Homemaking

Is it really so long since I posted last?  The weather has been mostly warm and sunny (apart from a brisk and chilly easterly wind for a few days) and has encouraged me to spend time working outside rather than blogging.  The last week or so has been cooler, especially out of the sun, and this week we've had some cold winds and low temperatures by day, with very chilly nights; the wind yesterday was positively icy.  This means that I have to find homes under cover for plants that are ready to go outdoors but need warmer conditions.  There are two rather large courgette plants, too large for the windowsill, currently living on the dining room floor (by the window); I daren't put them in the greenhouse, where nighttime temperatures have been down to 6C.  A third courgette and a winter squash plant, both much smaller, have a home on the windowsill, as are the pepper and chilli plants.  There probably wouldn't be room for them in the greenhouse anyway; I'm struggling to make homes for all the plants and seedlings that are in there already.  The aubergines are hogging the best spot (I don't suppose they're enjoying the cold nights either, but needs must), the tomatoes, already nearly a metre tall, are in place on the ground and the dahlias are under the staging by night and being taken outside during the day on milder days.  Remaining space is full of seed trays, at various stages of growing on/pricking out.  The brassicas and lettuce have been turfed out into the veg plot to look after themselves; I've run out of an under-cover home for them.

The other thing I'm running out of is potting compost.  Garden centres are reopening from today, but until now I've been eking out my last bag of peat-free and making use of whatever I can lay hands on.  I found an old bag containing used compost at the back of the greenhouse, and have pressed that into service with a few handfuls of 6X fertiliser; it looked in reasonable condition, with good structure and no obvious weed contamination.   I was also reduced to scavenging compost from currently unplanted pots, again with some 6X.  The aubergines got mostly new compost, but the tomatoes (seven of them for the greenhouse, plus an eighth which is destined for an outdoor pot) are homed in what is basically a second-hand mix with fertiliser.  In milder gardens, they would grow in garden soil, and I reckon that what they've got is no worse than that; we'll see!

Outside, the wildlife is busy homemaking and raising young.  The sparrows and starlings are in their usual homes under the roof and in the leylandii hedge, there are at least two pairs of blackbirds gathering food for their nestlings and a pair of mistle thrushes nesting somewhere nearby and coming to our garden for nesting material and food.  A song thrush has been singing lustily in the trees.  Goldfinches drop by for a quick drink, a pair of nuthatches have been about, at least one marsh tit has been at the seed container and of course there are robins everywhere.  One pair of robins seemed to have a nest in the ivy very low down at the foot of the big ash tree, judging by their to-and-froing, but activity stopped about ten days ago; we hope they've decided to move to a safer place.

It's not always clear, however, just who is nesting where.  Who is using the nestbox on the summerhouse wall?  We first saw bluetits checking it out, but then a pair of great tits seemed to be taking moss in.  The bluetits have still been showing interest in it, but it is becoming clear that it's the great tits that are in residence; they're taking food in.  Then there are the eight neat little holes in the grass alongside the path leading down the garden.  I've seen both bees and wasps going down into them; mostly bees, so it's possible that the odd wasp has just been checking the holes out, but it would be interesting to know just who is living in there.  They are presumably solitary bees as there has been no mass activity.  They're not causing a problem - they probably find it nice and dry under the flagstones - and it's nice to think that they find our garden a good place to live.

Whose home?

One bird who clearly isn't much interested in homemaking is the female pheasant.  She and her gentleman pheasant have been around the garden quite a lot and are fairly tolerant of our presence.  This evening they drank together at the pond and fed a little underneath the peanut feeder, but then she beetled off to the edge of the damson thicket at the bottom of the garden, sat down on the grass and spent a few minutes squawking there while her mate strutted around a bit.  Eventually she got up and they wandered off.  A quick inspection of the area showed that she had laid, and abandoned, an egg.  In the past I've found pheasants' eggs left lying around, and this confirms what I had long suspected - that pheasants take a rather casual attitude to the nesting business.

Woodpigeons do build nests, but not very substantial ones, just a loose pile of sticks.  Our elderly lame pigeon Lefty, whose mate was killed last year and whom we've seen this spring sporadically in the company of another pigeon, does indeed seem to be in a new relationship; he has been collecting twigs.  It certainly explains his increased belligerence towards any other pigeon who approaches his territory; age has not dimmed his feistiness.  The question is, where is his new home?  There's no sign of a nest in the holly tree, which has been his favourite place; presumably his new lady has ideas of her own as to where their home should be!