Off The Edge Gardening

A lot has been written about planting combinations, I believe books are out there to help you in your hour of combo need.  Here is my contribution.  Take a look.  Does it please the eye?  Then it works.  The End.

A little bit battered but still beautiful,  a quince in bloom.

Most gardeners get followed around by a chirpy robin.  So why do I get the chicken?

It is the time of year when any semblance of control evaporates, if indeed it ever really existed outside of our bubble of optimism.  The warmth of the sun and the spring showers have conspired to produce the perfect environment for all the weed seed in the universe to germinate.  At least it seems that way.  This seed was always there, lying unseen on the surface and just below, like some noxious germ.  Produce of weeds that flowered, ripened and scattered last year, or perhaps the previous, or the one before that, or up to seven years ago if you can believe the old gardener’s tale.  These may have come from your own patch or flown in airmail from a neighbour’s.  Or perhaps a small piece of pernicious root was missed whilst removing past adversaries, even though you searched for every scrap as if for golden sovereigns.  Seemingly over night, they emerge like monsters from the deep; stickyweed strangles and tangles like evil velcro around the cultivated softies, anaconda bindweed twines around emerging herbs,  the dandelions whose transition from mane to clock to empty glass happens in the blink of the eye, the mat forming ground elder stifling and relentless.  But do not despair, this exuberance will slow and as we approach mid summer the pendulum will swing back in our direction again.  Those released from the dastardly clutches will spread to swamp the interlopers and a delicate truce will be formed.   Until next time.

I could just lie down in the soft sedum and have a snooze.  Like this little chap.  Wouldn’t that be nice.  You may have guessed I am weary and short of words this evening.   This could be a good or bad thing depending on your viewpoint.  This reticence is unlikely to last.   Again this is open to debate.

A bit like lilac time but more dangly.

Tomorrow this butterfly will be free from its cocoon.   The “almost” is as beautiful as the “there”.

I took some great photos at The Farm yesterday.  Buttercup yellow laburnum flowers cascading from skinny branches, revelling in their deliciously noxious reputation.  A mallard drake with his head barely above the plantain and grasses in a burgeoning meadow.  The Rasta lambs, now less shy and more photographically amenable, posing delightfully in the paddock enjoying the post-deluge sunshine.  A monstrous hosta, still unscathed.  Evidence of bunny activity.  A fallen quince tree.  Three half barrels in decreasing sizes planted up with bedding, brightening a dull corner.  Spanking new plants in their new homes.  Public enemy No. 1, a particularly wilful and malicious chicken, who has been digging up these newly planted specimens and doesn’t even have the good grace to wait until I have left the area.  Throughout the rain and the accompanying mud I wrestled with waterproofs and juggled my poor abused camera to take these award-winning shots.  All for your delectation.  On arriving home I found my camera memory card still inserted into my laptop.  Oops! Here is a lovely lilac from earlier in the week, it will have to suffice.