MY DOWNFALL

I have mowed the lawns and they are looking a bit better after the wet winter.

Today is a glorious day - sun, blue sky and only  a slight chill in the spring air. I put on my terrible hat to protect the loftiest part of my skin - this produced are look of utmost distaste from R. I do not think she likes the hat. Personally I am not bothered as long as it does the job and I am only in the garden.

C and P are here - C messing about with his car and P reading masses of Bill Shaky plays.

The summer seats are out by the kitchen and occupied.

Down the garden the rhubarb is doing well, overlapping the boundaries of its bed. We have enjoyed some simply cooked with sugar - it does not need much as the young stems are surprisingly sweet.

I have tidied up the messy new growth on the gooseberries so that they grow on a leg. This makes picking much easier if I can get to them before the mildew and sawflies. The variety is Careless.

There is blossom all over the place - this first one is our Victoria Plum.
All the fruit trees are flowering though the Bramley Apple is late as usual.
The greengage I moved is in leaf and looking ok but no obvious blossom. We will have a lorry load of damsons if the frosty keeps away.

So here is another, yes another pic of the Prunus shirotae. This one from below.

Tulips are everywhere - in the flower beds and in pots. The yellow pansies are enjoying the company of the bulbs. I have had to water them for the first time as we do not have any obvious rain due until Easter Sunday or Monday.

The first queen wasp has been sighted but I missed swatting it. After the stings last year I am not feeling too friendly to them.

I have found a new patch of ground elder up in the wood - need to deal with that.
Wild bluebells are spreading through the wood and appearing in unusual places. When they are in the flowerbeds they are not welcome but a wood full of them in spring is a delight.

And MY DOWNFALL - well I got out the seats and with them my favourite.
Unfolded it.
Sat in it.
There was a ripping noise and I found myself on the floor.
That is not the embarrassing bit though.
When I came to stand up my tin knee made life difficult and I had to have help from R to roll over and escape.

We have now had swallows half a mile away down the road but not here yet.
We wait.

Seen one skimming over the back field.
All things come to . . .

WHERE HAS ALL MY STAMINA GONE

Long time passing etc etc . . .

An hour digging out the top stream and I am kna very tired and perspirey.

"A cuppa tea, a cuppa tea, I'd lub a cuppa tea." (Quote from Spike Maligna the well-known typing error.)(Quote from Spike etc etc.)

Let us start with an early morning shot of the garden taken from the wood

Right, that done, we move on.
"What did your father do with the Pleones son?"
"He put them in and on the stones around his gnome. That's not a gnome, it's a dwarf. Well, it is small. Doc too. Very appropriate.

They are not too hard to grow. They usually grow on mossy trunks. Roots die off in winter and leave pseudobulbs. Do not bury them. They should be on the surface and many species are hardy to cold. They like a cool partially shaded position. In the winter, after the foliage has died down, leave dry. Water in the spring once new growth has appeared.

But then we have had a mild winter. This osteospermum has flowered a bit throughout. Usually they succumb to the cold.

I never thought I would get tired of birds singing but there is one cock chaffinch that never stops. It sits in the small ash outside my window and goes on and on and on. He probably thinks that that is how to get a mate but the female birds are probably taking wide avoiding action. I mean it could drive one mad when all is wanted is a quiet snooze on the eggs.
SAW A SWALLOW three miles away down by the bay.

At last - I hope it will not be long before they get here - if any of them have survived the shooting ranges in Malta and Spain. It seems hardly worth it for such a small bite.
Perhaps we should equip the birds with miniature air to ground missiles and let them take out the hunters. Well, not hunters - there is little hunting goes on just firing away at anything that flies.
Apparently millions of small songbirds are slaughtered for FUN!?

Perhaps the RSPB should offer bounty for each gunman removed from the scene?

It worked to eradicate the Red Kite and other raptors. (Not velociraptors - that was before the RSPB was founded.) (RSPB - Royal Society for the Protection of Birds) (This information is for the man in Canada and the reader in Kazakhstan).

This blossom above is the Prunus shirotae.

Both the big cherries are fantastic so expect more pics in the future.
The one below is Prunus taihaku.

In the autumn I ordered sweet pea seeds and have put them somewhere safe - somewhere where they will not germinate as they are in their paper envelopes - cannot find them.

And my lovely cosmos seedlings are no more - just slug food I think - aaaagh! The big crambe has also had its leaves assaulted - slugs and snails again - so out with the beer and bury a glass jar to its neck in the soil. Get 'em drunk, get 'em dead. I am unable grieve for them and anyway they will be so blotto when they drown they will not care.
Apart from beer and nematodes and slug bait I know of people who have crushed snails in their fingers, squished slugs and even taken scissors to slugs and chopped them in half. A friend goes round every evening with a bucket collecting snails (he has a lot of dry stone walls), fills the bucket with water and puts a lid on top to stop escapees.

Why can't we all live in perfect harmony - dear slug/snail you can have 10% of my plants if you promise to leave the rest alone.

Where have all the Cosmos gone, l-o-n-g time passing!

CHERRIES, CUTS AND CURRY

"My Lord, what a morning,
My Lord, what a morning,
My Lord, what a morning,
When the stars begin to fall."

Now before you say I have spelled morning wrong and anyway stars should be cherry petals, I know but this mooring the sun is out, admittedly it is chilly, yet it is a glorious spring day.

Even Mr Pheasant is full of it. R looked out of the window the other day to see him leap onto one of his two hen birds and 'Whizz-bang!' it was over. And right outside our window under the feeders.

The two cherry trees by the house are wonderful and loaded with blossom - Prunus taihaku, the great white cherry and Prunus shirotae with its horizontal branches and hanging flowers. With the latter you can stand underneath and look up into the blossom - wonderful.

One lot of plants that seed themselves and springs up in surprising places is honesty. We have both the red (really deep pink) and white. The best white has appeared by the compost heaps and is grown large on good feed.

The wallflowers in their cutting bed are also splendid and rampant in colour and scent. Every time I pass I just have to bend down and inhale. We have a rhododendron on the upper bank in flower and I had forgotten we had selected it because it too has scent unlike many of its kind.

Yesterday I cleared away grass from around a veritable hedge of redcurrant I have created with cuttings - every year stick a few in - and the blackbirds will be ecstatic when the fruit come.

No, I did not wear gloves, R.
Yes, that is why I am covered in scratches and cuts.
Yes, I am silly (and a bit sore) and brambled sliced. It is astonishing how a blade of tough grass can cut one.
No, I have not put plasters on this morning - I am trying to let them dry out and heal.
Yes, I could use superglue but knowing my propensity for clumsiness, I would probably end up stuck to myself and everything within reach (including the tube of glue).

Now, two plants, in the grass, that we like (ish) are daisies - ok - and R likes dandelions on the top bank. Trouble with the latter is that the do not stay there but crop up all over the place sending down their taproots.

And the daffodils are not over yet as later ones come into flower. The old ones need deadheading and later feeding so the bulbs are built up for next year.

My soon to be defunct willow tunnel/avenue is springing into leaf as are the other willows in  the garden.

And everywhere there is colour - tulips planned and forgotten (and risen again), the forgetmenots edging the rose beds, the flowering currant. The pace at which the garden is moving is amazing. How can it be so empty for the winter and now so full?

And as I swallow a cup of tea this early morning with dew still on my hair we await the coming of the hirundelles (I did a little french at school.)
So come on martins and swallows, our eaves are aching for your nests.

And to finish - the cover of Neil Curry's latest book - a fascinating read, an interesting idea.

Some amateur photographer did the cover image though - I wonder . . . .  ?

SOON AFTER DAWN AND BANANAS

Could not sleep last night thinking about the changes to the garden. So out at 7 am and a walk around the garden in the chill morning sun. Blossom everywhere, mallard on the pond, chaffinch and blackbird belting out their songs, and the air so sharp it would cut with a knife.

This afternoon finished trying to weed the bed by the Wendy House but the sedges are a nightmare. I clipped the reeds by the pond and did a little tidying on the laths. R deadheaded the daffs - many nibbles. As I strolled around the garden I her Hallfound things I had forgotten - more fritillaries by the weeping pear - I suppose I must have put them in - and two big white honesty plants flowering by the compost heap.
The cutleaved elder I pruned and the prunings have been stuck in the top garden. I do not suppose they will root but - you never know.

The wood pigeons have gone barmy - three times in the last hour they have crashed into my window - males chasing males I think - typical laddish behaviour now the hormones are on.

 This is a collared dove - not a great image but they will not stay still and I have not got all day - t'other pic is a goldfinch. The doves coo away, the finch goes, "Coo-ee."

The other day I showed you pics of Holker Hall, today it is the turn of Muncaster Castle Gardens. We took our d-in-law's parents there and a good time was had by all.

 A little out of the way up the Cumbrian coast it is well worth a visit - the rhododendrons, azaleas and camellias are coming into flower and then again in early May come when the blubell wood is AMAZING!
There are tearooms, a walk up the terrace with views up Eskdale, the World Owl Centre, flying of birds and later in the day Heron feeding time.

If you want there are also tours of the castle itself. All in all a good day out and you can add on a train trip on Ratty (The Ravenglass and Eskdale Railway) or just a walk through the village. This is where Reginald Hill the author lived.

All this takes me away from telling you about the weeding I have done, digging up of climbers from the willow tunnel and replanting, and cutting two big bunches of wallflowers from the plants in the cutting beds for the house.

So, this weekend is spend in trepidation - come on yer Scousers! Liverpool play Manchester City this weekend and, though I am not a football nutter like my son C I do have an interest in the game as occasional entertainment.

I have just found a box of old seed on top of a cupboard in my room and among the packets is one for Verbena bonariensis. However germinating is a hot business.
Instead I have rescued three blackened bananas from the bin and made a banana cake (they call it Banna Bread) - yes, me! And it is edible! Goes well with - you've guessed it - a cuppa tea.

You want the recipe - 8 oz plain flour, 6 oz caster sugar, 4 oz butter, 3 very ripe bananas, 3 level teasp baking powder, 1/2 level teasp salt, 2 eggs, perhaps a little milk.

Cream sugar and butter, add eggs (take out of shells first) and beat vigorously. Mash bananas and stir in well, sieve flour, b. powder and salt together and fold into mixture. This should now be of a soft dropping consistency whatever that is. If needed you can add a little milk here.
Bake 1 to 1 1/4 hours 350F or Gas Mark 4, test with a skewer and if nowt sticks to it then done. Leave to stand a while then pop onto one of those mesh cooling things.

Eat.

Have indigestion.

Take some Gaviscon or Kolanticon.

Burp.

Have a cuppa tea.

Be smug.

GARDEN UPDATE (AND THE PEANUT MYSTERY)

It is muzzling a bit this morning, damp clarts the air but it looks like it will brighten up later.
The cosmos seedlings have arrived early from Sarah Raven but she says they are properly hardened off so will be planted soon.

Despite the rather dull day yesterday, the sunny shot at the top is from this morning, I have decided to post a series of photos to show how the ornamental beds around the house are getting on. So here they are - views left and right along the paving outside the kitchen and a view up the garden from there.

Then there are three images of the beds around the corner, all sprouting masses of vegetation.

Right, duty done in that respect I will have to answer the question posed at the end of the last blog regarding the disappearing peanuts.

As you can see the jay has two and possibly three peanuts in its beak, no doubt more in its crop.

I have just had a text from my son-in-law in Herefordshire - the swallows have arrived there. I always feel I cannot quite put winter behind me till they come back from Africa. Then my heart lifts up as WW said.
I am waiting.

We have had a good few days with P's parents, T and A, travelling the southwest Lake District. One can become a bit reclusive in one's garden if not careful and their company was excellent - really enjoyed it. We went to Muncaster Castle - rhododendrons and azaleas and magnolias out or coming out - and they have cleared a lot of, I suspect, R. ponticum.

I have mowed with the big mower and it chewed its way through the long lush grass with difficulty, clogging up and so on. When we plant the many white birches in the plan I am tempted to clear the grass where they are to be.

After midday rain today I intend to get the shallots in - bulbs saved from last year, and plant the Cosmos. The ground is almost ready. And I should prune back the cut-leaned elder so we can have a new explosion on of growth.

Also, now the sap is running, this is a good time to make whistles.
And a cup of tea.

SPRING IS SPRUNG

The grass is riz
I wonder . . .
where them squirrels is?

The house is full of flowers, daffs and primroses all over the place.

Vases to the right of me,
vases to the left of me . . .

Into the garden of daffs strode the old gardener. And he got onto trouble again. I was wearing clothes far to good to be mucking about and got them all dirty. I know that I should change into tatty trousers, worn shirts and wellies but I am just too lazy - what-the-hellism gets to me.

I should be organised like the chives by the blackcurrants, standing in a neat green row, well controlled and sensible. But I am not. I am more of a rambling weed, unpredictable and casual.

And two squirrels banished but another one here - seen today! Tree rats everywhere. Perhaps I could collect them and sell them to L'Enclume in Cartmel as a tasting menu delicacy - sort of mini squirrel rolls with mustard seed sauce? And some rowanberry jelly?

I once made some rowanberry jelly. It is supposed to accompany venison well - well, it was a bit bitter and I accompanied it to the lavatory many times after eating it! Not intending to make any more.
Redcurrant jelly will suffice.

The daffs are going over but we have enough despite the small grey slugs chewing the petals. Apart from the wild ones we have big yellows - on the left - and more delicate ones with an orange trumpet as here on the right.

And bunnies have been seen - a pair of fat furry choppers on the top banking. Fortunately the fritillaries still have their flowers and buds in place - but for how much longer?

It is great to see old friends emerge from the earth.
This is lovage and soon these small leaves will be eight feet above the ground.

We have guests - T and A - and it is good to see them wandering around the garden on their own. We like to share our garden and have others enjoy it. Of course we could not open it to the public as there is no way we could meet insurance requirements for safety. And anyway there is nowhere for them to park their cars.

So if friends and family want to converse with our trees, commune with the tadpoles (if there are any left as the heron was back this morning), or smugly note the weeds and mess they are most welcome.

The grass is drying out somewhat so the great mow is at hand.
One man went to mow, went to mow his jungle.
One man and his . . .

You know the rest except it never gets beyond one man.

Now, I told you that I was cross with the mice eating all the peanuts in the squirrel trap - I was wrong. It was not the mice, it was not there squirrels. Watch for the next blog and all will be revealed.

Now, thinking of all that mowing has tired me out - I must go and have a lie down.

MOW, HOLKER and CROW

Just been bathing in a cascade of chaffinch song and rook croaks.

The garden is bursting forth but though I now have my mowers the weather continues to ensure the grass is wet! So No Mo.
I lie, I LIE, I LIE!!!!
Just been out with the small mower and trimmed main lawn and mown paths here and there. (That will please Milady.) You can see the main mown area in the foreground and the pathy bits in the background.

Anyway, this does not stop us going elsewhere in search of gardens. One our joint membership of the RHS gets us into free is that at Holker Hall on the Cartmel Peninsula. Of course the scale is a little different.

Cue for pics :-

Good for a walk around, a sit in the sun on the big seat - we sometimes have to wait for others to leave - a sneaky snack or later something in the cafe. Then there is the park and the deer where open can stretch legs a bit more.


The deer pic is of a fallow stag in the park at Holker Hall. The wild deer we have in our area are Roe and Red - fortunately we have not had any in the garden (so far).

After our meeting with the gamekeeper (see last blog) I brought out the squirrel trap and baited it with (I have just looked out the window and there is a carrion crow on the ground under a feeder!) peanuts and crumbly Lancashire cheese.

The peanuts went quickly - take by mice but the mice LEFT the cheese. However one of the squirrels submitted to its greed and wallop! We have a squirrel.
This is where it gets complicated and I get a bit soppy.
I am now supposed legally to kill it. Mmm!

Being a wimp I find that a tough thingy so I break the law, whizz off a good few miles and release the little critter.
Now the car stinks of squirrel!

However, if I can minimise the numbers of tree rats in the area then the birds have a better chance. I have not forgotten the grey squirrel climbing up the house wall to a house martin nest and emptying it.

-----

Just up, this morning, I was standing at our bedroom window gazing up the garden when a large carrion crow landed on the windowsill, beak and nose two inches apart separated by glass (thankfully). It gave an enormous squawk and flapped off to one of the tall trees to recover!

I am already having my cuppa and it is raining - so I shall sit here and watch the chaffinches in the old ash fluttering wings as a precursor to mating. Now the pigeons are billing on a branch outside the window. I think I need a lie down.

OH! TO BE IN ENGLAND

Now that April's here.
The Cherry now is hung with bloom along the bough - well one of them is, almost.
And the daffs are great where they have not been nibbled - petals chewed here and there.
And I got my mowers back tonight.
And it has started raining.
And my sister and husband come for tomorrow (so no mowing).
And the grass is a-growing - I can almost hear it laughing at me.
And we were given a pot full of pleones - Chinese ground orchids. I have repotted them and we have a dozen small pots now. I am told they like well drained gritty soil (so they are in soggy potting compost) and should be left to dry out in the winter, only watering when they show signs of growth in the spring. They seem to grow from small bulb-like/corm-like thingys.

So we will give some away, nurture others, both indoors and outside, and say a big thanks to Sue who is so generous with her seedlings, cuttings and plants.

We met a gamekeeper whilst we were out on a walk yesterday and he said that last year he bagged over 40 grey squirrels - they eat so many small birds' eggs and chicks. We have a plague on our hands. R says, whereas she can appreciate a cuddly bunny (even when it eats the buds off our fritillaries) for the grey tree rats she has no loving feelings.
So I set the trap again and - nothing yet. (D***, I have just dribbled tea down my shirt.) My shirt is red and so are Madame Lefebvre tulips - first ones out.

In the bed where the path branches off down to the Wendy House R grows an expanse of euphorbia, splendid and acid green. However, this bed also contains some roses, several rosa rugosa, and various perennials. These are to go, she says, so that the whole bed can be one glorious mass of green and yellow. 

So now I am wondering where to move the other plants - I cannot just chuck them away - everything can have a place if one thinks hard enough - well not quite everything - not the ground elder, bindweed and creeping buttercup.
And that is to not mention plants we do not have, and DO NOT WANT! - Japanese Knotweed, Himalayan Balsam - that will do - I am having palpitations. I have enough with nettles and brambles and sycamore and ash tree seedlings everywhere. The little trees are easy enough to pull up if small but once they get going they are toughies.

We have sent off our response to Gary Primrose's first ideas and wait his response. Then it will be a matter of balancing budgets with plans and desires.

We live here in our little world and greater events flit past only brushing us incidentally. I am in my

study footling (am an expert footler) and R is in her Wendy House writing. In this image you can see the pond as it is - watch this space. And the mallard come every morning for a breakfast of tadpoles.

So I shall now tootle off into the other room and stare at the TV.
So from a footler and tootler, fare ye well till the next blog.

Oh! To be in England,
now that April's here.
April is a barmaid
with lots of sun-blonde hair.

Sorry Mr Browning.
(I wonder did his friends call him Gravy?)