more flowers and seedlings

The primroses under the willow tree by the stream are going over now, while these tiny tulips below, (tulipa alba coerulea) shouldn't be flowering till april.
Below is a seed tray full of japanese quince seedlings (Chaenomeles japonica) and also seedlings from crocosmia 'lucifer' that I hope will come reasonably true from seed. The mixture is the result of my belief that the quince were not going to germinate so I flung the crocosmia into the nearest available seed tray (was in a hurry). Now the quince will have to wait till the crocosmia are a bit bigger before I can prick the lot out.
The bergenias along the east side of the house have done really well this year.
This is one of the quince seedlings along the side of the gîte garden.
This is euphorbia griffithii 'dixter' in amongst the grass and nettles due to a years neglect of most of the garden. This is proving to be somewhat of a thug - it was a tiny plant 2 years ago, but it is spreading with considerable determination, despite neglect.
Lastly, the serre is coming on well - almost have the wood frames in the ends for attaching the plastic and hanging the doors. Have used some of our wood chippings for the central path and left over copper pipe for the side bars.

things done - 17 march

Sown: beetroot in the potager, lupins in a pot in the greenhouse, cosmos in modules in the greenhouse.
Potted-on: Curly leaf parsley
Done:
mown the grass in the orchard, thanks to the newly-sharpened mower blades,
another 4 barrow-fulls of soil into the serre
mown the back lawn for the first time this year - none too soon!

flowers and sunshine

Mid march, the euphorbia is in full bloom and the muscari are opening fast.

One of the pale pink camellias is almost open

This photo is of blossom on what I think is a peach tree that has grown from a peach stone in the compost - it blossoms really early each year.
Lastly, the tiny ipheion underneath Gertie is, I think 'Froyle Mill'. I acquired it as an unexpected extra in a pot containing a hazel seedling bought at a garden sale in Bampton, at least 8 years ago and I thought I had lost it. However, up it has sprung again and I will be able to unearth the bulbs and put them somewhere safer. There are two small clumps of bulbs now.

hedge finished and shredded

All that is left of the piles and piles of hedge cuttings are two piles of shredded chippings. I have already used some for the pathways in the fruit cage, and am planning where else to use them.
Today I sowed spinach, carrots, radishes purple sprouting broccoli outside in the potager, I sowed early peas yesterday. The little greenhouse is stuffed to the gunnels with sprouting and growing-on stuff. I have heleniums, hollyhocks & echinacia plants on the go, Japanese quince seedlings from the bush that fruited its heart out last year - made fabulous jelly! also crocosmia 'lucifer' seedlings that are germinating well and parsley seedlings that have all germinated (!) Have also put in aubretia cuttings, as I uprooted a biggish clump while weeding the front garden the other day. In the ground are verbena bonariensis that I allowed to stay in the soil overwinter in case the frost devastated it in the garden again.We are slowly barrowing soil into the serre. Note re-use of old corrugated iron sheets as bed-edges. Still have the last one to cut to finish it all off, but the angle grinder cutting wheel is knackered and we need a new one.

more potatoes and serre construction 2

We have just been give 20 Pink Fir Apple seed potatoes - have joined the others on the windowsills to chit. These are apparently superb for potato salads - very tasty & waxy.
As you can see every available windowsill that the kitten cannot get to is in use.

Yesterday we finished laying the hedge along the west side of the field. We are hiring a chipper on Saturday to shred the stuff we have cut off, (that isn't big enough to keep for firewood)

Next thing to finish is the serre - we have ordered the plastic cover yesterday, and need to get wood to make the doors and to anchor down the sides, and cut some corrugated iron sheets lengthwise, to fold in half, to edge the raised beds. (photo to come)

Today I potted up some (19) hollyhock seedlings that have been in the little greenhouse over the winter and are starting to sprout.

I also potted up 20 echinacia plants that I bought bare-rooted - see photo above.

I also discovered a pot of lilies that had been left for at least 2 years and have developed lots of offsets - potted these up too.

Yesterday I sowed 3 types of sweet peas (lathyrus odoratus): Matucania (left) black knight (right) and a packet of mixed-colour sweet peas.

Last year I didn't get round to sowing sweet peas and sorely missed them in the garden.

Tried mixing up my own potting compost - molehill earth, municipal compost, sand and our own compost, using the cement mixer. Unfortunately, it was all to wet and took on the consistency of horse-turds, so I had to lay it all out on the floor of the hangar, on sheets of cardboard, to dry out. Rats! - bet the cats use it as a nice fresh loo!

Hedging - race against time!

The orchard hedge is now completely laid. There is just a corner where the trees haven't grown much that I haven't bothered laying this year - I will clear out the grass round them and put a bit of fertilizer/mulch round them - see if they will grow a bit better first. That corner is also where one of the apple trees has not grown at all well- wonder why?
Below is the main hedge that we planted in winter 2000/2001. IT had taken loads of work to trim out the brashings to get to the trunks to lay it. Looks a bit drastic - hope it works!
We have heaps and heaps of twigs in the field now, which will have to be disposed of (more of which later)
Pete & Colin started laying the hedge at the top by the orchard - the short length at right angles to the rest. In background see the smoke as we tried to get a fire started - but not enough wind.
Below are our attempts to get the stuff to burn - these two people are ex-firefighters and even with petrol the bloody stuff refused to burn convincingly!
There is just too much space between the twigs, which themselves are too green to burn well. Very frustrating, as the grass underneath will die-off if we don't clear it soon, leaving the docks even more in charge than they are at the moment.

excavation, fencing & new duck facility

Have taken the fence from the corner of the sheep field to the edge of the property, to keep the ducks & chooks off our neighbours' garden. Note how huge some of the eucalyptus has grown!
In the process have taken out a lump of soil right in the line of the boundary, behind the confluence of the stream with the ditch (under the big yew tree)
This has given us a n extra bit of usable land and opened out the stream under the yew - we think there was a 'lavoir' there - a basin surrounded by stones, in which the washing was done.
Here is the area we have dug out, and the new fence installed & the ducks can now play in the basin under the yew tree.
Duck heaven!