there are any unforeseen consequences to doing this that I have not considered. I imagined that I would end the trenches 1 foot away from the line posts and corner posts. The ground is sloped, but the fence tops will be level (I’ll cut the taller posts down), and I want the tops of the hugelkulturs to be parallel to the fence, so in practice this means I will have to dig the trench quite deep on the higher end of the slopes.

In theory the mounds will make for nice additions to the fence perimeter, but idk. Don’t want to dig for days just to find out I ruined my fence before I even constructed it, lol.

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