Sunday 31 May 2015

Gardening on the South Downs..March/April 2015

Spring is stirring. The branches of the trees are still pretty much naked. The white rowan in the fore ground was planted for Isabelle who as a young girl danced ballet..it looked as though with its little white berries gleaming, it was holding up its arms in a delicate arabesque.



Fennel self seeds everywhere and will I know soon dwarf the rosemary. I'm thrilled to see the foxglove seeds I planted have turned into lovely plump babies this year. Foxgloves or Digitalis are definitely one of my very favourite plants...such a delight to find growing in woodland often with sensuously curling ferns nearby.


My funny birthday gift lady gnome is standing clutching her basket in amongst the onions and feverfew.

Rhubarb got itself off to a good start. Poor thing I don't actually do much for it..except give it a drink if it asks. The crumble it gave me a few weeks ago was sensational...and last years rhubarb and ginger jam still tastes wonderful.

I laid out an array of wedge shaped beds a few years ago to wrap around the lime trees in the middle of the garden...sadly the last few seasons I have had no time at all but this year decided to make a real effort early enough in the year for it to make a difference...and hooray my sister-in-law Margarita came to stay and amazingly gave me a hand. The kindly kept working while I dragged myself to the computer to work 'work'.

The grasses and wild flowers so short and contained in this image are now so tall it's getting hard to walk through them...The whispering aspen tree sends out suckers I suppose they are... that happily grow where they can.In the distance is a ginkgo.

Weeding between the beds has helped enormously...early days so the weeds have hardly started to grow.

Adding seeds beds in the form of containers...


The thistles and nettles and of course docks grow thick and greedy..I refuse to put down weed killer so these are on the list to pull up by hand.

Big bruisers..their bark is worse than their bite as they come up out of the ground really very easily.


As seeds are now in the ground the cross chooks are confined to their run..but it is hardly small or too boring for them. Lots of shade and areas to scratch and ferret in.

Cuttings from last years pruning of the beech tree hedge..dragged out to enable gradual burning in the log burner.


Potatoes are in and tucked up warm..with some of Michael's lovage to keep watch over them.

Chooks meanwhile keep an eye on me and petition every day to be let out...petitions denied!! Until after harvest.



Meantime the front garden starts to come to life...the path to the postbox.

Thursday 28 May 2015

Books for Chooks Educating Hens!!


Helen enjoys reading Grayson Perry...Close to earth she says...all that clay! Requests have been received to see the tapestries. I rather think she has her mind on a visit to his new Artists House in Essex...We'll see.


Sylvia on the other hand is a devotee of Jorge Luis Borges. The extraordinary Argentine writer born in 1899 and who died in 1986 She seems to enjoy the challenge of his poetry as well as the short stories where the genre magical realism was conceived. She doesn't understand how came to be omitted from the Nobel Prize in Literature. He surely should have been awarded the honour. Scrabble who is sitting listening to her views on this subject isn't so sure. 

Sylvia has been considering her own literary career. She has adjusted her diet recently so that instead of spending time sitting on eggs she can contemplate under the ash trees as she unravels plot lines.