Saturday 23rd August, 2014.
I am not sure whether there are more late broods of baby birds this year or whether I am being more observant than usual. I saw three youngsters on Sunday.
First a thrush, with feathers that looked too pristine for an adult or a spring baby. It landed briefly on the terrace under the bird feeder. It might even have been a sibling of the fatality that I found in the garden last week.
The young dunnock has also been back but it keeps disappearing before I get to the window with a camera.
I did get a photo of the third visitor though - a very young robin. It must have just started fending for itself and was still uncertain about which things were suitable robin food. I watched it pecking at leaves under the Kowhai tree for a while and then took out a handful of sunflower seeds and scattered them under the tree. All the birds flew off and I didn't see whether the young robin returned to eat the seeds - but he was back the next day.
I have had to revise my opinion of hydrangeas. I always thought they were vain plants interested only in their appearance with no value apart from adding a splash of colour to the garden in late summer but now I think that this applies only to the mopheads with their clusters of colourful bracts. I have been watching the bees and hoverflies gathering pollen from the tiny true flowers in the centre of the lacecap blossoms . . . and as you can see the pollen bags on this bee's hind legs are full.
Even though I am overstocked with hydrangeas, I couldn't resist pinching some prunings which had been discarded in the skips at the tip. The flowers were a more intense blue than any of mine. I couldn't reach them but Tim has longer arms and retrieved a few pieces for me. I trimmed them into eight cuttings. I hope they don't all grow but I think it is unlikely because most were softwood and I think the older wood roots better.
Summer started earlier than usual this year and was hotter than usual - a mixed blessing because the grass behind the house suffers in hot, dry weather. I can empathise because I wilt in the heat too. Autumn and Spring are normally our longest seasons. We have hardly any really hot weather and very little extreme cold but plenty of inbetweenish days. There is an old saying in England about summer being three hot days and a thunderstorm. The same could apply to the Island but we don't always get the thunderstorm.
It has been feeling like the beginning of autumn for a couple of weeks with a pleasant chill in the air in the morning, but on Tuesday it started to look like autumn. After heavy showers overnight we woke to bright sunshine and I noticed, for the first time, that the berries on the hawthorn had turned red. Exactly three months ago the trees were covered with white blossom.
The big event of the week has been the daily fern trimming. I have nearly finished cutting the ferns which overhang the ditches but there are more on the banks. It is the first year that I have cleared the ditch without any Schipperkes to keep me company. The boys used to walk up and down in the ditch "supervising" and I had to take care not to snip off the ends of their curly tails.
I did have some company though - a new supervisor. On Monday one of the semi-moulted young robins watched my progress with interest. A second one came to join us but was attacked by the first one and beat a hasty retreat. I also saw someone, very small and very fast, running along the bottom of the ditch on Monday. It might have been a pigmy shrew but it was gone almost before I saw it.
The young robin was back the next morning. It likes to perch on the edge of the big black bucket that I use to carry the ferns down to the garage. Unfortunately it keeps getting frights when I drop a handful of ferns into the bucket. I think it was the same robin that was watching me the previous day but it is hard to tell one bird from another as they are almost identical.
Wednesday was yet another day in the ditch being supervised by the young robin - this time working in the shallow ditch next to the terrace which used to be a "road", below the old hollies growing on the bank at the top of the garden. This bit of "road" led from the original cottage on the croft to a water tank in a neighbouring field. While I was working in a sunny midge-free area I put my hat down on the old willow trunk and was amused to see my little companion perched on it. I wasn't quite so amused to find that he had left a small deposit. Tim laughed and said that the robin had paid his respects to my hat - a joke which dates back many years to the day a friends' dog lifted his leg against the plaque at St Patrick's keeill and someone commented "Barney is paying his respects to the saint!"
Showers were predicted on Thursday. So I had a break from gardening and we walked up through the plantation in the morning. On the way down to the gate, I paused to take this photo of a white heather plant. According to the gypsies (I don't think that is a very PC term but I am not sure what I am supposed to call them now), white heather brings luck. I don't know about that but this must be a lucky plant because it is the only one of a little pack of six that has thrived. Some were dug up or over-fertilised by neighbouring cats and a couple just didn't seem to like our damp, shady garden.
When we reached the top of our walk, Snaefell was covered with cloud but I zoomed in on The Neary, an old ruined farm above the glen. I liked the contrast in muted colours . . . the yellowing fields of pasture grass above the green bracken-covered slopes, with the purple haze of heather moorland in the background.
This shrub/small tree must be a gift from a visiting bird. It came up next to the ditch below the holly bank. I didn't pay it much attention and just assumed that it was another cotoneaster. We have an upright variety as well as the horizontalis and they both self-seed. But Tim pointed out that it was different from the cotoneaster. I had a close look and then did some research. It turned out to be a Luma apiculata or Chilean myrtle aka Orange bark myrtle. It is attractive in an understated way, with decorative bark; glossy, aromatic leaves; and little white flowers. No berries yet but it produced a few last year and I have read that they are edible.
On the way back to the house after photographing the myrtle, I noticed this flowering apple mint with a backdrop of ripening plums. The surviving bit of the plum tree is in rather an exposed place and branches often blow off in the winter gales. The plums will be disappointing this year because I neglected to thin out the fruit again.
This photo of some wild angelica growing near the plum tree reminds me that I must make an effort to cut back or weed out the feverfew before it scatters seed all over the garden. I like it - but it can become too much of a good thing.
After I got home from shopping in Ramsey yesterday, Tim suggested a walk. For a change, we walked up the glen towards the old quarry. There were clouds lurking around but we were lucky. We went as far as the pretty little mountain stream near the quarry but didn't cross the stream.
Instead we climbed a short distance above the path to look at a new planting of trees. I think these must be part of the Ramsey Forest project. I found this entry on their Facebook page:
20 August 2013
Ramsey Forest has organised its first small woodland planting for the New year. It will be 500 trees in Glen Auldyn to create the first bit of true upland oak woodland.
We peered into some of the tubes and identified a few oaks, some birch, an ash and some we weren't certain about . . . which might have been hazel.
Sitting in the clearing enjoying the early afternoon sun was a remarkably relaxed hare. It just sat there while I took four photos - then I turned to tell Tim about it and by the time I looked back it was half way up the hillside.
I have been contemplating the importance of time in a garden. It takes a long time for one small Japanese anemone plant to spread to a clump this size but it could be faked by buying multiple plants . . .
. . . but you couldn't fake the age our ancient hollies. They looked like mature trees in a photo of the glen which could have been taken about a hundred years ago. This one has a more personal history for me. The Schipperkes spent many happy hours sitting amongst these exposed roots guarding our garden from imagined monsters in the plantation - and hoping to get a chance of shouting at the riding school dogs.
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