… but both at the allotment and at home there are plentiful spiders, ladybirds, (bumble)bees of several types and even a couple of butterflies (a peacock – bit battered, and a comma)…

I made another bed today and started planting out some peas. More tomorrow, when some sunshine is forecasted. Need to clean up the shed once again or I will miss some of the seeds that I have not catalogued by month as they were used already and stored in tins.

More raspberry shoots today, if anyone is keen on experimenting, they might even fruit this year if transplanted quickly enough.

I arrive at the plot, climb to the shed and…

My gosh it’s light and airy!

gobsmacked, jaw dropping… there is virtually no holly on the bank over the plot on the left, and the elders whose flowering I was looking forward for my cordial have mostly gone too!

Maybe the new neighbour, maybe the council following my request to clear the banks from evergreens (mental note: leave the council alone in future)…

I was not sure whether to be pleased – which I really was – or disappointed – which I was also, a bit. But I spent most of the time looking at it. It was beautifully clean, light and airy, so different from before and will help a lot with the establishment of my besties’ hotel -which I forgot to tell you, I finished last weekend: voila’!

But the elders were a sorry sight after a rough job, and technically in my plot – I always feel a bit possessive of my plot as you should know by now…

No new signs of slugs on the seedlings tonight.

I have been for the first time after work yesterday, and then again today – very frustrating but at the same time it has been absolutely vital as slugs and snails (big, beautiful ones) seem to have found their way to my seedlings and have already cleared out four crops completely and another two or three partially: I had to plant out my cardoons in the hope that they will be safer in the ground than they were in the protected environment of the propagator!

Tonight I have sprinkled ferric phosphate all over the place and will keep my finger crossed and keep checking (tonight I squashed three of the nasty visitors). Sigh.

— Post From My iPhone

Over Easter I became an expert of bed-making. I made four; still have another four to go and I am a tinselly bit tired and sore, but you know… It’s that time of the year!

Anyway, if you do a big of gardening yourselves, you will know that it’s awfully expensive to buy pre-shaped wood to make beds. I am sure it is worthwhile and they will last forever, but I could never bring myself to buy any and then found myself with some old overlap panels – like the ones they sell at Wickes for next to nothing – from the fence at home. They are simply perfect for the job! As they are slightly rotten, they pull apart fairly easily. The overlapping wood makes fine bed walls and the battens, chopped to a suitable size, also have a role in keeping the bed walls in place. They look very nice and tidy and I am sure they will make gardening easier too, as the plot is clearly sectioned, and there are proper footpaths to walk on.

It is confirmed that the less you clear up your plot over winter, the more native ladybirds will like it: when I finally made it to pull dead leaves and sticks from my strawberries, there were a half dozen!

I have some raspberry shoots and gooseberry cuttings at various stages of rooting. Also mint and some peas Balmoral (50% germination) and Meteor (15% germination) if anyone is interested.

— Post From My iPhone

Suddenly the anxiety of having to do everything in the weekend because the week is off-limit was gone: British Summer Time! It was more relaxing doing what I have done for the last couple of months: digging and sowing, knowing that I will be able to go back evening after evening. Except if the weather is rubbish all the time as it has been since…

I am still very divided about the ducks: when I caught them mating in the pond I found it sweet, but when they came back later I shooshed them away and they went to lie on a neighbour’s black polithene sheet, as they have done all of last year.

My spawn at home was doing very well with almost-tadpoles wriggling inside the eggs of one of the clumps but then something happened and they may be dying, a feathery white fungus feeding on the decaying matter.

Finally tonight I finished and sent the first paper of my horticulture course.

Long weekend approaching, lots of gardening is going to be on the menu, but of late I am not too inspired about writing, as I do not seem to be able to find an interesting enough angle to what I do: after all gardening implies the same rituals to be repeated year after year after year…

It’s March 21st and definitely the start of spring: ladybirds busily hurrying about (all natives too!), the amazing green of new leaves just out of buds, spawn in the pond (at home) and… the mallards are back, three of them (at the allotment)!

I love those three ducks, they are so beautiful when they lazily pull themselves out of the water, or walk in. Neighbours might worry that they eat their vegetables (that’s the first thing my auntie said when I mentioned them) but I have done some research and here’s what the WWT says:

“Mallards are dabbling ducks and are usually seen looking for the leaves, shoots and seeds of water-based plants. When these are submerged, the ducks up-end yet it has been known for Mallards to graze grasses, including cereal plants, as well as to deliberately shake vegetation to loosen any seeds and invertebrates that were out of reach. Mallards will also eat insects and their larvae, small fish and when the need arises, will even eat small mammals. Their tolerance of people has allowed them to make the most of any food that is freely given.”

so they are more likely to be the reason why no frogs have taken residence in the allotment pond than to cause any damage with the veg.

And talking of frogs, last week was a hard one: as it rained for the first time since the good weather, all the frogs came out to breed and just down the road it was a massacre: I counted 9 killed, 1 wounded and in distress – very very unpleasant images are still at the back of my mind.

I had no idea I was so keen on frogs, but now I do, and this morning, when I spotted spawn in my home pond (which is tiny), I decided to dig another one and make a log pile, so that more of the slimy creatures can come and stay in my garden.

Over the week I learned other facts about them: they do not eat for the whole of the breeding time and they can drown while mating! Frogs have an urge to go back to the pond they were born into, so the few I rescued from the road were probably back shorly after I released them. In the UK there is a charity that monitors amphibian & reptiles.

Anyway, I finished long after dark, and the mother frog watched me closely all the time – I had never seen her so exposed before, usually they hide under vegetation.

At the allotment, I did up two beds, and sowed some seeds:

• beetroot
• agretti (I am trying again, never managed before)
• hollyhock
• thyme
• thai basil

and a few had started to come out

• cardoon
• chamomile lawn
• and some peas and tomatoes were on the point of…

The leeks have self-seeded massively, and are growing fast, so I am considering keeping the bed for one more season – they seem healthy, but that means I will have to make space somewhere for the cardoon next week, as it will be ready to transplant.

It was great to be out in the sun, and although probably tomorrow I won’t be able to move a single muscle, it was a great way to spend the first day of spring.

As I said last week everything is tidy and ready to burst into life, and it’s so good to look at and enjoy, except it’s NOT under control! This is the time of the year when all the gardening chores start to compete for my time, at home and the allotment, and I still have only the weekends to tackle them.

This weekend it was mostly the turn of my garden at home, where I planted some more bulbs, spring and summer ones. I found some tiny lovely irises – purple, that go very well with the plain yellow of dwarf daffodils. And I will give another go to lilies (the first time round they were decimated by slugs & snails…)

Then at the allotment I only managed to dig half a small bed.
My rotation plan tells me that – apart from where I already planted (alliaceae, Jerusalem artichokes & broadbeans, besides soft fruits & asparagus, and last year’s leek seedlings that are still apparently growing) and the potato & chilli beds weeded and covered – I currently have no clear beds to plant anything in the ground, so I can only sow in the greenhouse. This is a most inconvenient situation, as you can imagine, as there are at least a couple of vegs that I could sow in the ground now.

Which means that I fell behind once again: 8 beds still need weeding and clearing! I hope I manage by Easter…

— Post From My iPhone