Skyhill bluebells

Laissez-faire Gardening?

Saturday 30th May 2015

I have been trying to think of a way to describe my style of gardening.  The most accurate description would probably just be “messy gardening” but that isn’t completely accurate because I do try to keep the grass mowed and to prevent it from spreading into the areas reserved for other plants.   Calling those areas flower beds might be an offence under the trades description act (whatever that is) because they just contain a jumble of plants . . . conventional garden flowers mixed with pretty weeds and anything else interesting that just happens to come up spontaneously.  It is a case of survival of the fittest - so I think I will call it laissez-faire gardening.  This is the “area reserved for plants other than grass” under the big beech tree.

Saturday

There has been curiouser and curiouser behaviour around the bird box.  Activity had all but ceased, yet last week a great tit was seen taking a beakful of moss into the box.  Then all activity ceased again for a few days.  This morning some prospective tenants, a pair of blue tits, were examining the box.  Almost immediately a great tit arrived and chased them away.  The great tit had something white in his beak but he didn’t take it into the box and he left the area as soon as he had dispatched the intruders.

We went for a short walk up the glen to the end of the tarred road.  We wanted to have a look at some building work that appeared to be going on up there.  We had seen equipment and materials being transported past our house and guessed that work had started on a decrepit old barn/garage which used to be on part of Far End’s garden.  When we moved to the glen, the barn was still in use as a garage although  the roof timbers were already sagging.  A few years ago the property changed hands and was subdivided.  The old house was completely altered and modernised and is now for sale but the barn was left to deteriorate.  

On the way up the road we passed two beehives in a field.  This explains why there have been so many more  honey bees on the flowers in our garden recently.  I felt like muttering about immigrant bees moving in and stealing all our bumblebees pollen - but it seemed a bit xenophobic.

It turned out that we were right.   Work has commenced on the barn.  The roof has been taken down and the walls have almost disappeared behind scaffolding and blue plastic mesh.

This is what it looked like in January.

Sunday

After shopping and feeding the herring gulls, I spent some time weeding the gravel on the turning circle.  I am taking out the pesky annual grass, which is almost impossible to eradicate, and the taller “weeds” (apart from a few Welsh poppies by the wall which I must remember to dead head so that they don’t spread seed everywhere).   But I am leaving the violets and some patches of Soleirolia soleirolii also known as baby's tears, angel's tears, mind-your-own-business, peace-in-the-home, pollyanna vine, polly prim, mother of thousands, and the Corsican curse!   A lot of names for a very small plant.

Monday

A milestone was passed.  Phase one of the path project (removing the strips of grass and stacking them at the top of the garden) was completed - at last..  It took me three months from the time I started but work stopped for weeks after I got a twingy pain in my back while I was cleaning leaves out of the ditch.  The next step is to go up to the top of the garden with the crowbar and retrieve some paving slabs which were laid outside the top gate during the Schipperke era.  Our dogs used to race up and down inside the fence shouting abuse at the riding school dogs which came down to bark at them when they were walking in the plantation.  During wet weather all the thundering dog paws churned up the mud and Tim laid some paving slabs in the muddiest places so that we could walk up to the forestry tracks without getting stuck in the mud. Now the days of stampeding packs of dogs are over and the paving slabs can be recycled for my new path.

The niger seed was going down so fast that I had to refill the feeder.    Then I looked out of the window and saw three siskins on the feeder so I went to fetch my camera.  When I returned there were four - a full house - one on each of the perches.

Tuesday

The  morning was devoted to home maintenance - buying spares and then fixing a broken toilet handle and replacing the starter for the strip light in the kitchen.  Then I mowed in the afternoon.  The grass wasn’t very long but rain was forecast for Wednesday afternoon, we have to drive to Douglas on Thursday for a medical appointment, and showers are predicted for Friday.  

Wednesday

In the morning I did a second session of beech hedge trimming down by the road before the wind strengthened and the rain started.  It is very slow because I prune the hedge instead of clipping it.

The first flowers are just starting to open on the wisteria.  They are about two weeks later than last year which isn’t surprising because it has been a cool spring.

Thursday

A cool, sunny morning for our drive to Douglas.  It is always a pleasure to drive around the Island in spring when there are new leaves on the trees and everything looks fresh and bright.  But we don’t have to leave home to enjoy the spring foliage because we are surrounded by trees in the glen and have a good view of the broadleaf trees which were planted below the conifers in Brookdale plantation on the far side of the glen.

Friday

It was very damp  outside in the early morning.  The sun was hiding behind the hill fog, which had settled on North Barrule after overnight showers, and there was no wind.  I took a couple of photos from the patio.  The wet front garden . . .

. . . and the flowers on our lilac.  

I sent a friend a photo of the proper lilac-coloured lilac in our neighbours’ garden and she wrote back asking about the scent.  I had always been disappointed in the scent of our lilac so I stole a sprig off our neighbours’ plant to check whether it was different.  It was far stronger.  Now I know why people rave about the scent of lilac. This is the sprig of "real" lilac.

After morning tea we walked up through the plantation behind the house.  I picked up my camera before we left and then wondered why I was bothering to take it.  We have done this walk hundreds of times before and I have photographed it from every angle.  But it pays to have a camera handy - just in case..  The path was wet but the birds were singing and there were bluebells under the deciduous trees near the streams . . .

.  . . but they paled into insignificance compared with the view from the top.  A wonderful combination of bluebells, golden gorse and bright green grass.  The wind had strengthened, the clouds were racing across the sky, and the light was changing every few minutes. I couldn't choose my favourite - so here is a selection . . .