DAMN. Nigella damascena – not sativa the seed-spice plant, which is what we wanted – has flowered profusely in our kitchen garden. Gorgeous blue; cerulean, indeed, but it’s not sativa, which yields the seeds for such exotica as the spice the Hindus call kaloonji.

Checked this out on the web last weekend by typing in ‘nigella’, and the opening page on Google gave me nothing but links to the lovingly-endowed English chef of the same name, surname Lawson. Wonderful as that was, it took quite a few minutes to find a reference to the annual known as N. damascena and the spice called sativa.

That time of the year has come which brings plants to blowsiness; overgrown and, some might say, untidy. Our oakleaf lettuce has flowered prolifically, throwing up great stalks such that these look like dwarf Christmas trees. Leeks have thrust long prongs skyward, topped by heads of fluffy white florets on which sit elfin-like caps for a short while. Oregano has reached 60 centimetres tall and almost rivals the cornflowers that are hanging on between the roma tomatoes.

Into our plots have gone russian tarragon, caraway, pyrethrum daisy and dill. Dwarf beans yielded wonderful greens for christmas lunch and tomato yellow pear is racing ahead of its neighbours, the german heirloom sugar lump red tomato.

Summer also brings thornbills, silver-eyes and wrens in search of food, and the small softening tomatoes are perfect targets for their tiny beaks. But what is a kitchen garden if not for sharing?
We have now spent a total of $210 on our vegetable-and-salad patch since April 2008, but we have bought not tomato, lettuce nor bean since then. And another bonus – the blue-banded native bee has just returned to pollinate the flower-heads.