November birds

Fruits in November: apples still on the tree, attracting the birds

The writer Thomas Hood’s poetic verdict on this month was “No fruits, no flowers, no leaves, no birds – November!”.  Perhaps that was true of London in his day, but surely he was being a little hard.  Fruit may be limited to late apples, but plenty of them; and, if thinking botanically rather than culinarily, there are a good number of shrubs and trees that have fruit (berries) well into early winter.  Flowers admittedly can be in short supply at this time of year, especially in Hood’s lifetime (early 19^th century) before so many winter-flowering shrubs had been introduced from China and elsewhere, and leaves are mostly limited to evergreens and other wintergreen plants (though I suspect that Hood wasn’t a gardener and that his knowledge of plants wasn’t the best).  The lack of birds, though, seems surprising.  One assumes that London sparrows were just as plentiful as in other months; Hood was an invalid for much of his life and maybe didn’t get out much to notice the birdlife of the city.

Cotoneaster berries, popular with the birds

November is actually the month when the birds return to our garden after their moult, and certainly there’s been no shortage of birds here.  They’re generally shy from mid-September to mid-October or whenever the weather starts to turn colder; once they have moulted, and set about finding a territory for the winter, they reappear in search of food and shelter, and of course the migrants from the colder parts of Europe turn up too.  When we went on holiday there were relatively few visitors to our garden, mostly sparrows and woodpigeons, with the odd robin and dunnock, and a couple of blackbirds skulking around the cotoneasters in search of berries.  By the time we returned in early November the garden was alive with birdlife, and I’ve counted over 20 species since then.

In our absence, of course, the bird feeders were empty, so it wasn’t our seeds, peanuts and fatballs that brought them in (although I suppose it’s possible that some of our regulars were hanging around in the hope that we’d come back and put more out).  The garden has matured into quite a good habitat for birds, with plenty of shelter, untidy corners for foraging in, berries and seedheads to eat and a pond for bathing; most of it not put there primarily for the birds, but partly with them in mind, and they’re welcome to make use of it all.  

We seem to have a very healthy population of blue and great tits at the moment; they obviously bred very well this year, and there are always a few scouring the bark of the trees for insects, as well as hanging around the bird feeders.  (Sadly, one great tit was found dead outside the back door this morning; he has been buried under the big cotoneaster by the drive entrance.)  The coal tit and a long-tailed tit have also been about, as has a wren, and a goldcrest put in a brief appearance one day (I suspect that they’re around quite a lot, but being small and not distinctively coloured they’re easy to mistake for bluetits at a distance).  There are lots of sparrows and at least three dunnocks, in an uneasy relationship with one another (they’re not social with their own kind, though they hang out with sparrows), and of course at least two robins (another uneasy relationship).  We’ve had a male chaffinch, and there’s a substantial flock of goldfinches that appears from time to time; and the starlings have discovered that the fatball container is being replenished.  The blackbird population has increased, possibly because of winter migrants; a song thrush has come for a bath, and the early cold weather in Scandinavia has brought in the usual large numbers of fieldfares and redwings, the latter, with some help from the blackbirds, already stripping the holly tree of its berries.  Two greater spotted woodpeckers (male and female) have been visiting the peanut feeder, and the green woodpecker has been at the windfall apples, which are also attracting three magpies (until we chase them off).  Add to all of that the woodpigeons, collared doves (which have reappeared after an absence of a few months) and the pheasants, and we have quite a variety of avian visitors.

Other flying visitors have been about too: late one afternoon, as it was starting to get dark, there were three bats fly-catching outside the dining room window.  I had thought they would be hibernating by now, but it was a relatively mild day and they had obviously been tempted outside.  Normally we see bats when it’s already fairly dark, and all you can make out are the shapes, but there was enough light this time to see them quite clearly.

In his poem, Hood also described November as ‘No sun’, and while that’s not been totally true of this month, sunshine has certainly been at a premium.  It has been a grey, murky or downright wet few weeks.  In the past couple of days the weather has perked up, turning sunny and clear but colder, with frosts the last two nights, and it’s set to continue this way for a few days.  The greenhouse has been bubble-wrapped (re-using last year’s wrap), but I’m holding off switching on the heater; the temperature hasn’t dropped below 2.7C this autumn so far, which is just enough for overwintering the plants (houseplants having been moved indoors).  The colder weather is making it all the more important to keep the birds' needs in mind!

Dealing with the debris

Leaving the garden for any length of time is always a little nerve-racking.  Even in October and early November, when the weather is unlikely to be very extreme and there are few pressing jobs to be done in the garden, and even knowing that a kind neighbour is keeping an eye (and some watering) on things, there is always the concern that you might return to something unexpected.  While away on holiday we read online reports of heavy rain and the odd gale at home, and some chilly nights, so we weren’t surprised to return to rather a wet garden and cold-blackened dahlias, but there was nothing that was unusual for early November.  Piles of dead leaves on the drive and veg patch, and lying less thickly on the lawn (I would guess that the leaves from the big ash tree were blown away by the gale), were waiting to be dealt with.  The courgette plants were, as expected, only fit for the compost heap, and the summer bean plants were over (though I managed to salvage a few ‘Blauhilde’ pods for eating and some Borlotti pods for drying); the late-sown pea plants were still bright green but the pods were in poor condition.  All of these, plus the sweet peas, which were not completely dead but had collapsed into a heap, and the remains of the other dead (or nearly dead) annuals have been pulled up and added to the compost.

Gardening is often a regularly repeating cycle: 2019 sweet peas pulled up, more sweet peas sown for overwintering, to provide colour and scent in 2020.  I will put them in the same pots on the terrace, since they did so well there this year.

The late-sown veg seeds have not been a success; although some had germinated nicely, they have now disappeared (slugs, probably, although the pigeons and pheasants may have had a hand, or a beak, in it), with the exception of the parsley.  The various brassicas that I had planted out and covered with fine mesh netting have also gone, and again I suspect slugs; the netting would have kept birds off.  Ah well, an opportunity to clear those beds and mulch them heavily, in my new no-dig style.  Unexpectedly, however, the antirrhinums still have flowering stems to offer for cutting, and the little ‘Pink Sunday’ salvia, about which I had been so unkind, is standing up to the weather very well.  There were even a couple of Nerine bowdenii stems for a vase; they’re protected by a big, self-sown Euphorbia characias (which is casting far too much shade for them, but they don’t seem to mind too much).

Antirrhinums and Salvia 'Pink Sunday'

Mahonia 'Winter Sun'

With so many fallen leaves about and plants such as dahlias in need of being dug up/cut back, the garden has a sorry look about it at the moment.  However there are small patches of colour and other interest.  The pot of red dwarf chrysanthemums on the patio was in full flower on our return, and is only just going over now; the Mahonia ‘Winter Sun’ is doing what it says on the tin; and there are berries galore, mostly on the cotoneasters but also on the Viburnum tinus and the Euonymus europaeus (spindle).  And if you look closely, the leaves of Cyclamen coum are out, ready for the delicate flowers later in the winter.

Euonymus europaeus 'Red Sentinel'

Cyclamen coum

Winter feels like it has come early.  There was no autumnal warm spell this year; temperatures have been on the low side, with much chill and a few frosts, and one day we awoke to an unexpected light covering of snow.

There is plenty of wildlife about.  The squirrel has been visiting, and one late afternoon D spotted a big fox tucking into one of the windfall apples.  I wonder if he was responsible for the pile of pigeon feathers on the lawn?

When autumn leaves begin to fall

Autumn is here; the central heating went back on at the end of September when the chill and damp began to bite, and, despite occasional warmish sun, the temperatures are definitely on the way down.  When autumn leaves begin to fall, there are still things to do in the garden.

First, the leaves themselves: raking them up is only one part of what needs to be done.  The collected leaves go in the leaf-mould bins – a couple of rolls of fence netting that was left by the previous owners of the property – and, before that can happen, last year’s leaf-mould has to be taken out and used.  This was a process that made one of our robins very happy; evidently there was a lot of tasty micro-life in the bottom of the piles.  Some of the old stuff has been bagged up and will be used as mulch later this autumn, and the rest was spread on some of the veg beds in place of compost; leaf-mould lacks nutrients, but a top-dressing of 6X fertiliser should take care of that, and in my hungry soil any organic matter is useful.  Most of the leaves that have fallen so far are from the plum tree – it always drops its leaves first – but ash leaves are also starting to come down in the rather breezy weather that we’ve had recently.  The collected leaves have been mixed with some grass clippings to help keep them moist and to speed up decomposition; it’s always alarming how much room they take up, but the level drops quite quickly, making more space for the next lot.

 

While raking up leaves, I noticed some interesting little greenish-blue toadstools in the lawn.  I’ve tried to identify them, but most of the websites I’ve found seem to assume that the reader wants to kill toadstools in the lawn, or eat them (and I want to do neither).  Anyway, I didn’t find a description that fits these.

My mulched veg beds are still being disturbed by interlopers; a pheasant was caught in the act today, pecking at my spinach seedlings.  He was chased off.  Perhaps I should put the fleece covering back on.  Not that that would help my turnip seedlings, which have been munched by slugs.

It’s also time to get the bulbs, other than tulips, planted.  For once I’ve managed to plant my daffodil bulbs in pots before it gets too late.  The mixed miniature daffs (they were a job lot won in a raffle) have gone in the two big plastic tubs; these rather unlovely objects are relics of my very early gardening days, and although not very stylish they can be masked by smaller pots in front, and the little daffs cheer them up no end.  I’ve sown herb seed, dill and coriander, on top, and they’re now starting to come up; it’s late for them, but I might get a final crop before the weather gets too cold, and then they can be pulled out, leaving the way clear for the bulbs.  All my ‘Tete-a-tete’ bulbs seem to have disappeared, but I still have a lot of ‘Elka’, most of which have gone into two matching Whichford pots.

Another autumn job is clearing the window-boxes and planting them for some winter interest, and the remainder of my ‘Elka’ daffs have gone in there.  The big window-box hasn’t been very colourful this summer; the fuchsias and osteospermums in there didn’t deliver, though there were some lobelia flowers, and the little purple sedum provided additional interest.  For winter colour I’m mostly relying on foliage, with a mix of small golden euonymus plants, bronze sedge, a newly-acquired Heuchera ‘Cracked Ice’ (purple with a hint of silver shimmer), and two small Phormium ‘Tricolor’ (actually, maybe this combination is a bit too varied).  There are crocuses (angustifolia, I think) besides the ‘Elka’s for additional spring colour.  The phormiums are a bit of a risk.  Their proper name, I see from the RHS website, is Phormium cookianum subsp. hookeri ‘Tricolor’, and they’re in hardiness group H4 which is only borderline hardy here, but I’m hoping that shelter from the house will keep them from the worst of the cold, and I have other plants (all divisions of the original) if all else fails.  Today they were facing wind and occasional showers; the wind shouldn’t bother them, as like many New Zealand plants they’re very wind-tolerant.

Big window-box

The little window-troughs have had their mesembryanthemums removed – they had pretty much stopped flowering, although they’ve done well this summer – and some little violas put in their place.  These were self-seeders that had appeared between the paving slabs on the patio, so they’re a bit of a mixed bunch, but they seem to be mostly the progeny of last spring’s floriferous blue and yellow violas.  I hope they’ll provide some colour (and for free!).

It’s not quite time to pull up all the annuals.  I’m quite pleased with my antirrhinums, which are still in bloom.  They’re a plant that I’ve been a bit sniffy about in the past, possibly because I’d seen too many garish colour mixes, but having grown some better varieties I have to admit that they make good cut flowers; a vase of them, mostly ‘Bizarre Hybrids’, have been looking good for a week now.  The colour mixes are a little bizarre – I’m not too enthusiastic about the yellow and pink ones – but overall they have pleased me, and with some of the crimson and dark red/white ones (‘Night and Day’) they make a good show.  Outdoors, the dahlias are still (mostly) flowering - 'Sam Hopkins' produced one bloom and then stopped! - with the 'Bishop's Children' single dahlias looking fine and attracting bees and the last couple of butterflies (a red admiral and a comma).

Antirrhinums

Dahlias and yellow achillea

'Bishop's Children'

The birds are starting to return to the garden; a female blackbird has been coming to the patio, and a mistle thrush was in one of the ash trees earlier this week.