Back in the back forty

Time today for a bit more housekeeping. In the house, you ask? No. Never mind the bloody house. No, back in the “back forty” (ha, ha).

I really should have taken a photo a month ago when the daffs were in full bloom all over the back. (One flowering thing bloody Bambo won’t eat.) It looked fabulous. Now it’s time to trim them all back.

One thing, now that I’m looking properly, is growing (and growing) increasingly clear: the weeds didn’t get (or perhaps did not read) the memo. This is a rock garden, featuring heather and lavender. No other vegetation need apply.

Well, except ferns. We like ferns. Wherever they wish to pop up they are very welcome.

As for the rest, they’ve got to go. So I start weeding.

What, I hear you ask, does the broom have to do with anything? It is actually playing quite an important role. It is allowing me to sweep away the bloody pine needles (which, moistened over winter and adhering together like mud, are encouraging weeds to spring up apparently out of nowhere).

Two hours later, much better. There’s still a considerable amount to do back here, but I think it’s time to kick Stella off the zero gravity chair, make a cup of tea and read the paper.

For now, job done.

The bees' needs

If I have a gardening philosophy it’s this.

In the absence of any innate ability, I find a philosophy is useful.

Of course, the keeping calm part was a challenge last year, after this bastard got into and wreaked havoc in the garden.

Bee friendly, on the other hand, has remained my buzz phrase. Furthering that goal was job one this Easter weekend.

Thanks to Cec (who is now – hurrah! – staying on the island), I have another yard of sea soil, which I can put to good use.

We begin, not in the garden, but in the back forty (as if I have forty acres – ha!).

As you may (or may not) recall, back in 2012 I had some trees felled.

The rounds were duly chopped and have by now been burned over the intervening winters. The ground remained covered in branches. After two years I accepted that these would never biodegrade during my lifetime, so I hired someone to help me clear them. Then I set about “landscaping”.

Rocks, as you can see, are a big feature. With no fence (not that that stopped frigging Bambo last year), planting options were limited. Deer do not eat daffs, so lots of those went in the ground last autumn. (Is it just me or do I definitely need more pink flamingos back here?)

As a rule (which can be broken), deer do not eat heather or lavender, so I planted both. Bees are very partial to lavender.

I was delighted to discover that another plant deer generally leave alone is my old bee-friendly favourite, the Ceanothus. (Which, as I was informed today, is also known as a California lilac, a name I’ve decided I prefer.)  

So, job one today was digging a hole in the rock-encrusted so-called soil, filling it with sea soil and adding a new California lilac.

This is the third one I’ve planted out back. Eventually, I suspect, there will be more.