Ashes to ashes

The three big ash trees round our boundary are all suffering from ash dieback.  While the one next to our driveway was the least affected, it was the only one that was actually ours, the others belonging to owners of neighbouring land.  If it fell, as it probably would have done at some point, it would have landed either on our house, our garage, the neighbours' house and garage, or the overhead electricity wires that run past our property.  None of those options would have been good.  

Last day of the tree

So we finally managed to engage Michael the local tree-man to cut it down; a sad decision, but a necessary one.  It involved a very large cherry-picker to deal with the higher branches (that's the red thing in the 'before' photo).  Suddenly the view from the kitchen window is a lot lighter, and currently dominated by a very large pile of firewood; that should see us through a winter or three.  And the smaller branches produced a load of woodchip, which I'm using to renew the paths in the veg plot.

Afterwards

The stump is still there - realistically it was just going to be too difficult to grind it out - and from a quick count of the rings I reckon the tree was about 150 years old.  You can see the dark patches where the dieback had taken hold, and some of the firewood has nasty-looking bits in where the wood was affected.  The stump will become some sort of feature until it rots away; once the area has been cleared of sawdust (I can find a use for that too), I'll need to clear it of weeds and give some thought to how to plant if up.  It will now be considerably sunnier than in the past, though the tree roots mean that only the tiniest seedlings, or seed, can go in there, which limits the options.

As for the other trees, we're making noises to the owners about removal; neither of them would hit the house (just) if/when they fall, but they would make a big mess of most of the garden.  Sorry, trees - and the wildlife that enjoys them - but the alternatives aren't good either.

The volunteers

As usual, I’ve sown more seeds than I can realistically handle.  Some are still in trays, waiting to be put into their patio pots; at least I’ve managed to keep most of them watered, although I’ve had to scrap some that got too leggy or sad-looking.  Next year I really must cut back.  Especially as some plants are showing me that they can take care of all the germinating and growing on by themselves.

Panicum seedling, flowerhead just opening

I have some panicum (grass with big feathery flowerheads) and antirrhinum seedlings still not planted out; but last year’s plants of both varieties have self-seeded, and are making better growth than my seedlings, so I needn’t have bothered.  The panicum was an F1 hybrid so its seedlings won’t have come true, but they look perfectly satisfactory to me.  Last year’s sweet William plants have also seeded, and I’ve planted some of those out at the far end of the veg plot for next year; this is useful as the rather old seed that I sowed in June didn’t germinate.

Violas under the sweet peas

The sweet pea pots were re-used from last year, with the new plants put in last year’s compost and a bit of fertiliser added to give them some feed; last year there were some violas in there, to provide some colour at the feet of the sweet peas, and their offspring are doing very well this year.  Violas and pansies are great self-seeders, and there are several coming up around the garden; like the panicums, they’re the products of F1 hybrids but still often fine plants.

Another, very pretty, self-seeded viola

Last year I let my parsley plants, under the ash tree at the side of the drive, seed themselves around.  Perversely they seem to have done most of their seeding into the gravel of the drive itself.  I’ve left them there (will pull them up before they seed in their turn), especially as I haven’t got round to sowing any this year (need to do that …) and these are the only usable parsley plants I currently have.

There are also some plants that seem to have germinated from seed that never came up last year but obviously survived the winter and germinated this year; I have a couple of dill plants that have appeared in places where I sowed seed last year.  Probably also in this category is a solitary bupleurum plant.  A couple of years ago I planted out a few bupleurums – they’re good flower-arranging filler plants – but didn’t take good care of them and they died; I can’t actually remember where I planted them, but this year a single bupleurum appeared in a row of lettuces.  Apparently they need cold weather for seed to germinate, so this seed might have been hanging around in the garden for a couple of years and only been started off by this year’s particularly cold spring.  I’m keeping the plant going in the hope of saving seed from it; and next time I will try to take better care of the resulting plants!

Bupleurum rotundifolium (with lettuce)

Winging it

During this last week or so we have been having summer – temperatures up to 30C (86F), even in our rather chilly garden, almost unbroken sunshine and the watering can in constant use.  It prompted the ants nesting in the greenhouse to take to the air one hot afternoon, to the delight of the birds: sparrows and blackbirds busily picking them up, and house martins and swifts swooping overhead for the higher-flying ones.  A couple of enterprising sparrows positioned themselves on the garage guttering directly above the greenhouse roof vents to catch those that flew out that way.  With the patio having been relaid, there are no longer any nests there for the birds to enjoy, but I’ve been putting out any others that I come across (there was a nest in one of the dahlia pots) to be dealt with by our avian visitors.

There have been a great many insects in the garden this year.  Our bees, sadly, buzzed off, we don’t know why; they had seemed happy enough and we left a lot of the lawn uncut so that they could feed on the clover, but our beekeeper neighbour confirmed that they had deserted their nestbox.  We’ve told him that we’d be happy to host another hive next year if he has one in need of a home.  However there have been plenty of bumble- and other bees, hoverflies and the like, and we’d like to think that leaving so much grass to grow long has helped.  (It’s now time to cut most of it down; there are ants’ nests appearing in the cowslip patch, and the blackbirds will be most appreciative if we expose them and let the lawn recover.)  I’ve also left the parsley to grow tall, partly for the flowers which look good in arrangements of cut flowers, partly for the seeds and partly to keep the pollinators happy; at a distance they just look like a froth of yellowy-green flowers but, closer to, you see that all sorts of insect life is in there.

Parsley in flower

Insect life on the parsley

... and a ladybird

The ladybird is particularly welcome.  I had the usual infestation of blackfly on my broad beans and on the leaf beet that is still in the veg patch from last year, flowering but still with a few edible leaves; however the ladybirds obligingly laid their eggs on those plants and the larvae cleaned up the beans completely and did a reasonable job on the spinach.  I see that there is also a larva on one of my aubergine plants in the greenhouse, dealing most effectively with the greenfly.

Hungry ladybird larva on the aubergines

Until a couple of weeks ago this had been a very poor year for butterflies, but the heat has brought more of them out, especially the whites, meadow browns and gatekeepers; there has been an occasional peacock, red admiral and tortoiseshell, but very few.  I'm hoping that more will turn up when the buddleja flowers, but a couple of weeks ago we had a very windy day which snapped a lot of the buddleja stems, so it's looking rather sorry for itself.  One day I spotted a very small blue butterfly but am struggling to identify it; the size suggested a Small Blue but it’s the wrong month, and the other contenders (Chalkhill Blue, Silver-studded Blue, Brown Argus, etc) seem to be too large or too early/late.  It was very pretty.  There is no shortage of cabbage whites, especially under the netting that I’ve put over the brassicas! – there are a couple of very fine cabbages in there and I’d like to keep them caterpillar-free.  The netting is also to deter the pigeons, though if I took it off the bluetits might deal with the caterpillars, so it’s a tricky trade-off. 

There are plenty of little bluetits and wrens around, and still a few baby sparrows being fed.  One day I left the back door open while I went outside to sow some seeds and, when I came back in, there was a baby wren in the dining room trying to get out of the (locked) patio doors.  It tried to hide behind the curtains, but I managed to scoop it up in a bundle of garden fleece and took it outside; I was a little bemused when it didn’t fly out of the fleece, but I found it clinging desperately to the hem of my T-shirt, most reluctant to let go.  Eventually it took off in search of mum; I hope it recovered quickly!

The wild garden

‘No-mow May’ was a thing this year, with gardeners encouraged not to mow their lawns for a month to let wildflowers bloom for pollinators.  We always leave the cowslip patch unmown until well into summer anyway, and this year an area of grass under the plum tree has been left to allow more of the orchids to flower; but from the middle of the month we were away up north for nearly three weeks and the whole lawn was more than a bit wild when we got back in early June.  After a cold and dry April, May was cold and wet, finishing with a warm spell, so the vegetation was decidedly luxuriant on our return.  A lot of cow parsley had crept into the bed at the bottom of the garden, which was pretty but not to be encouraged, though it did set off the last of the tulips (in the big pot by the summerhouse) and the first of the alliums.

Tulips, alliums and cow parsley in the bottom border

So one of the first jobs to be tackled when we got home was to mow those parts of the lawn that were meant to be mown and to get things back to normal.  In the process, we discovered that it wasn’t only the grass that had gone wild.  On the trunk of the plum tree was a heaving mass of honeybees. 

The 'cast' on the plum tree

Fortunately we have a beekeeping neighbour, who was summoned to advise; he informed us that it wasn’t a swarm but a ‘cast’ (don’t ask me the difference), apparently a group of bees who have followed a queen bee to find a new home.  There needs to be a certain (large) number of bees for them to survive, and unless this lot started breeding fast, they would die over winter.  So our neighbour and his friend, fully kitted out in case the bees turned nasty (in fact they were extremely docile but you never know with bees), brought along a bee box and scraped most of the cast, including the queen, into it; it was then lodged in the lower branches of the plum tree for the other bees to find their way into it.  Some bees came out of the box, flew over to the others on the tree trunk, and gave ‘come on guys the party’s here’ signals to get them to follow.  

Preparing the box ,,,

Getting it into the tree ,,,,

... now in place

That was two weeks ago now, and they’re still there, apparently reasonably happy but possibly not reproducing fast enough.  We’re happy for them to stay if they can form a viable colony, but if not they will be re-homed in another existing hive elsewhere in the village.

We’re just pleased that they thought our garden a good place to live; maybe our ‘no-mow May’ helped!

When we got round to mowing the grass verge outside the front of the house, we found more wildness: five early spotted orchids had appeared in the grass there.  They have been carefully mown around; we hope they’ll seed about.  Presumably they seeded in from the group in our lawn, where we have early spotteds, pyramidal orchids and common twayblades (a very un-showy orchid, one of which has sent up a tall green flower spike).

Early spotted orchid, in the verge

It’s not only the bees and the orchids that have been proliferating; our birds are busily feeding youngsters.  The nestbox on the summerhouse wall has been home to a bluetit family (the bluetits seem to have won the battle against the great tits, although apparently it’s not unknown for one species to lay eggs in the nest of the other); they didn’t seem too bothered by our using the summerhouse for meals.  The little ones must have flown the nest in the past few days as activity round the nestbox has ceased, and at least one youngster was being fed in the apple tree today.  Down in the bottom of the garden and beyond in the field margin there is also a family of wrens, several little ones noisily following their parent for food, and a family of dunnocks; a robin also searches for food for its little ones down there.  The grass (and cow parsley stalks, and nettles) in the field behind the summerhouse is still very long and provides great cover for small birds.  Up by the house, the sparrows have several fledgelings, and a blackbird has been feeding one (but only one – blackbird broods seem to have been very small here this year) youngster.

Lunching in the garden yesterday (after a rainy and chilly spell, it was a sunny day), I noticed something very small scampering across the lawn.  I went to investigate, and the little creature hid under some foliage that the recent winds had blown out of the plum tree.  It stayed there long enough for me to grab my phone, lift the foliage and take photos.  It was a common shrew, one of our tiniest mammals; it promptly scooted off and hid in the long grass under the tree, and I let it be.

Common shrews are indeed common, but not often seen, and certainly not running across a lawn in the middle of the day!

Tulip time

Daffodils are always welcome because of the brightness they bring after the dull winter days, but I really do like tulips.  It's the variety of colour, subtlety of markings (often) and elegance of shape (usually).  They even look interesting as they fade, looking like old silk.

The big red tulips at the bottom of the garden, which I think were here when we first came and I don't know the variety, don't have quite the subtle markings (they're a plain, bright lipstick red on the outside), but I like the bold markings at the base inside; they remind me of the toy kaleidoscope I had as a child, which produced random coloured patterns when it was turned.

Inside the red tulips

The earliest tulips in the pots are now dropping their petals, battered by the rain and winds that we've had periodically over the past week.  This year I've planted a mix of varieties in the two big pots, and single varieties in the others.  'Orange Emperor' is still doing quite well; several of the bulbs have produced multiple flowers.  It's a lovely orange sherbet colour, with big, rounded flowers.

'Orange Emperor'

'World Friendship', which I grew a couple of years ago and liked, has a more elegant, typically tulip shape; although it's quite tall, it's doing well against the winds.  I think I must have planted the bulbs in two layers, as there are more stems coming through, which I hope will prolong the display.

'World Friendship'

The big pot on the patio has 'Ballerina', 'Antraciet' and 'Recreado', a mix of purples and orange; 'Ballerina' develops a darker, purplish flush on its orange petals which works well with the darker varieties.  'Recreado' isn't in bloom yet, which is a pity, but the other two varieties are looking good together.

'Ballerina' and 'Antraciet' (and 'Recreado' soon!)

Every year I try a variety new to me, and this year I have a pot of 'Doll's Minuet'.  Some of the bulbs are still to come into flower, but I like it: a vivid magenta-red with a darker flush and an interesting shape, and as they are small (about 20cm/8ins) the wind isn't troubling them too much.  They would make a great mixer with paler colours.

'Doll's Minuet'

The bulbs in the pot by the summerhouse are up but the blooms haven't opened yet.  And, so far, all the bulbs seem to be what they're supposed to be - no 'wrong varieties' this year!

Meanwhile, we're still having the occasional hail shower; one of the blackbirds was spotted eating hailstones one day!  Why??

End of April update

What a difference two days (since my last post) can make.  It's still cold - and April is now officially the coldest for 60 years, with a frost somewhere in the UK on every April day - but it has finally rained.  Yesterday was properly wet, while today we were treated to a couple of significant hailstorms.  May starts tomorrow, but it is still going to be cold (possibly for much of the month, if the forecast is to be believed).  I hope there is some warmth soon, so that I can move my aubergines and peppers off the windowsill and out into the greenhouse!

Hail on the lawn ...

... and another lot on the way

The rain has helped raise the water level in the pond, which was almost dry; the birds have enjoyed being able to bath in it again, and with the ground nicely dampened they are also finding it easier to seek out food.  Our bereaved female blackbird has apparently struck up a new relationship with one of the local males; she has been gathering nesting material and taking it into the top of the long hedge.  The new nest is just opposite our patio doors, so we might be able to track what develops there.

Another female blackbird has been feeding a youngster down at the other end of the veg patch, and occasionally they come up towards the house.  Yesterday they were right up near the raspberries; mum went off to search for food under the big gooseberry bush and, after a little indecision, youngster decided to follow her.  It was a good move, as it turned out; only seconds later the female sparrowhawk flashed by (and flew off empty-taloned, fortunately).  Little blackbird wouldn't have stood a chance if he hadn't been inside the thorny gooseberry bush.

A new vaseful of flowers from the garden to brighten up the house: big red tulips (variety unknown), doronicums, honesty and centaurea montana.

Coming and going

Daffodils - just going

There has been a lot of coming and going in the past few weeks, with a lot to do in the garden, plants fading and being overtaken by others and plenty of birds coming and going too. 

My comings and goings have been to do with trying to keep on top of the various garden jobs at this time of year: weeding, sowing, pricking out, potting on and, given how dry it has been, watering.  April, unusually, has been very dry: apart from the light snow showers earlier in the month, there has hardly been any precipitation here for weeks, and coming and going with the watering can has been necessary.

The weather this month has also been mostly sunny but an easterly wind has kept it decidedly on the chilly side.  The cool temperatures (low teens centigrade/below 60F most days) have kept the daffodils flowering for longer than usual, though they are now going over, at that stage where they provide welcome colour from a distance but, when viewed close to, are too obviously on the way out to be suitable for cutting for the house.  They are being superseded by the tulips.  The first of these to flower were the little red ones in the front garden, which came out in the last days of March, but the first of the tall ones were the ‘Couleur Cardinal’ which were planted out years ago into the end of the veg plot and have provided a vaseful of colour each year since.  They were closely followed by ‘Apricot Beauty’, a new variety for me (I’m trying to grow at least one new variety every year); it isn’t quite my idea of apricot, being quite pink without much of an orangey flush, but it is lovely.  ‘Exotic Emperor’ was next, an old favourite and always a cheerful early potful.  ‘Orange Emperor’ is also out, as is yellow ‘World Friendship’, and the two big pots with mixed varieties are just starting to come into flower.  

A vase of 'Couleur Cardinal'

'Apricot Beauty'

'Exotic Emperor'

Other colour is also starting to appear, especially around the summerhouse end of the path by the long hedge – doronicums, honesty (Lunaria annua) and a few of the red tulips that are dotted through the planting down there.

Path by the long hedge

On the wilder side, the cowslips in the lawn are coming into bloom, though the sparrows have been pecking at the flowers; and the unintended patch of them on the verge outside our drive is going from strength to strength.

Cowslips in the verge

If the gardener has been kept coming and going recently, that is even more true of the birds here.  A few of them have literally been coming or going, on migration.  ‘Going’, probably, were two male bramblings (a colourful finch which overwinters in the UK) spotted in the plum tree ten days or so ago, and another yesterday; I’ve seen bramblings here before, but they’re definitely unusual visitors for us, probably stopping off on their way back to Scandinavia for the summer.  My Scandinavian readers might be seeing them make landfall after crossing the North Sea soon!  ‘Coming’ were two male blackcaps, probably en route for somewhere more sheltered than our garden; we occasionally see them early or late in the season, again probably on passage, but they never seem to hang around.  I’ve also seen one house martin and D has seen swallows, so our summer visitors are gradually arriving.  I wonder what they’re making of the cold.

The resident birds are busy nesting and raising youngsters.  The blackbird family who were nesting in the hedge seem to have come to an unhappy end.  Dad had been feeding their one survivor from the first brood while Mum incubated the second, but one day we found little one cheeping forlornly for food, and a sad little pile of male blackbird feathers on the lawn.  We tried to put out food for youngster, but he wasn’t sufficiently advanced to sustain himself.  Mum took over feeding duties, even though she had started gathering small worms presumably for the next lot of nestlings, but little one hasn’t been seen for several days and Mum is no longer gathering food, so we assume that she has had to abandon her nest.  Another male has moved into her territory and she is mostly keeping out of his way.  Another possibly abandoned nest is our birdbox; blue tits had been going in and out, but one day they had a full-on, stand-up fight with a pair of great tits down there, and I haven’t seen any activity at all since then. 

On a more positive birdy note, Lefty the lame pigeon has been picking up nesting material with his mate, and at least two pairs of robins are actively taking food to their nests; one of them, presumably my friend from earlier in the year, has become quite tame, following me around when I’m weeding.  Another pair of robins spent one day busily taking nesting material into a hole in the neighbours’ garage fascia, but I haven’t seen them there since; either found somewhere better and moved on, or just being very low-key in their movements?  A young collared dove appeared in the apple tree today, and a wren has been paying visits to the greenhouse, probably in search of spiders (he’s welcome to any that he can find in there as long as he can find his way out again!).  And a rare visitor, a marsh tit, has found our fatball container and has paid at least a couple of visits to it; I hope he makes it a regular pitstop.