Off The Edge Gardening

I love tractors.  The ones that tickle my fancy are not the modern, all singing and dancing behemoths, but the ancient spluttering, characterful ones.  This beautiful Ford 4000 belongs to George’s Dad and proved yesterday that not only is it very handsome but it is also very useful.  I believe it to be about the same age as myself, so of a fine vintage and in its prime.  We are in the process of revitalising the outside spaces at the farm and surrounding the holiday cottages including rebuilding beds and borders.  Mr and Mrs G have spent the last 4 years working very hard, renovating the cottages and setting up their new business.  Now it is time for the outside spaces to be whipped into shape and that is where I come in!  At present the grounds are mainly adorned with old and poorly-pruned shrubs, on the whole hydrangeas and fuchsias, long past their ornamental best.  There is also an awful lot of pampus grass, seemingly loved by the previous owners and is being removed as a priority.  This project is significant venture but we are plodding on, one day at a time, and though most of the work has been carried out in rain/hail/storm/gale it has been great fun.  Hard work but plenty of laughter and at times very bizarre and I do enjoy a bit of the bizarre.  A bonus of course are the animals, which I love, top of the list being George the philandering kunekune boar.  I have noticed, however, that they are beginning to give me that “not her again with her silly voice and no food” look!

Yesterday, as part of the revamp of an area adjacent to the office, a substantial post needed to be removed in order to install new gravel board.  There was nothing for it but to call International Rescue.  It didn’t take long before Thunderbird 4000 trundled, at a modest but elegant rate, to the rescue.  The post was expertly impaled onto one of the prongs and the admiring audience gasped to see it effortlessly lift out of the ground, and keep lifting, and keep lifting! The resultant hole was at least 4ft deep with water in the bottom, I could have sworn I saw a kangeroo bobbing about down there.  I did suggest a new business venture “Ye Olde Wishing Well” but it didn’t go down terribly well.   For safety it was quickly filled with bits and pieces hanging about.  Now where did that chicken go …..

Hard week, frazzled gardener, so pretty picture, few words, night, night.

Seeds want to germinate, that is what they are designed to do, it is their raison d’être, their goal in life, their purpose.  There are not many decisions to be made in a seed’s life, it must either germinate or not germinate, just the two options and the first is preferable.  There is, I suppose, another option which is “provide a healthy snack” and that is exactly what this little grain was destined to do.  Somehow, undoubtedly with great derring-do, it managed to escape captivity (like Steve McQueen in The Great Escape but without the motorbike and with success).  This new-found freedom from the feeder inspired it to attempt the prime objective, and it triumphed.  The fresh green shoot pushing up through the boards of L&L’s bird table must be jubilant.  We will not dwell on its future, we must live in the moment.

Today was proper winter.  Winter just like in story books.  Not damp and dark, but raw and bright.  After a frosty start, and the first windscreen scrape of the season, the sun rose blindingly.  Where its magic wand touched the crusty ground it thawed, making is quite workable.  Shaded plants glistened with stardust.  Wearing more layers than a millefeuille I stayed toasty warm in this mysterious icy land.  At lunchtime I sat with my face to the sun and basked like a self-satisfied cat.  Or perhaps a self-satisfied gardener.

This post is for L&L ensconced in an exotic paradise.  I am convinced they are not missing us at all and so need to be reminded of all the wonderful things they are missing in Blighty.  Reclining on beachside loungers sipping pina coladas, paragliding off forested mountainsides, swimming with dolphins in the balmy waters, hiking through virgin rainforest, feasting on lobster and kumquat; it may just cross their minds not to bother coming home at all.  Why, it is hard to imagine. I am depending on some pictures I took of their garden to say thousands of words, all of them tempting and tantalising.

Although there are many open flowers on this Camellia “Donation” it was a bud, doing a fine impression of a rose, that took my fancy.  So perfect, like a kiss.

The irresistable pansy with a face that could melt the heart of the hardest cynic.

A host of daffodils is over rated.  A single, admittedly battered, bloom is all you need.

And my trump card, an adorable little hellebore, flushed with pink and green.

So glad you are having a lovely time, but you better come home soon the garden is waking up!

ps Nobody on any account is to mention the weather.

With cold weather on the way this frog spawn is more likely than not, as Private Fraser* would say, doomed.   The frost will do its worst and it will disintegrate and disappear.  However today the sight of this multi-eyed mass was a heart and toes warming sign of spring edging ever closer.  As for tadpole casualties, I’m sure the frogs will have another go, any excuse!

* for those of you unacquainted with this character please Google for enlightenment.

After much deliberation I have chosen a new tree to follow.   For those of you who aren’t acquainted with Tree Following and think I am having another one of my funny turns, I will explain.  This is a wonderful meme, institaged by Lucy at http://www.looseandleafy.blogspot.co.uk, and entails following a tree throughout the year, or for as long as possible, and documenting the detail.  Actually it is more of a tree watch than a follow as on the whole they don’t move far, not unless yours lives in the Enchanted Forest.  Anyway check out Lucy’s great blog and I am sure all will become clear.

So *drumroll* *annoyingly overlong pause* please meet Larix decidua, the European Larch, my new subject.  From now on it will be known as “my tree” although technically it isn’t.  Actually in no way or form is it mine but I am hoping that George wont mind sharing.

I hestitated to pick this tree for the sole reason that its owner isn’t keen on larch (I believe this is more to do with the amount of specimens on their land than a personal vendetta) so I thought it would be contrary to spend the next year singing its praises.  Ultimately the “fors” far outweighed the “againsts” so I am going to take up the challenge and make it my quest to convert Mrs George to the charms of this amazing deciduous conifer.

Here we go again ……

 

Due to birthday celebrations (not mine but I like to be helpful) today was a day off.  We drove through heavy rain to Crow Point car park, the sun immediately came out and we walked the coast in beautiful sunshine.  The return drive was a hail storm.  Someone was on our side today.

Today I have been writing about hellebores for a magazine article.  The most interesting fact, and one I am sure you will appreciate, is that if you stand on the powdered root it will render you invisible.  Honest, I read it!

This wonderful stand of hellebores is on my friend Pat the Field’s land where she grows a wide range of amazing cut flowers.  Don’t forget to support our local producers 🙂

I have just seen the weather report for the coming week.  It doesn’t bode well for gardening of any shape, form or persuasion, except for those lucky enough to have access to a greenhouse or conservatory.  On reflection I don’t think it bodes well for any outdoor activity, much more an  indoor pursuits kind of week, tidying out under the stairs or lying on the settee with leftover Christmas chocolates (yes there are still many many many of these golden brown temptresses in our house) watching Casablanca or equivalent.   In summary this is the forecast: a blue amorphous blob is approaching rapidly from the Atlantic where it slows significantly to dawdle nonchalantly across the south-west only to be ushered away by further saturated blobs in its wake that appear to be just as lazy.   This is unfortunate as, the more astute of you may well have worked out, I make my living as a gardener.  So these swirling amoeba of torrential rain and gale force winds brings with them a problem – the conundrum of when it is right to work and when it is not.

There may be doubters, but it is more than just a case of not wanting to get wet and mess my hair up.  Although few enjoy working in the rain (mainly ducks and the weird and I’m not sure how much work ducks actually do) it is unlikely to be anything much worse than uncomfortable for the worker.  Getting up a sweat whilst dressed in full waterproofs, even the poshest breathable kit, and the result is boil-in-the-bag gardener, I believe considered a delicacy in the nether regions of the Alpha Centauri star system.   Some pay thousands for an equivalent spa treatment.  It is not the gardener that is the problem, it is the garden.  There are some jobs that can be safely undertaken in bad weather without detriment to the garden, there are many that can’t.  In fact even when the rain has stopped the soil may well be unworkable for a while.  Once I explained to a client that I may not make it in as there was snow forecast “afraid of a little cold weather” he mocked “no” I replied “the ground will be covered in snow”.  Pruning is a job that can be done in the wet, as long as you don’t have to stomp all over flower beds in order to do so.  However “twinkle toes” you consider yourself to be (and I certainly do not come into this category) this will compact your soil, potentially ruining years of careful nurturing.

So this is the entrance to the moral maze, do you turn up for work, at best achieve little at worst cause damage and not be “value for money” or do you stay at home to do the paperwork* and miss an opportunity that the weather may improve, get labelled a “fair weather” and of course miss out on a days pay?  I don’t know the answer, I just want to be fair, all I can say is that I am looking forward to spring!

This magnificent acacia at Damage Hue has no interest in the weather.

* See previous references to settee activities