Thrawn

We had "scunnered" last entry, now let me introduce you to another fine Scots word: "thrawn".

Stubborn and willful.

Something I think can be applied to all gardeners. After setbacks you have to sulk and ruminate for a wee bit and then, set the jaw, pick up your trowel and start again. Apparently I have a real jaw-set which my nearest and dearest know means "don't argue, she's made her mind up and you'd be better keeping out of her way!"

I think Nature is the same though. She just does what she has to do, and despite the weather and the storms, it's heartening to see the apple trees forming tiny apples. I think these are lovely, little tangible symbols of hope, these hop-sized fruits.

D spent this morning putting together a new growhouse for me, wood and polycarbonate and hopefully more sturdy than the polythene one.

(I took the remains of the other one to the recycling centre where there were two other scunnered individuals dumping the mangled remains of their greenhouses - we exchanged rueful eye-rolling as we tipped the metal into the scrap metal skip). The rectangular planter I had the tomato plants in was just too small, so I transplanted them into individual large pots and put them in the new growhouse - with temperatures just 10 degrees I figure they'll appreciate the protection. There wasn't much root that came with them though - that's a bit worrying... I tell you, these tomatoes, if they appear, will be the most expensive ones ever - remind me why I don't just simply say "sod-it" and head to the supermarket??

Or, indeed, to our local farm shop? Our lovely garden centre, Hopetoun, has today opened a farm shop. And it is lovely. Unusual condiments (lots of variations on balsamic dressings - and samples to try); seafood and smoked fish from St Monans in Fife; a fantastic bakery and deli, with things like venison chorizo, air-dried venison ham, pheasant balmoral (haggis wrapped in pheasant), artisan breads, free-range chicken and ham pies, locally made cheeses; a selection of not-normally available to buy cookbooks, locally made sweets, artisan dairy products and a butchery where the produce is farmed in the fields around the shop, and everything is labelled "Estate". There are jointed chickens and whole ones, all free range, all from just a mile away from the shop.

We bought a load of stuff, amongst which was some smoked salmon trimmings, and when we got home, I rustled up a couple of quiches with the glut of eggs we currently have, with smoked salmon, the last of the garden's purple sprouting broccoli and asparagus. And they are heavenly. I've put them in the freezer and they'll do lunches for a week or a trip to see friends in Fife where it's a communal buffet.

Spring is busting out all over...

(Me with a 5 week old osprey chick)


Very exciting news this morning with the news that the first chick had hatched on EJ and Odin's nest at Loch Garten. This morning I had a look at the webcam and EJ stood up very gingerly to reveal the teeniest, wobbliest wee chick which waggled its head and then collapsed again before EJ manoevred herself with great delicacy back over it to provide it and the other two eggs shelter. It always amazes me, having seen and held ospreys, the size of those talons, how they manage to manoevre their way over these tiny little chicks without stabbing them. It does happen, but it's very rare.

The oldest breeding female osprey, Lady, at Loch of the Lowes, is due to hatch out her 49th, 50th, and 51st chicks over the course of the next few days, and the birds at Aberfoyle aren't that far behind.

So it's all go, and, as as one Loch Garten blogger put it: the rollercoaster ride begins. It's a long 7 weeks until the chicks fledge and in that time, with the Scottish weather, anything can happen. Keep your fingers, toes, legs, eyes, and anything else you can, crossed for a half-decent summer and good fishing!
On Sunday I'm heading to Aberfoyle to do a stint. I'm looking forward to it, though I've found it really hard going this week with work, and am at work again on Monday, so I'm planning a few very, very, early nights next week to help me manage. I'm quite taken aback at how exhausted I'm finding being at work, but then, as well as being at work, I'm doing all the house-work too, so it shouldn't be that surprising. Just need to take it one week at a time I think...

From eyries to earth now - I visited the Allotment yesterday for the first time since the weekend, expecting to see a burst of weeds, but also a burst of growth after the heavy rain of the last few days. I wasn't disappointed on the weed front, the grass has been putting out runners and forming clumps and mats around established veg, and there are rogue potato plants popping up beside new seedlings. Wonderfully though, there are now pea and beetroot seedlings. I had bought some young beetroot plants at the weekend, but a glut of beetroot is never a bad thing in this house as D pickles them, so they have gone in beside the new seedlings.

What amazed me though was the state of the soil: I had expected the rain to have transformed the dry cracked earth into crumbly, workable loveliness, but it seems instead to have activated the clay in the soil which has now hardened. The top layer of the soil is just dust which swirled around in the wind. So trying to yank out weeds meant that the top of it snapped off but the root remained in situ. Maybe it's not rained enough - what a dreadful thought!!
My poor kale seedlings are under attack though, from *something*. Most likely caterpillars as the cabbage white butterflies have been rampant. So I've salvaged D's empty 2L fizzy drink bottles and cut the bottoms off, and have plonked these over the remaining kale seedlings to hopefully prevent further attack. And I gave the last rites to the courgette plants which didn't, after all, survive the frost, so have more seedlings on the go in the house. One of which has an Elastoplast on it after I cleverly managed to snap one of the stems, and I'm living in hope that it wasn't snapped right off and can mend itself!

The weather here has been awful though - we've had gales all week and temperatures barely into double figures, but in reality pegged back by the wind to much colder than that. I'm worried that my greenhouse isn't generating enough heat to keep the tomatoes going, and I resorted to putting a clear polythene bag over the butternut squash plant in the garden. Though I'm thinking that what would be really useful, is a huge clear plastic bottle I can butcher and turn into a cloche/greenhouse thing. Something like offices use on their water-coolers. If you know of anywhere I can get my hands on one, do let me know!
 

Answers on a postcard

One our feathered little darlings must have managed to squeeze out under a gap in the chicken wire today.

I was confused though because there was no evidence of an ecstatic, manically digging hen in the veg beds, indeed, all three hens were in their run looking as though butter wouldn't melt.

But the evidence was all to clear, veg beds which were dug over, dug out and dug up. The salad bed with only a few sparse seedlings to show yet: dug so thoroughly I couldn't have done a better job myself - if I'd wanted to...

Clearly she'd got out (my money's on it having been Grizel) and for whatever reason, her teeny brain had told her to get back in to her run again.

What's stumped me is why she totally avoided eating the sprouting broccoli, or the spring greens that we grow specifically for them. Bizarre.

Anyway, the thing is that now I have a salad bed with no salad stuff, an asparagus bed with no asparagus (they were bare root plants which have not taken anyway), and a butternut squash plant which has taken a bit of a battering...

In at the office today to work for the first time in months. It was all meetings and just me trying to catch up on what everyone's been doing. Good gods, but it was exhausting though! Could feel myself really struggling at points and getting quite dizzy... Thankfully I'm working from home tomorrow so a bit less intense.

And if there are any sunny spells I can have a go at repairing the gap in the hen run and seeing what I can salvage/ replant...

Back to work

Today was my first day back at work again after a whopping 15 weeks' sick leave. I guess that isn't that much when compared to other people who have been far sicker than I was. Any rate, today was me doing a phased return, so 4 hours working from home. The time was spent just trying to wade through the emails. I'm surprised by how tiring I found it. I had just blithely assumed that because I was managing round the house and allotment, I would find sitting in front of the PC a doddle. Unfortunately it seems to require a lot more concentration and by the end of the four hours my concentration was waning and I was really tired, more than I'd been in a while.

Tomorrow sees me in the office for four hours, most of which will be spent in catch-up meetings. I hope I can take it all in!

In gardening news, I was amazed and delighted to see flowers on my tomato plants in the greenhouse. Poor things were a wee bit pot-bound since the salad leaves planted as an interim measure in the planters weren't quite ready to be pulled out and the tomatoes planted. However, since I have planted salad stuff outside (though the Gods alone know when they'll actually germinate), the priority in the greenhouse is the tomato plants so I pulled out some of the young plants (and used them in a salad) and stuck the tomatoes in the planters. Fingers crossed there will be some fruits!

Is it just me or is everything really slow to germinate this year? Carrots, peas and beetroot seedlings are taking forever to germinate. I don't know if it's the warm weather which dried out the ground, and I'm hoping that this current wet weather will trigger some action, though it's now turned a lot cooler and very windy... Can't have it all ways I suppose, though warm rain might be nice!

I've a notion to paint our allotment shed. I took a wander round the allotments the other day and there were a few which were brightly painted blue and red. I'm assuming that they sought permission though, checking the rules, there's nothing about regulating paint colour, only that the shed should be maintained. Anyway, I had a look at a coloured varnish selection in Homebase, and I'm really taken with a lovely damson shade. I think I'll nip in to the garden centre and check that it's okay to paint it, and that will be a weekend task. When it stops raining of course...

Confetti

One of those near perfect days today. It's sunny and warm, and the garden is a real sun trap and is blocking out the worst of the breeze which is cool on the exposed fields of the allotment.

I was along at the allotment this morning and planed out the broccoli seedlings, and covered them with the cloche tunnel. I also riddled over the soil in between the broccoli and red cabbage, since the Cavolo Nero and spinach seeds seemed to be doing precious little. The bed was planted with potatoes last year and there seemed little point - or indeed time - in riddling out that enormous bed, so the soil is pretty rough: stony and lumpy. But now part of it at least is soft and crumbly and just begs for you to plunge your hands in it. Or maybe that's just me! Anyway, I've re-sown some spinach and Cavolo Nero, making a note for myself here that I really must cover the kale plants when they grow this year, as last year they were absolutely decimated by caterpillars.

Speaking of caterpillars, we've been seeing a lot of the woolly bear caterpillars around the house. They seem to be migrating just now - we stood and watched one very determined one make fairly swift progress across the street and up onto the grassy verge. They're funny looking things, like their hairy bodies should be poisonous, but they're innocent enough. Apart from wanting to eat my plants of course.

Gardening work is over for today, and probably for a few days in fact as I'm pretty much on top of things for the moment. I've grown impatient at the lack of progress with the peas I planted at the allotment and have sown some in pots in the greenhouse to see if I can start some of there. It could be that it's just a bad lot of seeds - it happens. It happened sigh the sunflowers (Velvet Queen) - only two of them have germinated :-(

A surprise to me in the garden was the emergence of a plant which I'm pretty certain is Bergamot. It certainly has the same kind of foliage and the leaves smell faintly of orange. But I didn't label it, and chances are that it was a seed I sowed last hear and forgot all about it! If it is, it should have the most gorgeous raggedy pinky red flowers and be a real bee magnet.

My laissez-faire approach has spread to some self-seeders in the garden: acqueligias, or "granny's bonnet" as we call them here. I've tended to just let them settle where they may, and they're springing up in between paving slabs and at border edges, and since they're so lovely, and varied, I'm content to just leave them be. Sometimes a haphazard approach to gardening is one that can bring real joy and delight in my eyes. If gardening is humans shaping and controlling Nature, then it's only right that Nature be allowed free reign to some extent :-)

So just now I'm sitting out in the garden, with Classic FM playing out through the open patio doors. The hens are industriously digging through their run - except the one who's in lahiniv and chatting away to herself. The cats have chased off the mouse for the time being. Swallows are nesting in the eves and swooping up and down and chirruping noisily, and blossom petals from the pear tree and one of the apple trees, is floating off in the breeze and covering the patio and beds in a soft sprinkling of confetti...

Easter weekend.

I feel slightly cheated this Easter weekend given that I'm still off sick and therefore can't really enjoy the feeling of having a few days off work! This is my last week off sick, officially I start back on May 2nd, but I've actually booked a few days off as leave so that I start back to work on a Monday and a full week, rather than on the truncated week after the May Day holiday.

As you'd expect, we don't celebrate Easter. There are some Pagans who celebrate Ostara, after a deity named Eostre, but the jury's well and truly out as to her existence. Though I suppose it does then segue into the argument about whether humans create deities out of their own needs/ requirements, or whether the gods exist without any input or need on the part of humans... So while I don't celebrate Ostara, I do acknowledge the Equinoxes, and in a few day's time will be celebrating, in rather spectacular fashion, Beltane.

The weather broke on Saturday with cold wind and pouring rain. Ah well, the Allotment and garden really did need it, and today it was sunny and dry, if not quite as warm as our English and Welsh neighbours have been enjoying.

So there was no gardening on Saturday, but we did make a trip to Edinburgh Farmer's Market. There were more stalls there than on our first trip and some terrific food selections. Given that our freezer is full to bursting, we didn't buy masses of stuff. Just some smoked mackerel, rabbit and apple chutney pie, buffalo stroganoff burgers, pork and marmalade sausages, and some pheasant breasts with basil and tomato dressing. Oh, and some tablet which is just EXACTLY like the stuff we remember when we were kids. And our dentists probably did too.

Allotment yesterday though, gotta keep those weeds under control. Or at least give them the opportunity to show me how well they're doing... And they're doing spectacularly well. The flower seeds I've been strewing around are starting to come up, but then I have to dig about to try and oust the grass roots and fear that I've buried the flower seeds that haven't come up forever...

The garden centre to which our allotment is attached was giving away freebie bags to the Allotment holders, plant labels, twine etc. And a notice that there will be an Allotment competition in August where an ex Beechgrove Garden presenter (Beechgrove Garden is a Scottish gardening TV show) will judge the best allotment based on various criteria. I spoke to a few other allotmenteers who say they aren't bothered... Aye right, I guarantee that there will be a rash of suddenly spruced up plots over the next few months...

This morning I decided to plant out some of the stuff in the greenhouse. So I put the butternut squash out in the garden, and took the courgettes, cabbages and some chard to the allotment. Tomorrow will be the turn of the broccoli. I'm all organised: have the glut of eggs baking as pasta frittatas, and I'll take a slice of it along with me for lunch so I can spend most of the day at the plot, planting and weeding.

Can't wait :-)

All change

As expected, the weather took a turn this week and we've been plunged back to more typical April weather: cold, damp, blustery. The salad crops I planted in the outside planter have done absolutely nothing, so I'm pleased that I sowed some in the greenhouse, though, at the moment it's not a lot warmer inside there.

The fruit trees are really starting to blossom though - the pear tree is now fully out, leading me to hope that for the first year we'll get a really good crop.  Last year we got about 4 or 5 decent-sized fruits, in what is the tree's - what - third year since we planted it?  By now the tree will be about 5 years old so it should be starting to get into its stride.

Isn't it just a thing of beauty?

The front garden is difficult to really plant - it's north-facing and most of the day is shaded by the house, so only the top of the garden - where the planters and tree are, get any consistently long hours of sunshine and that's at high summer.

And - another reason it's difficult to garden is our neighbour who is retired and as soon as you step out the house is there to "help" or offer advice.  Bless him, he and his wife are retired and elderly, and I'm sure he just wants the company, it's just difficult to really get anything done when he's there.

Indoors, the courgette seeds I planted just a couple of days ago have erupted spectacularly into life overnight. I looked at the seeds last night before going to bed and saw they were still the big, flat, tear-drop shaped seeds I stuck point-down - I'd just assumed they'd take a few more days to germinate!

The purple sprouting broccoli from the garden was a success: dark green and purple and very tasty with the individual chicken, bacon, leek and thyme pies I'd made (and frozen) a while ago. There are some more spears on the plant but I'm definitely going to grow some more - have to think about where to put it since it's a "long term" plant and is in the ground for up to a year...

I went into work  yesterday to discuss my phased return to work with my boss. It was very constructive, we've agreed a return over 8 weeks rather than 6 as proposed by Occupational Health, and it'll be reviewed part-way through to make sure I'm not struggling too much. Just before the meeting ended my boss nipped out to speak to another colleague - at which point I admit I sagged as I thought he was going to try and squeeze in a quick work meeting while I was there - but instead he came back with a bunch of flowers, an orchid, an Amazon voucher and a card signed by most of the Division. I was struck dumb - and it's not often that happens!  I was touched and delighted.

I think the visit though took a lot of out of me - and that was just for an hour. Today I've had to go for a snooze (with Poppy, who also snoozed so that we were nose to nose) and I feel a bit wiped.   Hopefully over the next couple of weeks I'll be improved enough that my stamina for being in at work will be enough that I don't suffer the same exhaustion after such a short time.   D is adamant though that if I'm still feeling exhausted, I'm to go and get signed off again - I really don't want that to happen.  I suspect that part of it is not sleeping well due to being so cold at night now that we've changed (somewhat prematurely and probably inadvisedly) to the lighter summer duvet! Hopefully the weather will start to warm up soon - but regardless, it doesn't seem to be stopping things growing.



First Harvest

We've been blessed the last couple of days with the most gorgeously unseasonal weather. Temperatures reaching for 20 degrees - at the start of April! Amazing!

Yesterday we went to the Farmers' Market in Stirling and picked up pigs' cheeks and bacon, and a piece of hot smoked salmon. Delicious.

In the afternoon, I went to the allotment. I was delighted to see that an allotment holder a couple of plots up, has returned and seems to be working on her plot. We thought that last year she had given up after being told that she could not paint her shed pale blue and had to paint it brown again. Which might come as a bit of a shock to her neighbour, whose young girl was gaily personalising their shed by painting flowers, handprints, squiggles and her name. I have to say, I really love those allotment plots I see from other parts of the country where the sheds and other buildings are a kitcsh, higgledy-piggledy and eclectic mish-mash of individuality. Alas, the planning permission for the field our plots are on, were specific in their rules about what is and is not allowed. So no trees, no painted buildings, no structures over 1m tall (more on that in a sec) and no livestock. That last is a disappointment, I had harboured hopes of a bee-hive...

The rule about 1m tall structures - being conveniently overlooked by the allotmenteers. Walk-in fruit cages and greenhouses etc are appearing all over the place as people plan a little bit more permanence and possession over their plot. Be nice to see them remain, but I know the people who live round about the field being quick to complain about any infractions to the planning rules, given they didn't want allotments there in the first place. Apparently there were vociferous objections to turning the field into allotments - living next to a farm I honestly am bemused by this: allotments are a darned sight quieter than a field that needs plowed, fertilised, harvested, cleared, etc etc.

Anyway. The highlight of the visit was taking a couple of rhubarb stalks which I stewed today to have in a crumble for breakfast tomorrow. The first harvest of the year! Very, very exciting! And, a purple sprouting broccoli plant that's been growing in the garden doing absolutely nothing, has now, suddenly, sprouted purple broccoli! I know that theoretically that's what it should have done, so hardly a surprise, but yet it is. So in another couple of days it'll be ready to eat. Makes me think I really should grow some at the allotment.

Update on the mice, the peppermint essential oil was an absolute... failure. It achieved absolutely nothing. They still seem to be there - at least, the cats are still enthralled by some of the clumps of geranium and the flap of the compost bin, and when I sowed sweet pea seeds this morning, one of the clumps shook violently and I thought I saw something flash by out the corner of my eye. *sigh*

Weather's supposed to break tomorrow, I'm not too disappointed in a way: Summer here is too brief most years, you always worry that a spell of good weather in advance of the summer months means it's peaked too soon! We expect cold, windy, even snowy weather in April, the last few days have been a welcome respite from the Winter we've endured, but I'd hate to think that this was as good as it's going to get!

My Favourite Things

I'm a woman of simple pleasures.

Lots of things come under the heading of "favourite things".

Digging for spuds, buried treasure of precious golden (mis)shapes. Apple blossom on my trees. Watering the garden late in a warm summer day, revelling in the fact that it doesn't really get dark at Mid-Summer and I can be out there at 11pm in near daylight, in near silence.

And listening to my iPod at the Allotment. I put in my earphones, and put on a playlist I have as my workout music when I'm at the gym. It's an eclectic, up-tempo, utterly personal mix of music tracks that I mentally - and sometimes physically - bop around to when I'm weeding and I hope nobody else is around to either notice or bother me. So I listen to things like Texas "I don't need a lover"; All About Eve "Every Angel"; Treacherous Orchestra; Muse; Dr and the Medics "Spirit in the Sky"; T-Rex "20th Century Boy"; REM "The One I Love"; Peatbog Fairies; etc etc. Very much a mish-mash of stuff I like and don't care if anyone else does. I love it and will potter for hours, lost in music (if you pardon the pun).

So this morning I spent a very happy hour or so at the allotment, listening to music, and sowing the first of the "April" seeds: beetroot and Cavalo Nero. I liked last year having flowers round the borders of the plot as they attracted bees and looked gorgeous, so this year I have more calendula (which I really must use to make into cream), red poppies and cornflowers. I ended up opening all the flower seed packets and emptying them into a bag, shaking it and then scattering the mix in the ground so that there's a really lovely mix of flowers. The neighbour across the path from us was there and, glory of glories, building a shed! The last owner of the plot had said she didn't want to put up a shed, she wanted, in time, to put up a greenhouse, much to our dismay because we were hoping that her shed would break the full blast of the wind and give ours some protection. For whatever reason she no longer tends the plot and the people who now do, have decided to put up a shed. We'll wait until it's built then see about repairing ours and re-setting it on the plinth it was blown from.

Back at the garden I've sown chamomile seeds - I love the scent of chamomile and I love chamomile tea. I suffer from periodic migraines and drinking the tea when I have one is immensely soothing. Again though, I really should do something with the flower heads beside tea, and make cream. It's a very healing and soothing herb, great for burns and soreness.

Also sown courgette seeds - I admit that neither of us really care for courgette. But a friend last year gave us a plant and it would have been rude to not have planted it, and if was a roaring success. We were harvesting courgettes on an almost daily basis from July to November. A food magazine contained a recipe for a courgette and garlic tart, and since it required courgettes and lots of eggs, it seemed like an ideal recipe for using up gluts of both. And it was delicious, really lovely. Moreover, it froze beautifully, so I was able to make up plenty lunches for work. This year, based on the success of the courgette, we're going to plant a couple of plants - to be honest I think they're a better crop for us than fennel which we grew very successfully, then decided we really didn't like the aniseed taste and had about 30 fennel plants to get through...

Not sure whether there will be much planting tomorrow: we have to go to Stirling Farmers Market and pick up pigs' cheeks from Puddledub, and, since today has been gloriously sunny and warm, tomorrow is forecast to be misty and cool along the Forth.

If nothing else, it's nice to feel that I'm on top of things... How long do I leave if before I regret saying that?!!

Wind, rain, sun - and mice

Wild weather the last few days - fluctuating temperatures, torrential rain and howling wind. At night we've been woken by the wind moaning, and venturing out in the street is an obstacle course with wheelie bins blown into the road. The other day was 6 degrees with a significant wind chill, today it's 14 and the wind feels warm. And the sun has now come out. It's like there's a battle for Spring and we're caught in the cross-fire!

The rain's been enough to keep me mostly indoors over the last couple of days, which has been fine because I've not been feeling great. Today though I feel marginally more like myself so decided to take the opportunity of dry weather to repot some seedlings. Potting delicate seedlings with those micro-fine trailing roots, and trying to gently ease them into new pots while the wind whips at the plant is a task that takes practise. Fortunately I get plenty of it! Of course, if I'd had my head screwed on I would have moved the pots that take up a shelf in the greenhouse and potted in there, tight a squeeze as it is. But I don't have my head screwed on just now which is why it takes me twice as long to do anything. Yesterday, driving to the agricultural supplies shop in Stirling I had one of those "tra la la... pretty birdie, gorgeous hills...  -  Whoooops, I'm driving, aren't ?! moments" I can tell you this because you don't live/drive near me so you can feel both safe and relieved... :-D

The greenhouse is starting to fill up nicely now. The planters for salad/tomatoes is doing the job of acting as a ballast to hold the greenhouse down and there are seedlings coming up. I ran out of plant labels so I can't remember what got sown in what part of the planters - it'll make a nice surprise I suppose!

The butternut squash is still living and the chard seedlings seem to be okay - bit shell-shocked but I'm sure they'll be fine, they're fairly hardy plants. I'm not sure how many chard plants to have... Never having grown it before I really don't know how much we'll use... I admit I'm growing it as much for looks as eating, the "Rainbow" variety looks so gorgeous and glowing jewel colours that even if I don't manage to eat all of it, it'll look good.

Elsewhere in the garden it's looking good. Bit drookit (soggy) but good.  Shoots now present in all the potato bags, hopefully at the allotment they'll be starting to come up there too.

But - oh - nightmare, we have mice. Just in the garden, they were there last year and seem to be back. We live in a fairly rural area surrounded by farms, so it was inevitable, but still... The concern is more the neighbours and whether they'll point the finger at the bird feeders, compost bin and of course, the hens... The last thing we want to be accused of is being an environmental nuisance. It's difficult to see what - apart from dig up the garden and concrete it, get rid of the hens, discourage birds etc, we can really do. The cats are pretty good at harassing the mice (if not actually killing them, apart from on one occasion), and when they're in at night, our neighbour's cat seems to take over. The hens I'm not worried about - omnivores that they are, they will eat mice. Thinking about it, it's probably more the bird feeders that would be the cause: there's no food left out in the hen run once they go in for their roost, but the birds are messy and scatter seed around. I've found some sunflower seedlings coming up from discarded seeds. I hear that cotton wool balls saturated with peppermint essential oil and scattered round the garden is effective as the mice can't stand the smell. Will see about doing that.

Allegedly, it is to be dry tomorrow. I'll believe it when I see it, but if it is, then I'm off to the allotment to plant the onions which I sprouted (and are sitting in the seat-well of the car after I decided not to plant them the other day), and to measure my rhubarb leaves to see if they're long enough for me to take a couple of stalks to stew...

Pottering in the garden

Despite the best part of 11 hours' sleep, I woke up feeling wiped and really dizzy. D, bless him, tries to make sure I get out at least a little while each day so I don't go completely stir crazy, and comes with me to make sure I'm all right. He even goes round garden centres with me, now *that's* devotion!

Today we went to the garden centre so I could get one of those fabric containers for growing salads/ tomatoes in in the greenhouse. This will serve the additional bonus of acting as a ballast to weigh the greenhouse down once positioned so it's on the lower frame. So I've sown some lettuce seeds, but need to get more salad seeds, and bought four tomato plug plants: Roma.

Now, tomato plants and I really don't have a successful partnership. I have no idea why: I grow them in lovely soil in the greenhouse, giving them as much warmth as a Scottish Summer will allow, feed them and water them, support them (they do like a bit of cheering on :-D ), and do pretty much everything you're supposed to do, and they reward me by doing absolutely nothing... However, being a gardner, hope springs eternally each Spring, so once again I will try and grow them. This variety (Roma) apparently can be grown outdoors, which means outdoors in the more consistently warmer climes of southern England, but if the weather is kind, I might get away with the greenhouse. We shall see.

I've had some success with my onion sets that I planted a week or so back, the ones I put into a seed module tray and stuck in the greenhouse to sprout. The red ones are still to come, but the shallots in particular (on the right) have done really well. In addition to the shoots, they have sprouted roots so when I gently tug on them, they remain fast in their cell. I'll wait another couple of weeks and then transplant them in the allotment.















I removed a dangerous and violent clematis from the garden, much to what I imagine is the relief of our elderly neighbour. Poor soul, he's getting on and every year he complains that the clematis causes him to swerve on the way out of his parking space past our house... We have no idea why, the plant tumbled over the garden fence but for it to be any kind of obstacle, our neighbour would have to be driving within 6 inches of the fence. Terrifying thought...

However, it was a fairly rampant plant, and had a tendency to choke the apple trees it grew next to. It would have been more forgiveable had it been a pretty plant, but it wasn't - to my eyes at least.

Inspired by Gardner's World the other night, I planted some dahlia tubers in the place of the clematis. Dahlias do well in our garden but I do keep forgetting to lift the tubers in the autumn and they die off. This year I'll remember. Honest.

NOW it's Spring

Woke up to clear blue skies and a totally different "feel" to the air. Like a corner had been turned out into the sunlight and the shadow and chill had been left behind.

Spring, now, is here.

To celebrate, D took me to the Allotment and left me there to weed contentedly for a couple of hours, before coming to get me (in case you're wondering, yes, I drive and yes, I'm capable of driving short distances (concentration is a bit of an issue for longer drives though), but he's keen to make sure I don't overdo it, so by dropping me off and picking me up, he can ensure that I don't work for too long and tire myself out).

So I spent a very happy couple of hours weeding and now the allotment is looking pretty darned good and ready for planting. For some reason though, known only to the allotment owner, the water supply is still off, which had been becoming a bit of an issue, given that I and some o the other allotmenteers had been putting in some plants and the ground was cracking with dryness. Jack, one of our allotment friends, asked the garden centre staff when the water would be coming back on. Next week! Which seems a bit bizarre given that, even up here, gardening does start in March in a good year. The garden centre staff, being obliging souls, switched the water on for us today, so I was able to give the new raspberry and blackberry, and relocated cranberry, a much desired drink.

We also paid our fees for the plot for the year: £140. I know it's probably a LOT more expensive than council allotments, but since the latter are like hens' teeth round here and our plot is only 2 miles from our house, not to mention the fact that the owner is very accommodating (and gives out freebies from time to time) we really don't grudge it. So that's us paid up for another year.

Back at the house, I have taken a chair and set it up on the patio. Our garden faces south and is an absolute sun trap. It's one of the reasons we chose this house (a new build when we got it), purely for the direction the garden faces. It's not a huge garden, it's really tiny in fact, but we have a patio with lots of tubs; a bed down the length of the garden in which sit our (espaliered-but-not-really (laziness)) apple trees and flowers; 4 of those 1m x 1m veg bed kits set up on a square of gravel; and at the end of the garden, and up the side opposite the apple trees, is the hen coop and run. Bijou and compact I think you could call it.

But it's pretty productive too, what with the apples (we have a pear tree in our front garden), and the veg beds. This year I've decided that we should use them to grow stuff that enjoys a bit of heat and space on its own, and so I've put bare root asparagus in one bed, strawberries in another, salads in the third, and the 4th I'm going to see if butternut squash will fare well with a bit of cossetting.

So I'm sitting, enjoying the warmth of the sun, the crooning and gentle clucking of the hens as they dust-bathe, and the faint scent of freshly watered soil. I can almost *hear* the plants growing. Or I could if it weren't for the incessant lawnmower symphony that starts now and ends in October...