The garden is doing much better at this time of year than I thought it would be. Average temps are in the high 30s and with the sun being so high, it's on the sand pit for most of the day. There's some shade in the mornings outside the kitchen door, but by 10am the shade has all but gone.
I've been getting up at 5am to work in the garden, around sunrise, mainly to tackle the weeds. The squash I planted from seeds was flowering a few weeks ago and had grown, taking over the bean plants, which had died. I was really surprised to actually find a squash.
Sadly the aubergines had gone past their use by date under all the weeds. But I grew 3 from seed, so next year, now I know these types of vegetables do grow I will keep a closer eye on them on.
There has been an abundance of chillies, also grown from seed.
The street is also full of dates growing. The palm tree we have in the garden doesn't produce dates. We need to get someone in to sort our palm tree out.
There are still plenty of flowers in the garden and a rather unusual plant, that has grown from somewhere, looking a bit like a bulrush, but green. There isn't any water round here and I've no idea where it came from or what it is.
The best part about gardening in Dubai is that we employ a gardener. I use the term loosely as what he actually does is chase the leaves, petals around the garden with a hose pipe and mows the lawn randomly. So I give him something to do, which is cleaning up behind me.
The house plants are doing well, as with the garden, they actually need less watering in the summer. I need to sort the climber out in the corner, it's just growing and growing. The Christmas tree doesn't look like it's going to make it.
Fresh cut flowers are imported and are quite expensive, almost 3 times the cost of buying a bunch in a UK supermarket.
I'm also surprised at how much colour there is in Dubai at the moment. These Delonix regina - Royal Poinciana, Flame of the Forest trees are producing a lovely orange flower and look stunning at the moment.
There are two areas of the garden I need to do some work on and plan more carefully and introduce some ground cover in the 2nd photo.
How's your summer garden?
