We have got to Midsummer’s Day, and the weather is hot and sunny. The birds nesting in the garden have all flown, and people have begun to cut their hedges, and along by the river the yellowhammers are just leaving the nests, with their distinctive calls racketing through the hawthorns and alders they seem to…
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It’s the warmest day so far, and the garden is looking quite pretty. I’m not the only one taking photos today – my daughter has caught me in the act of actual gardening, harvesting thyme. I have moved on to the planting out stage, the tomatoes are in the greenhouse border, and the aubergines are…
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We have got to the time of year when the mornings are dewy and the last flowers are making a brave show amid the wreckage of summer. This seems to have happened very fast. Last week, there was a magnificent array of marigolds and the first sprays of montbretia around the pond. This week there…
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now is the time when you start to reckon up, and think about the next year. As I go through the harvest, drying herbs, freezing tomato sauce, and trying new dye plants, I’m beginning to think – but what next? is this doing what I expected? what will the garden need from me next year?
There are about five bees here, all enjoying yesterdays sunshine. There are three carder bees and two white-tailed bumble bees. I’m think this is a hairy-footed flower bee. I suspect there may be miner bees here too. We used to have them in our walls a few years ago, and they were quite disconcerting as…
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When you see these flowers in bloom you know that spring can’t be far off. I’ve ordered my seeds, but not sowed any yet, nor written any new poetry, but there are some special circumstances. So far February has been a very busy month, with book editing, a trip to London to see the Anglo-Saxon…
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Today is sunny and not even too cold, which makes today the last before the cold air from Siberia hits. Forecasts show that the day time temperatures won’t rise so high and the night time ones will dip lower over the next fortnight, reminding me of that cold spring when daffodils came out and stayed…
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Well, you’d think, wouldn’t you. But sometimes lavender can look like this – lavender stoechas, possibly ‘Avignon’ or this Which is lavender rosea, or this which is lavender alba. They are all flowering their lovely heads off, and I’ve taken cuttings. With luck there will be some to share with poets at the Callander Poetry…
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The gallica rose is in full bloom, but it is soaking wet. After a lovely fortnight, the summer is cold and rainy, and the whole garden is lush and dripping. The strawberries have all been eaten by the sparrows and starlings, but there are gooseberries and blackcurrants aplenty. The angelica is setting seeds in flower-heads…
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A House for Winter The sky opens blue windows between shutters of grey cloud. Winter peers in. Brittle sunshine slants between skeletonised trees, thin relict leaves at twig tips. A breath of frost melts on the cold frame, split curls of seedpods glued to the glass. The dark glassy river is choked with panes of…
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