Goodbye 2020

Sunset 31 December 2020

Goodbye 2020, the year nobody has loved.  As chance would have it, the last day of the year seems to have been trying to make up for the previous 364 days – a lovely winter’s day, bright, sunny, calm and cold, with snow lying (patchily) on the ground.  We made the most of it by going for a walk.

Out for a walk

On Monday last we awoke to find a couple of inches of snow over everything; at least it was an improvement on a couple of nights previously, when Storm Bella swept through, with torrential rain and gales.  The snow continued intermittently and mostly lightly that Monday and part of Tuesday, and it stayed cold; there was a slight thaw on Wednesday, clearing snow at least from places where the sun managed to reach, but the local roads remained too icy for us to feel like venturing out.  Today, despite the sun, it has been too cold to improve the situation.  So all that food in the fridge has proved useful after all; no shopping until after New Year!

The garden, Monday morning

Thinking back over the year’s weather, the main events in my memory are a stormy February, a warm, dry and sunny spring followed by a miserable June and most of July, another hot spell in early August, and nothing very pleasant after that, including the wettest October on record. My usual failure to water the potted plants thoroughly enough during the dry spells caused a few losses, and is the likely reason for quite a few other plants not performing well. Those plants that had their feet in the soil did rather better, and the fruit trees obviously enjoyed the weather, as we had a bumper crop of apples, plums and raspberries – and much the best pear crop we’ve ever had (six juicy pears).

It was also the year when potting compost was unavailable for months, the result of gardeners panic-buying ahead of lockdown and then suppliers being closed; and apparently seed merchants were so inundated with online requests that deliveries of seed orders were taking ages to arrive (although I had all my seeds bought by late 2019 so didn’t have that problem).  On the plus side, thousands of people took up gardening for the first time, having nothing much better to do, and that can only be a good thing.  Let’s hope they continue in 2021!

And now we're back into lockdown.  Well, there's plenty to do in the garden - weather permitting.

Goodbye 2020 – it’s been a rollercoaster, and on the whole one best forgotten.  Let’s enjoy 2021.

Have yourself a mossy little Christmas!

Even a quiet Covid Christmas inevitably leads to a lot of advance shopping and preparation.  Why, when the shops are open again on Sunday?  I suppose we just follow what we’ve always done.  As a result, there’s so much to do and so little time to get it done.  Hugh Johnson appropriately called it the Season of the Great Too Much, and even with only two of us in the house it’s not so much No Room at the Inn as No Room in the Fridge.  Until Christmas Eve it was also No Room yet Decorated with Greenery, because of other things needing to be done, and because it had been too wet in the preceding days to bring in dry(ish) material to deck the halls with. 

We’ve never got into the habit of having a Christmas tree; instead I decorate the banisters and at least one mantlepiece with greenery, of which there’s plenty in the garden.  This year, having instituted a local online competition for various Christmassy things (best-dressed Christmas tree, homemade door wreath, table decoration etc), I thought I ought to show willing and create my own Christmas wreath. 

Mossing the wreath

It’s a complete DIY wreath.  The only non-natural element is an old wire coathanger which I’ve used to form the initial ring (and to provide a hanging hook).  First step was to bend it into a rough circle (more of a diamond really, but that doesn’t matter too much).  Then I used several long, thin, whippy stems of Buddleja alternifolia (which needs cutting back anyway) to build up the wreath, twisting them around the wire; a few of the thicker ends stuck out, but I reckoned (rightly) that I could work them in during the subsequent stages.  This produced a rather thin-looking wreath – I could have added more buddleja but at that point it started to rain again and I retreated indoors – but next I added the moss, which built it up considerably. 

The moss was easy to come by; there’s more than enough in the lawn to moss up thousands of wreaths.  Ten minutes with the wire rake pulled up a big bagful, of which in fact I only needed half; it made scarcely any inroads into clearing that patch of lawn, but it was enough to please the local robin.  Then I spent a damp and drizzly half-hour in the greenhouse binding it onto the wreath with green garden twine, creating something that looked quite professional except for the slightly wonky shape!

All mossed up

As a base material, I used bits of leylandii from the long hedge.  Just as well that I didn't complete trimming the hedge in the autumn!  It made an effective covering, but I was surprised how tricky it was to get the ends to penetrate the moss.  In my impatience I probably used too-long pieces of leylandii, resulting in them sticking out rather than forming the smooth base that I was aiming for, but it looked not too bad.   I intended to use yew on top to create a slightly more elegant finish, but, having added a few yew twigs, I realised that its habit of growth is rather splayed and spiky and it creates too jagged a profile, and anyway it could hardly be seen against the leylandii, so I didn't bother adding more.  You have to look closely to see the yew at all!

Leylandii (and spot the yew if you can ....)

This dark base then needed some decoration.  Last week we saw a wonderful wreath on a door in Cirencester, decorated largely with brussels sprouts (some would say that it’s the best use for sprouts), looking really good.  I do have sprouts in the garden, but they’re tiny – not much use either for eating or for decorating wreaths.  So, for a highlight, I cut a few sprigs of the variegated euonymus that was a present back in the summer, and which has settled in extremely well, to the extent of now needing some trimming to shape, so it was two jobs in one.  It looks not unlike variegated holly, which is quite appropriate for a Christmas wreath.  

With euonymus....

Then some orange seed-pods of Iris foetidissima for additional decoration.

... and iris seed-pods

The end result looks a little like it’s having a bad hair day, but it does the job!  It’s now hanging on the front gate, wishing passers-by a happy Christmas.

A cold and frosty morning

The other morning we had the first proper frost of the winter, which froze the water in the bird-bath and blackened the dahlia foliage.  At last.  The dahlias stopped flowering a few weeks ago, but you’re supposed to wait until the foliage dies back before lifting them for winter storage, and they had been stubbornly staying green(-ish) despite a couple of light frosts and a thin covering of snow last weekend (it melted after a few hours in the sun).  I’m now digging them up gradually, though the ones I really want to get lifted are those in pots; I need the pots for the spring tulips! 

I’m wondering whether I should put more of the dahlias in the ground next year rather than having them take up space in the pots.  If we really are going to get milder winters, they will die back later and later, and the tulips won’t have a chance.  On the other hand, they’re invaluable for filling the space in the two really big pots, which need something of substance to make an impact; a smattering of bedding plants just wouldn’t do the job.  Maybe next year I’ll put some in the big pots and plant all the others in the borders, or in one of the veg beds for cutting; the ones in the medium-sized pots didn't flower well this year in any case.

(I also wonder what would happen if I lifted them before they turned black?  Maybe I should do an experiment next year and see; I have plenty of tubers, especially of ‘Bishop of Auckland’, so I could spare a couple, and if they didn’t survive I would have enough of the others.)

Blackened dahlia foliage isn’t very photogenic, so instead here is a picture of my beloved ‘Bishops’ Children’ in full flower (they are now drying off in the greenhouse).  I still have some of the seed, and may sow a few more in the spring; I usually lose a couple of tubers in storage and it would keep the numbers up.

'Bishop's Children' dahlias in their heyday

I’m toying with the idea of moving the pot of gazanias into the greenhouse to overwinter.  They didn’t all flower, but they’ve made strong plants and they have lovely bright sunny yellow flowers.  On the other hand, I still have seed of those too, so I could just grow more in the spring.

Usually I try to overwinter all my half-hardies in the greenhouse, but they take up a lot of space, and as some of the plants are no longer in their first flush of youth I’m not sure it’s worthwhile.   This summer and autumn I took cuttings of the osteospermums and all the penstemons – I read somewhere that penstemons lose vigour after a couple of years and are best replaced – and may well discard most of the parent plants.  The little baby plants will be much easier to overwinter; certainly they will take up less room.  The penstemons might be a good replacement for the dahlias in some of the medium-sized pots in the spring; they could be more easily taken out when it’s time for the tulip planting.  Just a thought.

National Tree Week

It's National Tree Week, not that I expect most people to notice.  We have four large (over 10m) trees in or on the boundary of our garden, and several medium and small ones, and they provide much of the visual interest and wildlife habitat about the place.  The four biggies - three ash trees and one holly - are all mature and may be reaching the end of their lives, especially the ashes.

The holly tree was mature when we moved here nearly 30 years ago and, although it has some dead branches in it, I'm hoping that it is aging more slowly than the ashes.  It still berries well, not that it has any left this year; we cut several berried stems for Christmas decorations one day, and by afternoon of the next day there were no berries left on the tree.  The redwings and blackbirds which had been gradually stripping the berries were encouraged by a couple of frosty nights to take what was left.

The veg plot ash tree, pruned

I've written before about the big ash at the bottom of the garden (actually just over the fence in the field beyond), which is clearly dying either of ash dieback or old age.  It managed to put out more leaves than we were expecting this year, but it's still on the way out.  The other two ashes - one next to the drive and one, in the neighbours' garden but leaning across over ours, increasingly shading the veg plot - aren't so obviously suffering, but Michael the local tree man advises that they too have the dreaded dieback.  We (and the neighbours) got him to remove some of the lower branches on those two, to reduce the overhang on the drive and veg beds, resulting in a lot more light coming in, especially now that the leaves have fallen.  I hope that next year's veggies will benefit as a result!  However we have heeded Michael's warnings, and have told him to come back in the spring and take out 'our' ash alongside the drive, before it becomes too dangerous.  It would cause a lot of damage if it fell, regardless of where it landed; it would hit either our house or garage, or the neighbours' house or garage, or the overhead electricity wires.  It's sad - but it would open up other opportunities for planting.  That's the natural cycle of things in any garden.

The most prominent of the other trees at the moment is the apple tree, which still has a lot of big apples on it in addition to the windfalls beneath; it's a magnet for the fieldfares, starlings and blackbirds, and I've seen smaller birds, even bluetits, feeding on the apples as well.  We have plenty of apples in store for the coming months for ourselves, and to share with the birds during the cold months.

Speaking of cold, the first snow of the winter is forecast for the end of this week; probably not very much, but after a largely dark and murky November it would be a welcome change.

The winter crew

I know I’ve said this before: winter may not be the most interesting time of year in the garden as far as plants are concerned, but it is the best time for birds.  Maybe it only seems that way because the hustle and bustle of spring and summer activity is followed by a much quieter autumn when birds are moulting and mostly keep themselves to themselves, and then the appearance of the winter crew seems much livelier by comparison; but we do get a wider range of birds in the colder months.

The winter migrants, redwings and fieldfares, were here in October, even though the weather on the Continent (and indeed in the UK) has been mostly mild so far.  October here was very wet, with gales late in the month and into November, and this month has been largely damp and chilly but with only a couple of very light frosts.  Some of our other winter birds may well be incomers, either from the Continent or quite possibly from elsewhere in the UK, though I’m not sure why British birds would choose to migrate to a windy site 260m (about 850ft) above sea level – they must be able to find somewhere more clement, surely? – certainly we see more blackbirds, for example, in winter than in summer, and I suspect that some of them have come from elsewhere.  One influx this year has been collared doves; there were hardly any in the garden over the summer, whereas at the moment there is a huge flock of them around, and at one point we had over 20 sitting in the plum tree alone.

Collared doves in the plum tree

As usual we have at least two, and probably three if not more, robins; lots of sparrows and starlings; several dunnocks; and good numbers of blue and great tits as well as a coal tit.  The goldfinches, which were frequent visitors over the summer, are still around, as is at least one nuthatch.  Woodpeckers (great spots) are still coming to the peanut feeder, and to the fatballs when they feel brave enough, although they are nervous of us.  There are a great many woodpigeons in the fields around, and some (including our lame friend Lefty) come to the garden from time to time, although we haven’t had the large numbers that we’ve seen sometimes in the past.  And there is quite often a pheasant or two hanging around; shooting has been suspended at the moment because of the lockdown, so they are safe for the time being.

More noteworthy visitors have included a pied wagtail which called by a few times; they’re not at all uncommon but they rarely come into the garden except in very cold weather.  One day he was accompanied by the rarer grey wagtail, which I’ve only seen in this garden once before; they are birds of fast-flowing streams, and there is no stream of any description (and certainly not a fast-flowing one) anywhere near here.  It was raining at the time, but not enough to attract a water bird!  I’ve also seen the first bullfinch visitor of the winter, a handsome male checking out the winter honeysuckle, which is already in flower (they like to eat the buds).

Admittedly our garden holds a considerable attraction for birds at this time of year.  While I don't keep the feeders full all of the time, there is usually some food put out for them, and the cooking apple tree still has plenty of big apples, both on the tree and windfalls underneath, which the larger birds enjoy.  It has been a very good apple year.  (I haven't seen a green woodpecker on them this autumn, though.)  There are also still quite a few insects on the wing, and seedheads on the plants; and the ivy is starting to produce berries.  The redwings have been working their way down the holly tree, with only the lower branches still showing berries; we cut some today for Christmas decorations, and have put them in a bucket of water in the summerhouse.

Four-legged life is presumably also around, but less conspicuously.  We had a little harvest mouse come to the patio a few times.  I will need to plug the gaps around the greenhouse glass to keep the place mouse-proof; apparently mice can get through a gap only 6mm (a quarter inch) wide.

Also part of the winter crew, although not actually in the garden, is the little flock of sheep in the field beyond our bottom fence.  Usually this field has been home to horses in the winter, but it has changed hands this year and the new owners are renting it out for the moment.  The sheep are doing a good job of keeping the vegetation down under the big ash tree, which should improve the view a little (fewer nettles in the picture, I hope); the other day a couple of them were eating the ivy from the bottom of the ash tree trunk, precariously standing on their back legs to reach as high as they could.  They’re properly woolly sheep, very appropriate for the winter!

The woolly sheep (in the summer)

My lockdown treat

November already (ooh, rather a long time since my last post!), and we’re back in lockdown.  During the spring lockdown, like many people I got myself a treat.  Nothing frivolous like a new dress or lipstick.

It’s a compost bin 😊.

 40C on the lid thermometer

Not just any old compost bin, but a Hotbin; basically a big polystyrene box with a lid at the top for stuff to go in, a hatch at the bottom for stuff to come out and a drain for removing excess liquid.  It also has a thermometer in the lid, to give an idea of the temperature reached by the contents, for the point of the Hotbin is that it is so well insulated that it allows the waste inside to reach temperatures high enough (40-60C, 104-140F) for it to compost much more quickly than a conventional compost bin.  The heat is generated by naturally-occurring bacteria, and allows you to compost material including weed seeds and, within reason, food waste.  The lid thermometer usually registers a slightly lower temperature than the waste actually reaches; to get an accurate reading you have to insert a separate thermometer, which comes with the Bin, directly into the composting waste.

 waste registering 60C

Over the past few months I’ve been getting to know my Hotbin and its needs.  It needs a certain mix of soft kitchen and garden waste, shredded paper (to absorb excess liquid) and woodchip or similar to keep the mix open and prevent it from turning into a messy lump.  It took me a little time to get it up to temperature and keep it there; like some people I know it likes regular feeding (every couple of days or so), and not too much at once.  I’m coming to realise that the paper has to be shredded small for it to mix properly through the softer contents, otherwise it sticks together and doesn’t break down well, so I’ve reestablished my relationship with our little paper shredder instead of just tearing paper up by hand; soft paper like bits of kitchen roll are reserved for the old, conventional, compost bins.  When you get the mix right, the contents of the Bin get really steamy in a most satisfying way.

The Hotbin doesn’t care for newspaper apparently; it doesn’t break down properly in the bin.  This makes sense to me, as I know only too well that mulching my veg beds with newspapers covered with compost can result in the paper drying out and failing to be absorbed into the soil; some of my beds have ended up covered with bits of newsprint, like some sort of rubbish tip.  It’s surprising how long a sheet of newspaper can last out in the garden.

The idea is that the Bin should generate compost good enough for mulching in 30 days, and proper compost in 90.  I take it that this assumes that good temperatures have been maintained, and so I waited for 3 months before taking any compost out, given that temperatures fluctuated a lot until I got the hang of things; in any case the instructions warn that the first batch may not be all that great.  I got two sackfuls of compost from it, and indeed the quality has left something to be desired (though not bad for only 3 months composting): partly the result of not mixing the paper well enough and partly because the mix was probably too wet.  You’re supposed to be able to tap off about an espresso cupful of liquid every week or so, but I’ve been getting a good mugful more frequently than that, and it has leaked out of the overflow vent at times.  I’ve now started to be more careful about wet material, and am ensuring that plenty of paper goes in, which all seems to be working.

Hatch open, ready for the first batch to be taken out ...

 

... emptying in progress

All seems to go well until you stop feeding the Bin.  Just before lockdown we managed a 10-day trip away (one of the reasons for the hiatus in blog posts), and on our return the thermometer was registering a measly 10C (50F).  I’ve been feeding the Bin again and the temperature is slowly rising; if all else fails, the Bin comes with its own hot-water bottle to heat it up!

The conventional compost bins are still in use, as is the council food waste bin.  The latter is only for things that are (probably) beyond the Hotbin’s capabilities (it's not too good with egg shells and avocado skins - neither are other compost bins, to be honest - and it won't digest an avocado stone, I've tried), while the former is still good for waste that isn’t easy to cut up small (most recently, disintegrating and very slimy rhubarb leaves) and for when there isn’t room in the Hotbin – this garden can generate quite a volume of waste and the Bin fills up quite quickly.

A lady came to give us a quote for some decorating work.  She was barely out of her car when she saw the Bin.  “Oh, a Hotbin” she said.  “I can’t get mine hot enough, how do you do it?  And I get too much liquid out of the bottom ….”  We did eventually get around to discussing the decorating; she’s coming to do it in the spring, by which time both of us will have more experience of our bins to discuss!

Of mice and men

“The best-laid schemes o’ mice an’ men / Gang aft agley” (often go awry), mused the farmer-poet Robert Burns after accidentally destroying a mouse’s nest while working in his fields.  One of my schemes this summer has been to save some of my own seed for sowing next (or later this) year; I’ve done a little of this in past years, but this summer I have deliberately left some of my plants to develop their seed-pods with this in mind.  I allowed my ‘Aquadulce Claudia’ broad beans to dry on the stems and left them in the greenhouse to dry off, along with a few other seeds.

Then, a week or ten days ago, I noticed that they had gone.  The well-laid scheme had definitely gone awry.  The broad beans had disappeared, some of my sweet pea pods were also missing, and the coriander seeds had been broken open.  A couple of garlic heads which had detached from their stems (the rest of the garlic is hanging from the greenhouse roof by the dry stems) and which had been left on a shelf to dry off had also been disturbed, one having gone completely and the other lying on the floor.  And two or three tomatoes on a stem which was propped up on the staging had been nibbled.  I also realised that some of the spring bulbs that had been stored in the greenhouse had been eaten; fortunately they weren’t in great shape anyway.

Plundered bulbs

There wasn’t much doubt about the identity of the culprit; I found mouse droppings on the staging as well.  We haven’t seen any mice for a few months; a vole has been visiting the patio occasionally, but voles are not adventurous and certainly don’t go clambering around greenhouse staging.  No, this was definitely a mouse.

Nothing to be done about the beans; I’ll need to buy seed for this autumn.  Most of the sweet pea pods are still on the plants, and I found more coriander that had set nice ripe seed.  These and other seeds are now drying off indoors, and other edibles in the greenhouse have been put out of the mouse’s reach (it doesn’t seem to have a taste for shallots, fortunately).  Burns took a philosophical attitude to his mouse stealing his corn, acknowledging that even a mouse had to eat and being prepared to share a little; I’m also generally lenient about allowing wildlife to do their thing, but I do draw the line at them colonising my greenhouse.  Once the tomatoes have finished fruiting (excellent crop this year, now slowing down significantly) I’ll give the greenhouse a much-needed clear-out and a good wash down with Jeyes Fluid, of which I’ve found a large stash during a garage purge; the smell should put any rodent off.  At the moment the tomatoes still have a few fruits on them, though two of the plants have finished and been cut down; the tangle of stems is now looking less dense.  The aubergines are harvested and either eaten or frozen – ‘Bonica’ ok, ‘Slim Jim’ interesting to look at but a bit tough, though maybe I left them too long on the plant – and the stems cut down, just awaiting a suitable moment for me to clear them out of the pots.  The two sweet pepper plants, having produced several small red peppers, have got second wind and flowered again, with another crop of fruits coming along, though I doubt if they will ripen beyond the green stage.  Other plants such as the hedychiums can be taken out for a day or two to allow cleaning to take place, and then put back in.

The greenhouse badly needs a clear-out in any case.  It does tend to accumulate stuff: pots and seed trays, obviously, but also lengths of fleece and polythene for mulching, bubble-wrap for insulation in winter, old compost sacks (very useful around the garden), cardboard for laying on ground to clear weeds, and newspapers, which are also useful to supplement the cardboard but also to cover the staging when I’m working so that any debris can be easily gathered up and thrown away.  Much of the cardboard and newspaper has just been used on the path alongside the long leylandii hedge; this then gets covered with the clippings that fall from trimming the hedge (a September job), thus controlling the weeds and encroaching plant growth on the path.  Needing more newspaper to complete this job, I lifted the last of the papers stored on the greenhouse shelving, and, in a shallow cardboard tray underneath, there was a little pile of shredded newspaper, and – the mouse.

Not quite as traditional as Burns’s mouse’s nest, but very snug all the same; dry and hidden, with a supply of food to hand.  Unlike Burns’s ‘tim’rous beastie’ it didn’t run away immediately, but considered its options for a moment and then scurried behind the seed-trays (but leaving its tail sticking out!); it may still be in there for all I know, but I’m afraid I threw its shredded paper away.  Not very hygienic in a greenhouse used for edibles.  It’s barely autumn yet, so the mouse has plenty of time to find and furnish a new home before the cold sets in, and the garden offers plenty of good places for it to shelter in – though I will need to take steps to stop it from returning to the greenhouse!

More welcome wildlife visitors in the past couple of weeks have been a pair of little warblers.  In the past I’ve identified these as willow warblers, but I’m coming to think that they may be chiffchaffs, which are visually almost identical (and commoner).  I heard a song one day which I think was a chiffchaff’s.  There are at least two of them, coming quite regularly to the patio to bathe, catch insects and generally hang out on the fringes of the groups of sparrows.  They’re lovely little birds; in the past we’ve had sporadic sightings but never regular visits like this.  I hope they hang around for winter.

A ray of sunshine

A large seedling has sprung up underneath the birds' fatball container.  Initially I didn't pay it much attention (it's a weedy spot, and another weed in there wasn't going to make much difference); there is a sweet rocket plant nearby, and I took it to be just another seedling from that, as the leaves are similar.  The other day it occurred to me that sweet rocket leaves are mostly in a basal rosette, whereas on the seedling they are up the stem; and a closer look showed that at the top of that stem is a single, fat flower bud.  It's a sunflower, and a better sunflower than any that I've ever grown deliberately, despite being in a rather shady spot.  It must be the offspring of a seed that had dropped out of a fatball and wasn't picked up by the birds - remiss of them, as sunflower seeds are usually their favourite! 

An unexpected sunflower

It will be a few days yet before the sunflower flowers, but in the meantime a ray of sunshine is coming from one of the gazanias that I grew from seed; only one of these has flowered so far, but it's a bright, sunny yellow, providing a cheery note when the blooms open.

A sunny gazania

I've been bringing some cheer indoors with a vaseful of 'Bishop's Children' dahlias, whose bright and slightly clashing tones and open faces have been providing smiling colour outside and in.  Being single flowers they're attractive to bees, and when I picked this bunch I had to encourage a couple of honeybees to go elsewhere before I could take them inside for arranging.

Dahlia 'Bishop's Children'

In fact I'm becoming more and more fond of the Children; they're making a better display than any of my other dahlias (except perhaps 'Cafe au Lait', whose flowers are so large that they always make a statement).  It may just be that they were planted out earlier than the rest; we'll see how the others do in a couple of weeks!

As far as the real rays of sunshine are concerned, we've had a few more in the last week or so, and the forecast for the next couple of days is for warm and sunny weather.  After that, they say that the tail-end of the Atlantic hurricanes might start kicking in, and that might be the end of the summer weather ....

A triffid

August is continuing to be more autumn than summer.  We’ve now had two separate gales and some heavy rain and persistent showers; we’ve moved on from saying that it’s ‘good for the garden’, that stoically British approach to wet weather, and are wishing that it would stay dry for longer between the showers.   It's on the chilly side too, and the central heating has gone back on.  The rain is certainly encouraging plant growth, though plants are moving into that late-summer stage of flopping about untidily, partly because I haven’t staked them well enough.

One of the most rampant growers in the garden at the moment is the winter squash plant.  Only one of the seeds I sowed germinated, but the survivor seems to be trying to make up for the failed seeds by sending stems out in all directions.  I’ve never successfully grown a winter squash before and, although I knew it had the potential to be large, I hadn’t quite anticipated how much ground it would cover.  Comparing that particular bed when newly planted up with how it looks now, I can see that I was much too ambitious; besides the squash, I put in the three courgette and twelve radicchio plants and sowed three types of French bean (fortunately not all of these came up).  The two ‘Defender’ courgettes were supposed to be tied to the tall stakes and grown upwards, but one of them is growing away in the opposite direction and I haven’t managed to corral the other one into its intended position.  The radicchio have done quite well, but twelve is far too many – and they’re being buried under the squash leaves, so some of them have rotted away.  It remains to be seen whether I will actually get any squash to eat; there are flowers on the plant, but I'm not sure how many have set fruit.

The young plants newly planted - the squash is in front of the left-hand courgette

The bed as it is now - the squash romping away towards the camera

This particular bed was one of the ‘no-dig’ ones that was mulched last summer to get rid of the weeds, and this has been quite successful, with only a few stray strands of couch grass creeping in from the edges (these have been trowelled out), and there’s no doubting the soil fertility! 

One of the neighbouring beds (at the back in the photo) is the Hill, which hasn’t been the success I was hoping for.  The top soil layer is too thin – in both senses – and dry to grow much in, and the slope over the top has made it impracticable to pile good soil or compost on top.  It has been mostly empty this year.  There are obviously still gaps between the branches underneath, as holes occasionally appear and it looks as though some wildlife is living down there.  I’ve been walking over the top in the hope of compacting it, but the mid-layer of twigs, brushwood and old grass clippings is still holding up quite strongly and makes it strangely springy underfoot.  However treading it down seems to be working as the Hill is gradually subsiding and is now no more than a low mound, and I should be able to mulch it heavily this winter with little risk of the topping all sliding off. 

The dahlias have stood up well to the wind and rain, and the ‘Café au Lait’ ones in particular have come into their own in the past week.  With their pinkish-white colour they’re not an obvious pairing with the orangey-red ‘Bishop’s Children’, but together they’ve made a striking little vaseful for the table.

Dahlias - 'Cafe au Lait' and 'Bishop's Children'

August - isn't it?

It’s August.  The calendar says so, and certainly for the first couple of weeks we had fine, warm, dry summer weather, including some properly hot days; it’s not often that the temperature gets above 30C here.  Inevitably this was followed by thunderstorms, and although not cold it is now mostly wet, with some strong winds today and no lasting improvement in the forecast.

Blackberries in the hedgerow

Early in the month, though, even before the weather turned, it was starting to feel a little unseasonable.  The euonymus europaeus (spindle) leaves were starting to turn reddish, a reminder that autumn isn’t that far away; and in the hedgerow opposite the house, blackberries were already ripe.  Surely that’s a sign of September rather than August?  The first apples (‘Discovery’) were also very early, dropping from the cordon at the beginning of the month, which is some weeks earlier than usual.  Some of the flowering shrubs also seem a little confused; Viburnum ‘Dawn’ is already in bloom (although it does sometimes produce flowers in autumn, it’s really a winter-flowerer), and Mahonia ‘Winter Sun’ definitely doesn’t know what season it is.

Viburnum x bodnantense 'Dawn'

Mahonia 'Winter Sun', in August

Small tortoiseshells, basking in the sun

The wildlife does seem to know about the seasons.  Spiders are starting to proliferate indoors, always a sign of approaching autumn, and the August butterfly boom is underway; no painted ladies this year, but lots of small tortoiseshells on the buddleja and sunning themselves on the nearby woodpile, as well as red admirals and various whites, but sadly few peacocks - though a fritillary turned up yesterday.  Some interesting moths, too.  The birds have finished nesting, although the sparrows are still feeding what must surely be their last brood.  The patio robins and the blackbirds are moulting; we haven’t seen many juvenile blackbirds this year (sadly one succumbed to a window strike, and was buried under the new euonymus, of which more in a moment), and no young robins, but a young goldfinch came down with its parents one day.  At one point we had four young woodpigeons, all feeding together on the lawn, but they seem to have dispersed.

A rather pretty moth

Dahlia 'Bishop's Children' series

Dianthus 'Siberian Blues'

As so often in August, colour in the garden is mostly coming from the dahlias, particularly the ‘Bishop’s Children’ which were planted out before the others.  Among the other pops of colour is a little pot of seed-grown Dianthus 'Siberian Blues' which I planted up a couple of years ago; it isn't my idea of blue, but it's a small bright spot among the patio pots.  The sweet peas were blown off their supports by the wind that swept in ahead of the first thunderstorm, and as they were already starting to go over I’m leaving them to set seed, in the hope of saving some for next year.  As for the brachyglottis, whose demise I forecast in the last post, its fate is probably sealed.  Just after I posted last, a kind (socially-distanced) visitor brought an attractive variegated euonymus as a present.  There was a suitable spot for it alongside the brachyglottis, and like the brachyglottis it’s just the thing to provide a contrast with the surrounding green foliage; so in it went, and in due course I’ll remove the brachyglottis and let the euonymus take over its role.  It seems to have settled in happily, and with some statice providing a spot of temporary colour in front it looks rather good. 

Euonymus 'Bravo', with statice

The plum tree has started to shed its leaves, as it always does after fruiting (quite a good crop this year), and the wind has brought down much debris from the other trees too.  Some serious tree-pruning is being arranged with a local tree man!

Yellow

Like many gardeners, I find myself tending to concentrate on colour when thinking of plants.  I’m trying to focus more on form, and especially quality of foliage, which has the greater year-long impact in a garden, but I can’t ignore colour entirely, especially regarding strongly-coloured plants.  I don’t avoid any particular colour – I’m becoming more tolerant of vivid, and even clashing, ones – but I am still wary of putting yellow and pink together.  However there’s yellow, and there’s yellow – and when the garden was going through a short yellow phase a few weeks ago, I found myself musing as to why I found some yellows more difficult to live with than others.

Cosmos 'Xanthos'

Soft, pale yellows are no problem.  Cosmos ‘Xanthos’, which has become a favourite annual for my pots, sits quite happily with all sorts of other colours.  This year I have it in a few pots alongside dahlias, even the purplish ‘Ambition’ (though the white and purple osteospermum isn’t an altogether ideal companion; and I’m wondering if it was a step too far to include the orange-red tithonia in the mix.  I’ll find out when the tithonia flowers, which it will do shortly.  But that’s likely to be a clash between the dahlia and the tithonia, not with the yellow cosmos). ‘Xanthos’ is a gentle yellow that goes well with most combinations.

Phlomis with Knautia 'Red Cherries'

Earlier in the summer, the phlomis made a good show.  It’s also quite a pale yellow, though stronger than the cosmos; and although there are some red/pink colours nearby there’s no clash, possibly because the phlomis also has so much green about it that it tones down what is already a soft yellow.  There’s at least one seedling from the phlomis near the parent plant, and I think I’ll use it to establish another clump, as it's a good do-er of a plant and makes a fine statement in a border.

Antirrhinum 'Sonnet Mixed' -

 - and from another angle, with dark red penstemon behind

Some of my mixed antirrhinums are yellow, of a rather strong lemon hue.  I’m not sure where some of them came from; they may have self-seeded from last year’s ‘Bizarre Hybrids’ plants.  Others are part of this year’s ‘Sonnet Mixed’ seedlings, which I didn’t have very high hopes for but which are actually a welcome splash of colour in a pot on the patio.  If I’m being picky, I would say that their colour mix is a little too blandly cheerful; they might have benefitted from a stronger contrasting colour in there, and another year I might put them in a pot with the dark red penstemon (here in the pot behind) to tone things down a little.  I don’t have a problem with these yellows, even in combination with the pink antirrhinum in the same pot.  It’s the really bright golden yellows that can be a bit dominating.

Achillea 'Gold Plate' (with Erysimum 'Bowles' Mauve')

Even then, it’s not all of the golden yellows that I find difficult to live with.  I’m quite happy about the brightly-coloured Big Yellow Thing (aka bupthalmum), even though it flowers at the same time as the sugar-pink rose (R. alba ‘Koenigin von Daenemark’) behind; I’m not sure why that doesn’t offend my colour sense but the clash doesn’t last long and perhaps it’s because the eye tends to be distracted by the BYT’s huge green leaves.  BYT is also popular with butterflies and bees, which is a plus point.  Likewise, I like the Achillea ‘Gold Plate’ which dominates the bed outside the dining room window, although I must remember next year to give it the Chelsea Chop in May to reduce its height (and to stake it more firmly to stop it sprawling out over the lawn and exposing the bare base of the plant).  It also has good foliage, and it’s a long-lasting cut flower (it even dries for winter use).  To complement it, I’ve planted a pale yellow-flowered anthemis (I expect it is ‘E.C.Buxton’ though I got it unlabelled from a village plant sale) nearby, as the foliage is not dissimilar to the achillea’s.

Brachyglottis

No, the yellow plant that I still struggle with is the one that used to be called senecio and is now brachyglottis.  I grew it primarily as a foliage shrub, for its fine grey leaves; it’s the only plant I’ve ever grown from a stolen cutting, taken because I thought the foliage was particularly fine (it was part of a commercial landscaping, so I didn’t feel too bad about it).  The silver flower-buds look lovely, but the bright yellow flowers don’t go well, to my mind, with the grey foliage, and to make matters worse they die badly; cutting off the browned old flowerheads (which don’t go well with the foliage either) is a tedious job, especially as it’s now a big shrub.  It is on my list of ‘must do something about this’ plants – but there are so many of those, it’s a question of when I can get round to it!  I think complete removal might be on the cards.

One reason for keeping it, at least for the time being, is that it helps hold back the tide of comfrey which is sweeping across that part of the garden.  There’s not much that deters the comfrey, but old brachyglottis does seem to be doing the job – or perhaps it’s the thick ivy that has grown up inside the shrub.  I’ve noticed that even couch grass is reluctant to colonise areas where ivy grows; there must be something about root competition that keeps other plants at bay.

Euphorbia characias

Another ‘must do something’ plant at the moment is Euphorbia characias (which also has yellow, or yellow-green, flowers); there’s a large self-set clump at the side of the house which has finished flowering and the old flower heads need to be cut off before they set even more seed.  It’s a handsome plant, but there is only so much that I need in the garden.  Again, it’s a plant grown for its form rather than its colour.  I think the message from all this is that, ultimately, it’s the form and foliage that matters, rather than the colour.

Flight

After a fairly cool few weeks - the central heating went back on - a warm sunny day last week was the trigger for several ants' nests to fly.  It wasn't just here; apparently there were so many flying ants that day that they showed up on the weather radar.  Two separate nests on the patio swarmed that afternoon, as did some of the ants in the greenhouse; the blackbirds and sparrows were delighted, gathering them to feed to their youngsters.  They even ventured into the greenhouse to feed, though not all of them found their way out easily; the female blackbird and one of the sparrows got trapped between the glass and the dense tomato plant foliage, and some panic ensued before I could shoo them out of the door.  More ants have swarmed in there in the days since then, and the male blackbird in particular has become quite accustomed to popping in for a look.  Apart from that, there have been very few intrusions into the greenhouse this year; the only other known visitor was in the spring, when a goldfinch must have got in through an open roof vent (the door was closed) and couldn't find a way out until I opened up.  I haven't even seen a toad or frog in there this year either, though they could be hiding among the compost bags that the tomatoes are planted in.  We did have a tiny frog in the grass outside the greenhouse one day, and a very much larger toad lurking in the firewood behind the garage.

Tangled tomato plants

The tomatoes this year form quite a thick screen across that end of the greenhouse.  There are seven plants, of three varieties: 'Gardener's Delight' of course is an old favourite, though it has lost its AGM and I'm not sure it's as good as it once was, and 'Harzfeuer' I've grown successfully for a few years now, and quite like.  The third, 'Cocozelle', is also an AGM cherry tomato, and the fruits are lovely and sweet, but it makes huge growth, reaching the roof and sprawling over everything else!  The result is a total tangle, but they're fruiting well this year, and I'm not complaining, even if the visiting birds find them impenetrable.

The male blackbird, who is quite trusting of us, is still feeding at least one youngster, but he stopped singing about three weeks ago, as did the robins.  A song thrush still strikes up from time to time, but otherwise that phase of the year is past.  Visitors to the bird feeders and patio are almost entirely the regulars - sparrows, dunnocks, blackbirds, starlings - especially in the past few days, when some youngsters have dropped by - robins, though less frequently, and blue tits.  The occasional woodpecker, including youngsters, comes to the peanuts and sometimes to the fatballs.  And woodpigeons, of course; Lefty is gathering sticks again, so another nest must be in progress.  The male pheasant was around for a week or so, resting up quietly in the long grass behind the fruit bushes; he and I startled each other several times when I didn't see him and accidentally got too close.  He may have started moulting, as his tail was looking rather ragged.

Also in flight the other day was the red kite; the field behind us was mown, and he was obviously in search of an easy lunch, swooping quite low.  Another, smaller, raptor was checking out the bottom of the field, either a kestrel or possibly a female sparrowhawk - I couldn't tell at that distance.

Butterfly numbers have started to pick up, gently.  I've only seen a single peacock this year (a couple of days ago); but there are plenty of large and small whites, especially around my brassicas!  Yesterday I disturbed a lovely magpie moth which was hiding among the chives - black and white with an orange body - and what I think might have been a large yellow underwing, found sheltering in some rubbish that was being moved.  I'm not good at identifying moths, but many of them are beautiful, and I ought to get to know them better.

The edible garden

During the lockdown, I’ve been able to spend more time than usual working on the garden, especially given how good (mostly) the weather has been.  June, admittedly, has been more disappointing than May – some chilly nights (and days), wind, and some heavy rain (which has refilled the pond – so much for my getting to grips with the iris) – but there has still been plenty of gardening going on.  You might not think so, given the sorry state of most of the borders and the list of jobs still not done, but one area where I have been more successful has been in the veg plot.

Lettuce 'Merveille de quatre saisons'

'Fat Lazy Blonde' (top) and 'Delicato'

An even bigger 'Fat Lazy Blonde'!

The garlic and shallots have been lifted and laid on their bed to dry off (rain permitting); they’re small, presumably because of the dry spring, but should give enough to keep me going until next summer (I still have bulbs of both in store from last year, now going rather soft).  There is plenty of salad stuff, including some excellent lettuces – ‘Little Gem’, the dark red oak-leaf ‘Delicato’, the wonderful ‘Merveille de Quatre Saisons’ and the splendidly named ‘Fat Lazy Blonde’ (‘Grosse Blonde Paresseuse’, so-called because of its size, light colour and resistance to bolting); but also rocket, oriental mustard, land cress and leaf beet.  Various brassicas are coming along, especially now that I’ve put up netting and fleece to deter the pigeons from pecking at the leaves, and there are a few beetroot and some small turnips, whose leaves have also provided some stir-fry greens.  I’ve been growing the broccoli ‘Cima di Rapa’, which is also a stir-fry greens plant, though it seems prone to running to seed; perhaps it’s one of those plants that does better if sown later in the year.  I am inclined to sow things as soon as the dates on the packet allow, thinking that I need to get ahead since this garden is on the cold side, but some seeds are better left until summer or even early autumn, to prevent them from bolting.

Another reason for not sowing too early is that tender crops, if started early in spring, can be ready for planting out, or moving into the greenhouse, when the weather is still too cold for them.  Two of my courgette plants – ‘Defender’, a new variety for me – were real whoppers well before I could risk them outdoors.  They, plus one 'Cocozelle v. Tripolis' that I enjoyed last year, and one winter squash, are now out in one of the ‘no-dig’ mulched beds, but to be honest they haven’t put on much growth since going out there, and I could have left them until a little later; the first two baby courgettes are now reaching cutting size.  The tomatoes, too, were 18 inches (45cm) tall by the time their first flowers showed colour (the point at which they have to be potted on into larger pots, which means greenhouse-time for them – and the temperatures in there were still rather low at nights for them).  It doesn’t seem to have harmed them too much; all are growing vigorously, and the cherry tomato 'Cherrola' has already produced a few tasty little toms.  The aubergines seem to have managed the low temperatures all right; this year I’m growing trusty old ‘Bonica’ but also a small-fruited variety called ‘Slim Jim’, which has lovely dark leaves.  The advice on aubergines is not to allow more than 6 fruits to ripen on any one plant, which in the past has left me thinking ‘if only’ (I’ve never got more than one usable fruit on any plant, and small ones at that); this year I experimented by pinching out the tops when they were small, and lo and behold, this year I have multiple fruits coming on most of the plants, one on each shoot.  The two red pepper plants have several fruits coming on them; they were indoors until a few days ago, but they needed to be put in much bigger pots and that meant a move to the greenhouse, where it’s now warm enough for them.  The chillies are still indoors and will probably stay there; they should also go in bigger pots, but they’re doing fine as they are, and there are only so many chillies I can cope with!

The runner and French beans were sown in situ this year, and that seems to have worked well, though it will be a while before anything edible is ready from them.  The broad beans have been a mixed bag.  I usually sow the autumn-sowing variety ‘Aquadulce Claudia’ in October, and ‘Imperial Green Longpod’ in early spring; but last autumn I had few seeds of the former left and none of the latter, and thought I would try something different.  I noticed organic ‘Aquadulce’ seeds available, and bought those, only to discover that they were ‘Aquadulce’ but not ‘Claudia’ and were for late winter sowing; in fact they haven’t done particularly well, so I may just discard the remaining seeds and revert to good old ‘Claudia’.  My first sowing of the remaining ‘Claudia’ seeds, last autumn, wasn’t successful, but I managed to get the last of the seeds to germinate later on and am leaving the pods on those plants to save seed from them.  For spring sowing I bought a variety called ‘Luz di Otono’ which can also be sown in summer for autumn cropping; I was a little unsure given its rather Iberian name and our less-than-Iberian temperatures, but the spring-sown ones have done quite well and I’ll be interested to see what happens with the autumn crop.  When the beans are finished, their bed will become home to the leeks; I had to re-sow these as some interlopers, birds or beasts, disturbed the first seedbed, but fortunately I had seed left, and germinated that successfully in a length of guttering in the greenhouse. 

The wildlife also finds our garden a plentiful source of food.  The blackbirds have been busy in the gooseberry bushes (we’ve frozen some for ourselves, and the red gooseberry bush has been covered in fleece to protect it from the birds, as has the blackcurrant bush).  The pigeons have been at the brassicas and I’ve tried to protect some of them as best I can; they also took a lot of the plum buds, leaving us with a smaller crop than usual, and have been spotted trying to take raspberries.  I noticed the other day that some of the mint, in pots by the back door, was looking a little ragged; today I spotted the culprit, a rather cheeky sparrow, flying off when I came by.  We provide enough food for the sparrows and pigeons on the patio and in the feeders, so I don’t feel too bad about shooing them off the plants!  The food on the patio has also attracted some four-legged visitors, including a large rat which hasn’t been seen since I chased it off, the occasional vole and a rather sweet little wood mouse who has appeared a few times at dusk.  And the birdlife also attracts predators in search of food; yesterday a sparrowhawk was strolling nonchalantly on the lawn (empty-taloned, fortunately). 

The flowers in the garden also provide food, in the form of nectar for butterflies; last week during the warm weather (now turned cold and windy) there were three small tortoiseshells feasting on the erysimum and sweet Williams, a large white, a holly blue and a speckled wood.  And there are plenty of bees of various sorts enjoying the blossoms (and the weeds; they seem to like the little yellow flowers of the creeping potentilla that I’ve been trying to dig out of the lawn).  For us, the flowers are more a feast for the eyes than for the stomach; the sweet Williams have been lovely (seen here in full bloom), the roses and sweet peas are gorgeous as always, and the peony has provided wonderful cut flowers, here with the dark red antirrhinums, which conveniently turn a purplish-pink in the vase, complementing the peony splendidly and making a very long-lasting vaseful.

Sweet Williams in full bloom

A vase of old roses: (L-R) 'Felicia', 'Koenigin von Daenemark', 'Mme Hardy', Alba semiplena

A vase of sweet peas

Peony 'Sarah Bernhardt' with antirrhinums