I love these threads, Janie, thanks. Sad about your experience. No plant would be happy living with that horrible lady. That sort of thing happens here in the cities but we escaped from there and most gardeners are a bit afraid, or at least puzzled, by our wild "garden" anyway.
Ours is a late Autumn garden and it's fun to compare it with yours.
It's berry time here. In our indigenous (well mostly) garden the kangaroo apples are covered in bright orange fruit. We have saltbush berries the colour of port wine and big bright blue Dianella berries. Dianellas are clumping lillies named for the Godess. Little Silver eyes have arrived from Tasmania just in time to feast on the wild fruit. Skinks wait below the bushes for their share of fallen berries and ants carry away any seeds that are spilled. I can tell where the ants nests are by the little piles of grass-seed husks that they leave on their doorsteps.
We wait for the rain that is long overdue. Dark thunderclouds are building up in the West so it won't be long away.
"Mercy drops 'round us are falling, but for the showers we plead." Joy