Long time no see

There has been lots to do in the garden this year, but not the spare time to do it in. Unfortunately the garden had to take a back seat this year, I have had to work lots of hours and make hundreds of bars of soap!

The only good thing is the realisation that the garden doesn't really need me any more! (boo hoo). It has hardly missed me, produced lots of lovely flower displays and tubs and tubs of fruit. My vegetable supply is embarrassing but so what, the fruit tastes nicer anyway. Many a happy breakfast hour was spent sitting by the pond with a bowl of muesli and yoghurt topped up with freshly picked black and red currants.

Which has to lead me onto a rant about the weather, yes I know I live in Scotland and we are not famous for our long, hot summers but why!!!!!!!!!!! The few weeks that were was hot and sunny was missed by me, except when carrying decorating gear in and out houses.

Now we are well into October the mornings are getting frosty, the tomatoes in the polytunnel are dying and I am starting to plan for winter again. The used bedding from the rabbits is getting piled up at the base of vunerable plants and generally thrown about over the strawberries. The next plan is to get the rabbit hutch protected against the worst of the weather. The forecast for this year is for a hard winter again, great for taking photographs but less good for just about anything else!

Snow, dead plants and birdies

Spring has been a long time a-coming! And I am a long time a-coming back to this, but then there wasn't much happening except cold, cold snow. The picture above shows the sun lounger!!! lol. That was a winter to be endured rather than enjoyed, I was so happy that we have a stove to chuck wood and coal on, otherwise it would have been really hard.

My poor rabbits even looked miserable for a while, that was with three hot-water bottles a day, 6 inches of bedding, my old gardening jumper to cuddle into/poo on, and lots of insulation in the hutch.


A few plants are looking very dead. The Rosemary fooled me for a while but I think the greeness was frozen in, as soon as things thawed it turned brown. The Sage is still just alive but looks sorry for itself, it almost gave up totally last year. I wonder sometimes if they get depressed at being out of their natural hot, sunny habitat.

Most things are bursting back into life, shoots and big fat buds everywhere. The soft fruit is making my mouth water at the thought of all the lovely luscious juiciness!!!!!!!!!! Last year I got a whole three Jostaberries of the one plant. I had never even tasted them before but will have to find room for another, well worth growing. They are a cross between Gooseberries and Blackcurrants and taste like Blackcurrants but are bigger and sweeter.


The continuing pleasure this winter has been the amount of, and variety of birds in the garden. My new hobby is to pick up the bird poo from under the big tree, and throw it so that it is under the soft fruit instead. My kind hubbie was up the ladder every day filling up the bird feeder, sometimes twice a day. We had loads of the usual tits and chaffinches but quite a few unusual birds that we had to get the book out for. One day there was a sparrowhawk sitting in the sycamore, looking for an easy meal.

The last few days has seen blue tits in and out of the nesting box. They nested last year but magpies came into the garden and killed them, better luck this year. It brought a smile to my face every time I could hear the babies cheep cheeping away.

The nest box only took 20 minutes to make from a bit of left over fencing, there are lots of patterns to make them on the web, try
http://www.rspb.org.uk/advice/helpingbirds/nestboxes/smallbirds/making.asp
and make sure the top is secure! I wish I had known that one without learning the hard way.

A lot of people feed the birds in their garden but without somewhere to nest they will still struggle to breed. We are rural here, so one nest box will not make much difference, but in a lot of areas it will do.

Plans for the next few weeks are
.........still not ordered in my Biodynamic planting guide, it also gives a good indication of what the weather will be like as well
..........get some seeds sown, especially after having to pay out for a lettuce at the supermarket
.........another bottle of the E.M. (effective microbes) super stuff!
.........compost the dead plants (boo hoo)
.........chuck some seeds around, the lazy way to summer colour