Sunday 13 March 2016

Spring garden

The sun is out and it isn't quite as cold as it has been. Husband is off watching Charlton play so I thought it was a good time for some garden spring-cleaning.

There is the most enormous pile of dead cuttings; my lovely Uncle helped us severely prune some bushes/shrubs last year, unfortunately the chainsaw gave out before we were done, so we've been letting the discarded tree limbs dry out to dispose of them. This has been immensely popular with the foxes, squirrels and garden birds - but all good things must come to an end. I spent half an hour trying to trim away; unfortunately this seems to be a two person job as I have to sit down to do this and it means I can't really reach any twigs to chop.

Big twig pile
My little pile
There are all sorts of wildlife out in the garden - mostly the birds, I noticed Mr Blackbird hopping around where I'd been chopping up twigs to see what bugs I had disturbed. The little birds have been out a lot today as the parakeets and the pigeons were taking the morning off. As soon as I went out in the garden a heap of pigeons appeared to see if I was going to put some food out (or not).





The garden wildlife are now stepping up into the 'eating us out of house and home' phase of the year. The bird seed (etc.) comes via Amazon's "Spend and Save" but isn't due for another month... left to their own devices the birds and squirrels would get through that a long time before four weeks elapse.

Unfortunately the only thing that isn't blooming (quite literally) in the garden are plants. The hydrangea seems to have died over the last year - I bought MiL a new one for Mother's Day but the old one has to be removed first. The crocuses and daffodils that once used to grace the garden are a thing of the past as between them the squirrels and foxes have dug up and consumed all the bulbs.


As good as it gets is the plum tree, bursting with blossom and it will be bursting with plums later in the year which fall to the ground and get eaten by the avian population.