April 2020-Lockdown

Here we are in week 5 of the lockdown and life is not the same as usual. Following the government guidelines, I clearly can’t do my job from home and as I work on my own in my customers’ gardens I have mostly carried on. I know some people in the garden industry have been forced to give up because they need access through the house and others have received abuse for working when they are not key workers.

I am feeling so lucky to be living in a friendly village in a rural environment. Sometimes it feels different with no children to get to school and driving along empty roads to work, quite nice actually, and sometimes it’s just the same as I sow seeds, and pull out weeds with just the birds for company.

At home, with my family it feels normal, then I realise that I can’t  go anywhere. I would like to be able to visit open gardens, bluebell woods and the sea.  I don’t know if it is a coincidence, but since the lockdown began we have nearly endless blue skies and sunshine. This has no doubt helped the fantastic show of blossom this year, hence all the pictures! Apple, cherry and pear so far.

Lots more cherry blossom pictures to come.

With the endless rain earlier in the year and now the endless sunshine, the weeds are really growing fast now. It is difficult to balance the time spent sowing seeds, planting out (I’ve risked some beans this week) watering and keeping on top of the weeding.

Beetroot, lettuce, chard and broad, runner and French beans are in the ground, with a few in reserve just in case. I’ve got courgettes, squashes, cosmos and ammi in the polytunnel and dahlia seedlings inside on the windowsill. No show yet for the tomatoes, chillies and giant pumpkins. Maybe I should stop poking them!

I’m very excited because I have a delivery of compost coming this weekend, so I really must get on with potting up the new dahlias that I ordered this year.

Enough cherry blossom! This week I have been harvesting herbs and rocket from the garden and purple sprouting broccoli from the allotment.

It still feels like a strange juxtaposition that that normal life has ground to a halt for us but the plants are still growing, the potatoes are showing today, and the birds are busy feeding the next generation.

Mr blackbird has been very busy.

We have no idea of and end in sight at the moment so we just have to keep going and keep growing!

Easter 2020

It is mid April and everything is bursting into life, as it should be, but the reality for us is anything but normal. Across the whole world, countries, including the UK, are in lockdown because of the Covid19 pandemic. With a large percentage of the population confined to home, and a settled spell of fine weather those who are lucky enough to have one have been out in the garden. And I am no exception.

Looking back, the last blog was March 3rd so I’ll try and catch up a bit. This is Berberis Darwinii looking good in early March.

I have been managing to carry on gardening for most of my customers as I tend to be on my own and away from the houses anyway. Here are the daffodils at one of my larger gardens and a new garden structure which I am rather fond of.

The daffodils were followed by a fantastic show of other bulbs in the grass. Muscari, Anemone blanda, Scilla and Chionodoxa. They always are but that doesn’t stop me being excited and taking photos every year!

New Acer leaves.

It stayed cold for so long that I managed to hold off sowing seeds until the very end of March and beginning of April. But the weeds started growing so I weeded, gave  the lawn edges their first trim of the year and divided and moved a few perennials.

Fast forward a couple of weeks and it feels like it has been hot and sunny forever. The tulips are out at the pub which has temporarily morphed into a local shop. I have been sowing seeds in the greenhouse (not mine) to hopefully produce some crops that can be sold to the shop’s customers.

So far the cumin is doing well!

At home, we have moved the polytunnel  back a bit, here it is before and during the move, and put a replacement cover on because the old one was full of holes. This has created a bigger vegetable patch and honestly I have been sorting through my pots and it looks a lot better than this now.

Inside the polytunnel, I have sown most of my seeds now including the more tender vegetables like tomatoes and squashes and the half hardy annuals such as cosmos and zinnia. Dahlia seeds are inside on the window sill. The sunflowers, sown a week ago, have come up already. As you can see it is also used for storing guinea pig supplies which is not ideal.

Just the rest of the garden to do now before everything needs pricking out!

This cuckoo flower has sprung up in the lawn, quite a large patch, as if to emphasise how damp it has been, right near to the house.

Tonight it rained, which has filled up the water butt and hopefully gone down into the soil as far as the potatoes. I am so grateful to have my garden and live in such a nice place so staying hasn’t been such a chore and there is still lots more to do to keep me busy.