A TRUNDLE IN THE GARDEN

. . . on a dull day.

We come back from a holiday in the Outer Hebrides and the grass needs mowing, the beds need weeding etc etc. 

S the gardener has been and cut back the sallows using the trunks to edge the paths.

I see house martins. A bird flies out of an old nest above the extension window - it is a sparrow.

I put in both sorts of broccoli and a few extra sweet peas. The other tender plants in the shed - ammi, cosmos etc will have to wait. It is still cold. A friend E M who has been keeping records for over 40 years says that April was by far the coldest on record so I am wary.

R wants the pond plants thinning out. The rhododendrons by the top fence are too big. Anyway, I think they may be ponticum and so must be well trimmed back or go.

I have never seen so much flower on the redcurrants. We will have fat blackbirds and thrushes later in the year.

The rhubarb is in fine fettle but the asparagus is disappointing so far - possible the cold spring?

Time for the trundle - out from the house and down under the cherry tree with the bird feeders where the forget-me-nots have self seeded again splendidly. There is still blossom on the pear and greengage, the crab apple and, my favourite of all, the Bramley apple.

Passing the old compost heap where the white honesty is self sown (and goosegrass - so everywhere I have spread the compost the weed is growing) I head for the wood and rhododendrons and azaleas, and scent.

 

And so up to the bluebells. 

I find yet another horse chestnut seedling spawned from the big tree next door that hangs over the top clearing. One of these seedlings (conkerlings?) is now twelve feet high.

Coming back I pass the longer grass on the upper banking, was daffodils, now camassias and cowslips.

There are less of the former today as several lambs wriggled under the field fence and helped themselves. I have put a plank down to close the gap.

Back at the house I see the first welsh poppies, well the orange version rather than the wild yellow, another plant that is allowed to self sow.

The violas in the pots by the back door are thriving and the magnolia stellata just flowers on and on.

R has been weeding, my excellent co-gardener. I try to please her - the convolvulus cneorum is ok but next to it I have failed with the lavateria - looks like it is dead. Perhaps I should wear shorts more like Ben Fogle who was sitting at the next table on our holiday in Tarbert, Isle of Harris.

And I still have to decide what to do with all the box plants in pots . .