WEEDING AND DITCHES AND THINGS

There was a slight frost again last night.

It leaves strange patterns in the garden as on this stone and it lends a special beauty in the early morning.

This afternoon has been R weeding and me not keeping up with the horse manure. I keep getting side tracked.

The plan has been to take a wheelbarrow of chippings down to improve the paths by the veg beds and then return with a barrow of old manure.

Then I see that the Tutsan, though alive is very unsightly and would benefit from a prune. Other things in the garden are emerging - daffodils coming up, amd the snowdrops are well out on the banking and under the great sycamore.

Back to today - I was shifting manure but the stream by the Wendy House is clogged - mud slinging coming - and the sides need reinforcing with old scaffolding planks. I promised to widen the gravel path in from of the Wendy House Door.

Well all done - but so much more to be done and trying to get it done before I get the dreaded summons to the hospital.

I have come by my son's unused bird pole and feeders but where to put them? They need a bush by them and some cover as well as somewhere for them to queue.

Dilemmas, dilemmas - they never stop.

Well they do . . . . in the end.

STIRRINGS IN THE GARDEN

Still frosts as in this image after a freezing fog but as you can see the laying of the hedge has opened up vistas we did not have before.

The odd crocus, a primrose flower, winter shrubs and snowdrops are all stirring.

The birds are beginning to sing - when not drowned out by the squabbling rooks next door.

Yesterday dug out some of the stream bank and moved manure to the bed by the front door after planting a load of free Allium christophii that came with an order. I pruned the shrub roses a little (and demolished the sleeve on an old shirt on the thorns).

The fireproof bonfire has been excavated - I have made a tunnel into its centre to take paper, cardboard and so on.

It looks small in this photo but is actually 12 feet tall so you can see how wide it is.

As I dug out the horse manure I noticed a few nasty bootlaces in it - almost certainly old Honey Fungus - I have removed as much as I can but as the stuff is always everywhere I hope it does not infect anything else.

Today will go down to The Wendy House and dig a small drain, remove some turf and extend the path a bit.

So much to do and so little desire to do it!

Gin and tonic - ?

WINTER AND GARDEN WORK

Woke up expecting fog and was greeted by a sunny, if chilly day.

No excuses - get in the garden

It seemed only a few days ago The Nook looked like this -

So finally let's have a go at lighting the bonfire - lots of paper and cardboard in the holes in the base, sprinkle with some white spirit I found and - phut! Quick flare up then out. Perhaps needs a few gallons of petrol but that might blow the whole bonfire (and me) to bits!

Wood too green, too cold, too wet or just bloody minded as we have cut it out of the hedge - well the men I employed did.

So I shifted manure and R collected the sticks fallen in the winter.

Then we saw the first snow drops and as we went around we saw buds coming on the quince and the flowering currant, Daffs. and crocusses (or croci?) pushing through. Actually we are woken every morning by crow cusses in the wood! Except they are rooks.

Every year I divide the snowdrops and spread them - they are ridiculously expensive in the catalogues.

After shifting yet more large logs I discovered the yellow raspberries I had dug up and reburied in the farthest corner of the garden amongst the long grass and brambles. So I pruned them so we might get the odd one (or more) in the autumn.

So the day was only partially Phut! The problem is that if the bonfire does not burn soon the birds will nest in it. Then I will have to leave it and time the fire between the birds fledging and the hedgehogs snoring.

WEEDING ASPARAGUS

The electricity was off for most of the day so R went into the garden and weeded the asparagus bed.

I popped out for ten minutes to prune the gooseberry bushes and a Damson tree we were given by S and K before we moved - as a small sucker.

It is developing thorns!

I suspect that it might be a blackthorn instead - OK for sloes but not for damsons - we await blossom.

So R slogged on in the garden and muttered about the many parsnips I had dug up yesterday.

The one shown here is subject to suggestions for a lookalike title. It reminds me of a pale Bumbly (Michael Bentine - children's TV) with a spear.

So I left R slogging away and went out with friend NC to The Mason's Arms at Strawberry Bank where I had a very nice Smoked Salmon Muffin, a pint of Hawkshead Bitter, Apple Crumble and custard and coffee.

R had some old Cauli. Soup.

When I got back the electricity was on again so I had a nice cup of tea.

ps. One thing I have done is to move the solar lights from the path down to the Wendy House - where we cannot see them - to the path up through the wood.

Now we have fairies in the garden!

INSIDE THE GARDEN SHED

This was the inside of the shed before it got messy!

So what does one do in the garden when it is just too wet - tidy the shed and have a chuck out.

And then a visit to the recycling centre to dump old batteries, flowerpots, jam jars and so on. I have kept the thousands of screws and washers and nuts and bolts and bits of things that might be of use, and half empty paint pots, bits of wire, etc. etc.

I finally got rid of my fathers projector stand - it weighed a ton and was rusty. I have kept my grandfather's army camp bed - do not know why - might need it one day?

One thing I have still got but is useless and needs to go to the tip is a portable black and white television I bought years ago at ASDA for £32:10s. It was bought for the children to play the first computer games on a Dragon 32 computer. Until the digital switchover - a disaster here as we have lost several channels and with others the signal is ofter not string enough - I could watch cricket on it in the shed, but alas, no more.

So, for now, it is tidy - ish.

No doubt it will need tidying again soon.

GROUSE AND DEAD BIRDS

First the dead birds - I was tidying up on the terrace (which I called the patio but apparently that is spanish for courtyard which it is not) when I came across a dead female blackbird and then a dead blue tit.

So why?

They had flown into a window in out living room bay - windows both sides - and I think they were fleeing the sparrow hawk.

This calls for bird cutouts and so on.

Now to Grouse.

This is not a bird but the ground cover roses I bought from David Austin that have torn my fingers to bits. (My sister the nurse supreme suggests Lotil cream.)

I have been trying to dig the plants up from

this bed just beyond DOC and move them to somewhere that does not matter but - the roots go down so far they must be anchored to bedrock, runners sucker everywhere and in the end I had to give up and leave some of the roots in the soil.

They think they have won but . . . . just wait . . . . I have some evil weedkiller. I will plant temporary plants in the area and when the new shoots come through - zap!

Then last image shows the bonfire of brushwood next to the willow tunnel.

So one day - allowing for dryness, birds' nests, hibernating hedgehogs and so on we will have a bonfire. One day.

One way of clearing weeds anyway!

GARDEN HAZARDS - KINS AND CUTS

Yesterday I attacked a bank of very thorny rambler roses - cut them back hard in preparation before moving them.

My fingers now have thorn cuts - one of my leather gloves has a hole at the end of the left middle finger and every thorn found it. I have extracted two sharp bits of rose.

My fingers are also battered from sorting the brushwood from the hedge with kins (split finger ends) on my right thumb and index finger, (it did not seem to hamper my golf).

The roses will be moved to a bit of ground at the back of the house where all I have to do is shear them every so often.

This leaves the bed they were in empty and I have some tulips and white stocks to go in there for now.

So where are the photos this time?

Well, no one wants to see my finger ends - as far as I know - so here are the last of the snow images from the last two weeks or so.

There is one of the young ash by the top fence, a monochrome picture of a shrub on the banking and one of snow on the flowering currant.

HEDGE, POND and SNOW

Just when you think that you can get back into the garden and start to clear away the detritus of last year it snows.

We have moved most of the brushwood from the hedge-laying, either into the enormous bonfire or, I have to admit, over the hedge into the field for the farmer to burn - he does own the hedge so technically the stuff is his.

The first image - in which it is snowing - is of the pond with a huge sycamore stump behind surrounded by some large logs. To the left is the hand rail by the small bridge and to the left of that can just be seen the remains of my father's mallet stuck handle first in the ground. The head, of wood, split last year and I had to buy a new marl - which is far too heavy as I overestimated my strength!

The second image - in which it is also snowing - shows the boardwalk I built a couple of years back over the boggy area and the top settling pond - this is to collect gravel and silt washed down the stream and stop the bottom pond clogging up.

In the picture are a pile of logs waiting to be cut up and stacked for the fire next year when they are dry. There are two small trees left in the hedge - on the left the wild plum and behind a hazel.

Now I will have to get a chainsaw for the logs, cut them and wheelbarrow them up to the shed. A man's work is never done?

TRADITIONAL HEDGE LAYING

It is cold again and the garden is a mess from neglect, snow etc.

Mr E. and his two helpers are laying the hedge at the bottom of the garden. It belongs to B.T. but I have agreed to pay for it to be laid to improve our view and help prevent cattle of various sexes trampling into the garden. B.T. has agreed to put up a good wire fence on his side of the hedge after Mr E. is finished.

They are doing it properly and have agreed to save the wild plum, Prunus cerasifera, and, at their suggestion, a fine young oak seen in the photograph below.

We will get a good load of logs from this and they have agreed to saw the suitable wood into 9" lengths ready for stacking to dry for the wood burner.

The bottom picture shows the young oak on the left

growing out of the laid hedge.

The hedge will then be left for a few years before being done again to provide a stronger and thicker structure. Unfortunately it would have been better if there had been more hawthorn in the hedge but . . .

Apart from oak and the wild plum the hedge also contains cherry, hazel, blackthorn, sycamore, willow, sallow, beech, ash, rowan, elder, holly, and self-sown Rhododendron ponticum so the hedge must be of some age to have so many species in just 60 or 70 metres.

The main surprise this had produced is that we have more garden than we thought.

Mr E. says that the lower garden will be less boggy now as the sun can get at the turf. I can thus put off drainage a bit longer.

GARDENING, POETRY AND SUCH

So this is Christmas, and what have we done?

Chopped a few logs and had wonderful fun?

The earth it is frozen, in shade or in sun,

And the parsnips are locked in ground hard as stone.

A new dawn and a new year - the thaw has arrived but the track to the house is still a sheet of wet polished ice. Soon it may be possible to get back into the garden.

So back to Pomes -

Perhaps as New Year approaches the next poem is better ?

“Time everyone please.” Approaching midnight

God’s publican spreads the towel over the pumps,

tolls the bell by the bar. “Drink up,”

he calls - one final draught of life - and then . . . . .

In this remote inn the door is bolted

and all retire into the snug back room.

God can wait a little longer for their souls,

life has still a dram or two of single cask.

There comes a knock upon the fastened door.

God’s publican opens it a crack, sighs -

God’s policeman stands in the dismal dark.

“You will all have to come with me,” he says,

“But not quite yet.” He leans his sharpened scythe

against the wall. The door is firmly locked,

conversation swells, one golden measure

slowly drained - there is time for one more toast.

“To . . . . . .”

ps. The Sparrowhawk has been back scavenging under the bird feeders. He, it is a he, must be starving.

GARDEN, SNOW, ICE AND WILD BIRDS

So the weather is to turn warmer - about time - which means I have no excuses to stay out of the garden and implement the ideas circulating between my two brain cells.

There is still a little ice by the stream some of which refracts light in peculiar ways - with a little help from the imaging software.

The sun has caused some of the snow to clear near bushes and on the banking allowing birds and rabbits to get something to eat.

In other places the snow is still powdery and pristine, sparkling in the sun.

C has blackcaps in his garden in town so I am envious. S had nuthatches on Town Bank so I am envious.

Time to scatter some porridge oats which is very popular with the blackbirds and robins - continual warfare going on.

EARTHQUAKE

We had a rumble last night around midnight - I thought it was snow coming off roof but on looking this morning the snow is still there. Then I heard on the news and via a text from I in Coniston that we had an earthquake last night centred on Coniston - how does that fit with storing Nuclear waste at Sellafield! The local wit has named it the Kendal Mint Quake!

There we were, nicely asleep in bed, and then the earth moved for us and all it did was wake us up - we turned over and went back to sleep.

A few years ago we were on holiday on the Isle of Colonsay when we heard that there had been an earthquake - back home!

We are still in freezing conditions with snow cover - it has not melted except in odd places where it gets the full sun and has been partially cleared.

Walking around the garden visitors have left trails - rabbits eating at the uncovered grass on the banking, many birds and the unmistakeable single file spoor of a fox -presumably hunting the rabbits. There are scrapings from the grey squirrel and the jays who have been desperately trying to remember where they put the hazelnuts and peanuts earlier in the year.

The coal tits have also been burying seed but they cannot remember where they have put the seed or, perhaps, even that they buried anything. Sometimes I feel a bit like that - now where is the .....?

GARDENING AND SNOW, GIVING IT WELLY

Snow on snow on snow - a bleak but beautiful winter. All work on hedging, gardening and so on ceases.

Lots of spade work but one cannot "borrow" too much salt from the bin in the road - after all it is not really for personal use - is it!?

Paper lady stuck halfway up to house, R stuck trying to turn without "giving it a bit of Welly"! Or boot if that is what you are wearing.

An inventive mind is at work at the Nook trying to devise snow ploughs by fitting a "V" shaped wooden piece - 2 planks - to the front of the mower - the wheels spin and spin, a large plank on the front of the rake - gathers too much snow so too heavy to push, or perhaps I should borrow G.J.'s leaf blower as the snow is dry and powdery.

To end here's another picture of the Cumbrian Woodcock (not Scotch). Actually thinking of the cold and Scotch brings something else to mind - see you later - Cheers!

WINTER AND THE HEDGE LAYING

Back has come the bitterly cold weather.

Ground as hard as iron and all that stuff.

The Hedgemen came and began to lay the field hedge. They have produced a vast amount of wood and brush which R and I have been building into a bonfire, chopping for kindling, setting aside good poles for beans and sweet peas and larger wood for logs for the wood burner.

The removal of the large sallow from the hedge at the far end of the garden has revealed that we have a much bigger garden than we thought.

Ideas are going through my head - perhaps a sitting circle round a central fire as at Castell Henllys in north Pembrokeshire.

Planks supported on vertical posts are arranged in two semicircles with an open fire in the middle where potatoes and sausages can be baked in the hot ashes - sausages on a stick and potatoes in their skins, split and filled with salty butter.

I know - not very healthy but . . . . . .

GARDENING AND WEATHER

So, we are just getting used to driving around in the BMW again when we are told the snow and cold is coming back. Next year it is winter tyres or a better vehicle - though if I do change things we will probably have the mildest winter on record!

It is still very frosty at night as you can see from the enhanced detail it gives to shapes in the garden.

The top one is a teasel - in monochrome - the second one is a Cardoon.

The parsnips are still locked into the soil and will have to fend for themselves.

Bird feeding continues in a big way - I am trying a tip from Helen Yemm in the paper - she suggests adding a little oil to porridge flakes and putting that out for the ground feeders. The oil is to stop the stuff blowing away.

Apart from one dunnock the meal seems to have been largely ignored. Perhaps it is an acquired taste - a bit like olives and sprouts when you are young.

The halved apples are loved by the blackbirds and thrushes. I find that if I cut the apple into three pieces - two ends and a middle - then they can have the ends and I can enjoy the middle.

GARDEN AND MORE SNOW

Got up this morning to find it had rained overnight, not frozen but thawed and 5 inches of snow was all but gone. A little still in the shade and where it had been ice but that was all.

Panic!

I have all these pictures of The Nook in snow and so you are going to get them now!

I know - this is a clearing house blog but there it is.

I will just go and chop a few thawing logs for the wood burner whilst you trawl through these.

More to come -

I have also been to the shed to look at the defrosted plants delivered whilst under freeze etc. Potted on what I could and temporarily potted the echinaceas and agapanthus. I will await developments if any but I am often surprised by the toughness of some plants.

Just read January's - yes January - copy of English Garden. Lots about Gresgarth Hall - Arabella Lennox-Boyd - and opening times. A must if we can. I wish we had lots of gardeners and things - mainly things!

GARDEN BIRDS, COLD OUTSIDE, WARM INSIDE

Sitting at the computer I looked out of the window at the banking and saw this bird.

At first I thought it might have been a Snipe but on closer inspection it has a barred head, not a stripe.

This is a Woodcock.

The pictures are a little substandard because the lens was at full stretch but with a

little photoshoppery I have managed something recognisable.

Birds are finding it hard at the moment, even the Robin.

It seems strange that it is probable that this Robin is not the one I see in the summer waging war on other Robins but an immigrant from Scandinavia seeking better climes - got it wrong this year!

So there are the birds and animals shivering in the big freeze, the garden is in suspended animation and now I have found we are low on logs.

I will have to chop some more if I can prize them from the frozen log pile.

Then I can continue to have the woodburner at full flow warming the old cockles!

GARDEN, BIRDS, COLD!!!!!

So we are snowed in - well I will try to get out this afternoon - and then try to get back!

The first picture is a panorama - 3 images put together - of the garden from the house.

It all looks sunny but it is not warm - not even reaching 0 degC - the snow does melt where it gets a good dose of sunshine but elsewhere it does not.

The second shot shows us suffering freezing fog - it is a wonder anything survives - I cannot get a pickaxe into the ground though the stream still runs and keeps a small corner of the pond ice free. Hence the visit by the heron yesterday.

The usuals are all here including this fat Wood Pigeon waiting for one of the smaller birds to drop a seed.

And then I was in the kitchen and glanced casually out of the window by the feeders. That is a large blackbird, I thought looking down at the ground under the buddleia, and then the bird looked up at me, cheeky as you may.

It was a female Sparrowhawk! Even the predators are starving - there is little carrion and mice and voles are buried under the snow.

Finally this picture with the late afternoon sun leaking through the trees conveys cold - minus 10 C last night. In the summer we can sit on the old boxes on a hot day and be glad of the shade.

I think I will skip that idea just for now.

GARDEN VISITORS

The photograph of the fox tracks was poor and now we have 3 inches more snow. It is a good job we went shopping yesterday,

Friends are skiing up to us for coffee!

I do have a picture of rabbit tracks though - you would think

they would be safely and warmly tucked in their burrows.

Outside is a winter wonderland with every twig and blade of grass outlined in snow - WARNING! there will pictures to follow.

Family were here at the weekend sledging and so on - the braver ones on a plastic sack (very fast) - and the snowman still has his carrot for a nose.

The forecast is for sun later so the camera is on tenterhooks.

This rather poor image of a Brambling is the best I could get

as they insisted on hiding behind the buddleia by the feeders.

Nevertheless it is proof they are here.

We were planning a shopping trip later today as Christmas approaches but we will have to sit by the fire and read instead.

What a shame.

GARDEN ASLEEP IN SNOW

The snow is finally falling, the, last night it rained for a while, thawed for a while and froze. All is crusty.

Went out to shovel drive. The treatment I am on is wonderful - never felt the cold - just had a whacking hot flush!

The first picture is up the garden at night with a flash. The second is of an old sink from my mother's garden in which we had lilies. The stubs of their stems are just protruding through the snow.

The plants I received at the start of the freeze were carefully put in the shed and are now rock solid.

Normally the shed would be frost free but it has been so cold that it has been well below zero even in there.

The birds are everywhere and I seem to be feeding most of Cumbria. Today R spotted a funny chaffinch - it was a brambling and then another. They have fled from the cold of northern europe for - the freeze here.

The garden sleeps under the snow - except for voles and things which have tunnel networks hidden away in the long grass - a hidden world safe from kestrel eyes.