Let me count the ways: 60 plants in flower12 grasses in flower, or seed heads11 plants with colourful berries/hips18 plants with striking autumn colour And that’s not counting the ones with the odd single flower still just about hanging on, like the Lychnis coronaria, or evergreens and conifers, or plants which haven’t started to turn […]
I didn’t want one. I thought it would be too big, too delicate to carry around in the garden, and I was sure email and web on it would be unusable, just like Windows CE. I was wrong and I repent. I love its slidy screen, the pop up touch keyboard, the built in satnav, […]
What a month of contradictions October is. My breath drifted ahead of me on my morning stroll to let the chickens out and I left a trail of smudged footprints in the heavy dew on the lawn. Yet by mid afternoon the sun was strong enough to have me stripped to a t-shirt, sweating over […]
It’s hard to know where to start when I’ve not updated the blog for three weeks. On Sunday we closed the garden and nursery for the winter – always a moment of mixed emotions. The place softens at the edges when we aren’t open as we don’t trouble with appearances so much, and a stillness […]
Our suspicion that four of our six May chicks are cockerels was put beyond doubt this morning. The usual manic pecking around for corn and morning wing stretch was accompanied by a four way show down as the four largest birds squared up against one another in every combination for prime position on the compost […]
Wow. Streuth. Cor. Ooo er missus. (Best stop there, my parents read this blog …) I planted two blocks of sweetcorn (Northern Extra Sweet F1). The badgers got all the ones in the veg plot, but never found the block near the house. We picked the first ones tonight, boiled them for a few minutes […]
Wuthering westerlies have sent us scurrying from shed to shed this week, diving out of the heavy showers and whipping wind. The trees are taking a battering too, perfectly illustrating Emily Bronte’s description as the wind bends them in unison to the east. We’ve let the chickens out into the garden – they’re gorging on […]
On deadheading and feeding baskets: And great perennials for wildlife: If you’re an experienced gardener you’ll probably find these rather basic. The aim is to add a spot of gardening into a wider ‘magazine’ style programme and deliver clear and straightforward advice in a 4 minute spot.
Joy, tears and frustration, just as it should be. Well done ITV. An adaptation is always an adaptation, but I was captured. Joy and tears watching Wuthering Heights unfold beautifully on TV, for once. Frustration because I forgot to record the second part on Monday night. OK. I know I can watch it online but […]