OF MICE, MOSS AND A MISTAKE

The big mower has been out (with me on it) and most of the lawns are cut with the setting fairly high. The grass and moss is surprisingly dry. Things look much neater after the grass is cut.

I have put the Euphorbia characias Wulfenii in the new rose bed with one of the sages. We refer to this plant as 'The Alien' and at this time of year it looks very strange with its tentacle like stems. Actually should have pruned it in the autumn but didn't so will wait and see how things go.

I have been wandering around the garden doing the fingernail test - shrub looks dead, scrape on of the stems and if it is green then it lives. One of the osteospermums and a hebe came up positive. Battered but alive.

Picking daffodils for the house - it is so nice to have the place full of flowers. The pots outside the kitchen have been tidied and the bigger planter restocked with herbs - thyme, sage (two kinds), rosemary and marjoram. Blackbird singing, kestrel overhead, ducks on the shed roof by the pond, rolled up shirt sleeves - spring finally here.

Here is the mouse bit - a wood mouse has climbed the side of the shed and is feeding on the sunflower seeds for the birds. It lives under the shed and can be seen nipping out and back for discarded seeds. They also live in the shed, in a sack of straw, and I sometimes worry about the magazines belonging to my son stored in there. 

And the
mistake?
The rhubarb forcing pot was applied as usual and light excluded but as you can see the rhubarb in the pot did nothing whilst the rest is thriving. It should recover.

The daffodils and primroses at the edge of the wood and by the stream are doing well. We seem to have many more daffs than last year and the clumps of primroses are much bigger.

We do have a nibbler at large - probably snails or slugs - as the fritillaries are a bit chewed. Mind you rabbits are notorious for eating them though they tend to just nip the whole bud off.

They have multiplied too - probably by self seeding. So there you are, whilst Russia and the west do what they always seem to do, most of the time, I talk of nibblers. At least I am too old to be called up. However it would be a shame if the garden was frazzled by some despot with an H bomb.

Back to more important matters - Moss is a nuisance in the lawn and, of course due to the poor level of cultivation etc etc but it can be beautiful on walls and here on a banking of tree roots.

Spring is here so some spring pics of the garden in sunlight.