SO MUCH BLOSSOM, DEARIE

Before we get onto blossoming news a few birdy bits. Here are our pair of mallard, Noddy and Hilda, by the pond with the other drake trying to muscle in. I have decided to call him the Blockbuster just to annoy Slade fans. (Isn't that Sweet!)

And here is a tree sparrow - they sit on the edge of the roof below our bedroom window. Cock tree sparrows have a brown head rather than the grey of the house sparrow. As we removed the house martin nests they commandeered when we were having the woodwork painted  last year I wonder where they will go this year.

Nine spears of asparagus through this morning and we are eating lots of rhubarb - yes, it does. 

Strawberries tucked under netting and also flowering.

Okay, it is blossom time - I am very worried about blossom - the setting thereof - as we have had early morning frost and that can make a disaster of it all - fruit I mean - having none. We will have to wait and see.

This is the greengage I and A gave us.

This is the Victoria Plum
And below is blackthorn (or sloe) in the bottom hedge.

Then we come to ornamental cherries - shirotae

and The Great White Cherry, Tai-haiku.

The two on the left here -

We also have loads of damson, apple, pear and weeping silver pear, amelanchier and wild plum not to mention the Magnolia stellata.

However, there are other flowers in the garden, notably the flowering currant humming with bumble bees and the headily scented skimmia.

The tulips are scattered about - from previous pots and though they tend to decline in vigour over time many are still thriving.









Along the edge of the rose bed the forget-me-nots provide a blue punch - one of the two dominant blues in the garden now,

the other being the wild bluebell (and this seems to be seeding itself around. I wonder if it will become a pest like the wild garlic?). Another pest comes from the sycamore and seedlings and small treelets are everywhere.

And then there is the blossom that is not so conspicuous -

 Blackcurrant left, gooseberry right, redcurrant below.

One of the great shows of inconspicuous flowering at this time of year is on the ash trees. It would be a disaster if all this goes with the die-back spreading through the country. I noticed yesterday that many of our hedges contain a preponderance of ash.

So what have we been doing in the garden apart from sitting in it? Well, actually the temperature has dropped and it has been around 9C this week. So R has been digging up bramble roots that she missed. I have cut a branch off a sycamore that was very low and threatening to decapitate me when I went past - I know, some people might think that is not a bad idea. I have started to barrow slate chippings up the garden and replenish the surface of the paths, I have pruned the hawthorn cloud tree so it looks tidier and neatened up the sides of the beech hedge. It should be left now as birds may be nesting in it.
Our swallows and martins are still not back from Africa - cannot blame them in this chilly wind and I think that the ducks have decided that, nice as our pond is, it is not the place for a nest. they have probably gone up to the mill reservoir above the spade forge.

Have had a fruity panic - suddenly realised we have a freezer full of fruit from last year and something NEEDS TO BE DONE.
So have made some raspberry jam with the last of them and gooseberry jam.

Gooseberry jam -

2 1/4 pounds goosegogs, 3/4 pint water, 3 pounds sugar.

If fresh top and tail and simmer with water for 1/2 hour until soft. This will only take 15 minutes with defrosted fruit. Add sugar and stir till dissolved. Boil hard - about 10 minutes until setting point reached. Test on cool saucer. Skim, bung in hot jars and seal.
(You can also stick 8 elderflower heads in a muslin bag and cook with gooseberries. Squeeze bag before removing.)

Yum!

A and J are coming to do the drains, no they are not, yes they are, perhaps?
And there are so many pics of then garden at this time of the year so here are more from the wild garden and wood.

Dog violets

 Lesser Celandine

and bluebells.

These are really growing as a weed on the banking by the house but the far wood is a beautiful blue carpet untainted by the Spanish ones, so far.

As a man used to writing a handful of blogs a week this change to one only means it gets awfully long. I mean I do prattle on a bit (a lot I hear a cry). (And I was going to stop the blog altogether.) (And the bracket thing is taking over again.)

So, finally, a mention for G and L - here is a full compost bin covered in old cardboard for now - just thought I would mention it for any compostophiles around.

WE HAVE AN ALARM QUACK

Woken this morning by the duck (who I have called Hilda) sitting on top of R's shed and quacking. As I have called the drake Noddy (because he nods a lot) I thought Hilda a good name for his spouse - Noddy - Hilda - dreadful pun.
(Apologies to fans of Slade).

Mow, mow, mow the lawn, etc etc, Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a slog (at times) - in trouble as have traipsed mud into the house again!

I seem to have developed a following in Russia which is interesting. I suspect that much of that may be due to the different seasonal changes we have here (but I did mention Putin a year or so ago so . . . )? This is not a "Midnight in Moscow" situation where messages were passed using changes in that melody - in the 60's I think. Over here The Kenny Ball Jazz Band had a big hit with it - but I am not sure which version!

It is cherry blossom time.

A flash of white is caught through my window and I know the bullfinch is back now the fruit tree buds are fat and sweet.
Chris Rea is playing Touche D'amour in the background and Noddy and his spouse are ensconced by the pond.

I watched Gardeners' World and enjoyed it more - just Monty Don and two visits to gardens - one  magnolia feast and the other day lilies. We saw a scented pale yellow one that would be just the thing called Daylight.

Yesterday, we went for a long walk back of Oxen Park - so called because it was one of the farms for Furness Abbey in mediaeval times (there are others - we also passed Abbot Park and above Coniston Water are Lawson Park and Parkamoor). We walked over to Ickenthwaite and round on the fell with views down the valley to the sea and out to distant Blackpool.

Afterwards I went into the garden and put in ten rather shrivelled chitted (CHITTED) Desiree potatoes and some broad beans. I also planted out the sweet peas J gave us carefully surrounding each small clump of seedlings with a bottomless plant pot surrounded by a band of copper tape to keep the slugs at bay (I hope).

Woodland still doing well - primroses, anemones and daffodils.

 

The quince D gave us is flowering but not completely happy as the soil by the wall is rather poor despite lots of muck and such.

 The pansies in the pot outside the kitchen are full of colour and the tulips are just taking over from the tete-a-tete daffodils (small, scented and multi-headed).

Drama!! Trouble at t' pond. Noddy has a competitor for Hilda's affections. They are sitting together and he is about six feet away waiting for his chance!

Oh! Monday night at the duck pond.
(1963 - The Cougars - Saturday Night at the Duck Pond - Ah! Musical memories.)

Sticks in, french beans have been sown and courgette seeds put in small pots full of compost in the shed.

The asparagus bed had been weeded but will need doing again. This has to be done by hand to avoid damaging the spears, the first one of which is already through.

I will have to oil the squirrel trap - they are eating the nuts without it going off.
So I did, went out, came back and the trap had worked - unfortunately I had caught a stupid collared dove - yes, they are dumb, well not dumb - they make an awful racket coo cooing - just brainless. They made a nest of about six small twigs on a beam and she laid an egg which rolled off and broke on the ground!
And I have found out what is taking the nuts - watched a pair of great tits go in and each took a whole peanut.

So to end with the view from the living room door window.

I love springtime in England.

SOMETHING NASTY IN THE . . .

Poooooh!
There is something dead in the Utility Room behind or under the boiler (and totally inaccessible).
The pong reminds me of previous encounters with dead mice.
All we can do is wait and hurry through the stink.
I think they have got in via the water pipes or something. 

Talking of wild flowers here are some from the garden - woodland area.

Wood Anemone

Wild Daffodil

 Lesser Celandine

Golden Saxifrage

Primrose

It is obviously a yellow time of year - except for the Dog's Mercury - a wild euphorbia.

And talking of times of year - what is this doing flowering up in the wood - not due till May.




Talking of birds - two mallard and a plastic heron,

and two jackdaws not quite knowing what to make of Doc, the dwarf.

And the wood pigeons are billing and cooing on the fence outside. This one seems very fat but it was a cold morning and obviously he/she (cannot tell) had had his/her feathers ruffled.

And, like much of my blog here is more rubbish from the tip in the wood.

Pond news - we have the invasion of the dreaded spirogyra, its green tentacles spreading through the water. I will have to improvise some sort of extended rake to remove it until the pond can settle down and plants grow enough to keep it well oxygenated.

It is weekly mowing now, sweet peas given to us by J are hardening off to acclimatise them to the chill in the air. The rhubarb is in fine fettle and ready to pull (and eat). We have daisies and dandelions in the grass. I have spot weedkilled the thistles in the lawn but it is not bowling green stuff so full of such as plantain.

So to Friday - too much happening.
The swallows are back.

Have been digging and composting veg beds again - the more muck the merrier. I have made a netting cover for the strawberries to try and keep the birds away. On the left the little bit of unmarked bed contains parsley In the other pic you can see the rhubarb thriving.

Today the septic tank service man and the boiler service man arrived - the sign by the gate is unreadable - so have repainted that.


The camellia given to us by J is flowering but has been caught by the frost browning the petals. The soil there is too limey (from when the house was built - mortar, cement etc) and the leaves have a bit of chlorosis.

Now, sometimes I sit in the garden in the shadow 

of cherry blossom and try to understand the cruelty of man on man . . . and fail. Why does the quest for power, for wealth for so called righteousness and religious correctness engender such behaviour?
It is a sad mad world. (Where did that come from?)
Time for everyone to come and have cup of tea in the garden and talk of small things, ordinary things. I will bake some biscuits.

Mind you being the 30 Greats Grandson of Brian Boru (look up in Wikipedia) (and if you believe all the intervening ancestors were legitimate (that the stated parentage was correct (unlikely)) who am I to talk?

(I put that one in for G. in Dublin.) (Mind you her ancestors may well be Scottish so I chuck in Duncan 1st (never liked that play by Bill Shakey) and the Black Douglas for good measure.) 

Nuff said.

(Too many brackets).

HOEING AND MOWING AND SO ON

Monday -

This morning we were wrapped in a cold high pressure mist.

Now I am sitting on a seat beside the house looking west over the garden, my Portuguese hat on my head to shade the warm sun. It is a beautiful April day and I am reading a book by Jo Nesbo.

Tuesday -

My son C is down in the Wendy House working on his website - the educational company Educake. There are a pair of mallard sitting in the shade of the eucalyptus, resting. R has brought out a cup of tea, for herself, for me. She has been writing in the kitchen.
I notice two jackdaws have joined the usual tits, finches and sparrows by the feeders and then movement catches my eye.

From the shrubbery at the top of the garden two fat rabbits hop down to the longer grass and begin to groom and feed.
Sometimes a garden is heaven (except the b***** rabbits).
Of course there are disadvantages to ducks too - they have consumed all the frogspawn.
(Rabbit at bottom of beech hedge).



R. has been weeding and I have hoed everywhere, especially dealing with the sycamore and ash tree seedlings.
At this time of year - before the goosegrass and bindweed emerging - we have three bad weeds - ground elder (thanks to the Romans who introduced it (as they did with the rabbits)), nettles and, more recently - wild garlic. It is sowing itself everywhere and is a tough cookie.

Looking around the garden I see many shrubs pruned into the sales I want but two trees have their real shape - both pyramidal - a holly in the bottom hedge and a bay by the house.

And the lawns are mown for the first time, builders stuff - pipes and chippings have come on the wagon - I also got some slate ones for the paths.

Here is the engine in the wood - 4 cylinder block and cast iron - very heavy.

And here is the rabbit hole dug into the bottom of the bonfire before I blocked it up.

Later - 

So hoeing and mowing and weeding and feeding (with manure) have gone on. 
The two gooseberry cuttings that have rooted are to go to Herefordshire to my daughter and son-in-law.

Wildflowers like primroses are flourishing.

A spotted flycatcher is in the hedge, flying out from its perch to catch an insect and then returning, then repeating this again and again.

Later again - 

I have been weeding the bed near the pond with the candelabra primulas and was pleased to see so many plants and new seedlings. The flat stone "beach" has been drawn out to the whole curve and I have planted some kingcups (marsh marigolds) near the outlet. If we cannot get more big flat stones then slate chipping with an underlay sheet may be the answer in front of the Wendy House.

Then I brambled the hedge and it brambled me. One blackthorn spike went right through my Wellie boot into my foot!

I will end for now with pics of a Madame Le Fevre tulip (my  mother's favourite), pulmonaria and Anemone blanda. The garden is colouring up.

Time for another garden sit in the sun with my book and a drink of some sort - or OTHER!