Bees, Beans and Butter

The beans are in the ground. After a month of very settled and sunny weather, the beans are ready for planing out from their first home in the greenhouse. We made sure the ground was good and moist, then popped in runner beans around our mighty construction, with a dwarf variety, called 'butter bean' (confusingly) around the smaller frame.

Genie and I potted up a lot of the herbs, too. 

Some of the rescued strawberry plants went into the shallow stone trough, displacing a thyme plant, which was split and put into the 'rockery'.  I use quotes because the stones are there, but there are no rockery plants - something I want to rectify.

Genie sat on a nettle.

Rob kindly offered me some nematode slug control he had left over in a WhatsApp message. He said he put it on his strawberries. I said we prefer cream.  He treated this old joke with a dignified silence. Quite right.  

There was enough for most of the tender shoots in the veg plot, but I left one strawberry bed as a 'control'.

I was a bit too lazy on Sunday.  There were lots of jobs I could have got on with, but I wanted a proper rest having been somewhat poorly in the second half of the week.

The laurel over the stone seating area is in flower. The bees and furry hoverflies love it. So do I. The scent is subtly spicy, warm, and almost buttery (to my nose) and, with sound of the bees, makes a drowsy combination. The bush is too big for the location now and it leans over the seating area.  I need to think how I can shape it.  Not now though.  Too sleepy.

Blossom

This weekend, it's half a year since Pippy died. And here we are, all locked away from the World. And still the seasons roll and the blackthorn blossoms in the lanes.  Pippy would have a story for this, of course.  I know blackthorn, despite its beautiful flowers, has a sinister reputation in folklore, possibly derived from the long sharp spines, a stab from which can turn septic because of the tendency to leave a splinter in the wound.  The wood is dense and hard, burning like coal, and traditionally used for walking sticks and cudgels. Also witches wands.

So here it is, Prunus spinosa:

In the garden, the cherry and the apple trees blossom.  Also Prunus

Same family, Rosaceae, different genus, Mallus: the apple. This one is a Cox's orange pippin.  A stumpy little thing, only about 4ft tall, but very fruitful last year, while the three other apple trees in the plot seemed to concentrate on getting tall.  Come on, Pippin, the rhubarb is almost taller!

Lush, ain't it?  Plenty of room to hide elephant's eggs (I keep looking).

Look on My Works, Ye Mighty, and Despair

In Xanadu did Kubla Khan a stately pleasure dome decree

But I've got to get these beanpoles up and now it's half past three.

Shamed by Nature and Neighbours

Next door cut back their buddleia bush. I was shamed into tacking two in the border. Too warm for heavy trousers (I was happily lolling in a deck chair an hour earlier), I got my just deserts in the nettles.  

A hacked back buddleia is not an attractice thing.  Meanwhile, Nature puts on an effortless display. Aren't we all arrogant.

Tidying and Playing

A late start yesterday, but I've run out of excuses not to tidy the path into the veg plot.  Genie livened things up later by pretending to do some work:

We had a go at making a bean wigwam (in anticipation of the yet-to-show runner bean plants).  Couldn't find a roll of string for love nor money, but found some electrical wire ties.  Not massively pleased with the semi-completed result, but we've got a little while yet to improve it.

Raking the Moss out of the Moss

Fixed the 'rake' attachment to the scarifier and raked the small lawn.  More moss than grass.  The moss box on the machine is too small to be much use for a job this size.

Remembering Pippy and her love of making little heaps when raking the lawn in Hornby:

In the afternoon, Genie helped me lay some stumps as stepping 'stones' in the veg plot (trying not to disturb the onions sets just peeping out of the ground now).

A Warm Day for Worm Work

Dug over one of the two enclosed beds.

..and cleared under the birch tree. Easier climbing in than out again!

Meanwhile, the rest of the garden is not waiting for tidying.

Un-pottering

I ignored my own advice to tackle on job at once.  There's too much to do! Today, much weeding. Genie took some of the many new strawberry plants and potted them up.

I concentrated on weeds and our early crop of dandelions and brambles.  Cleared under the veg plot Acer (every veg plot should have one), around the compost bins and the paths around the blackcurrants.  I put a line of bricks to divide up the veggies - not a good job - taking in too many tasks at once.   It's not organised enough for pottering yet!

Planting, Path, Patio

Yesterday, we planted a few seeds for carrots, beetroot and lettuce. Just a few so we can plant more later and avoid a glut (I should be so lucky).

Today, I added a few feet of kerb to the path behind the tall wall to keep the soil off the path and widen it a little.

I finally finished clearing a heap of brambles from the patio. This has taken three wheelie bins. Well, the same wheelie bin three times.  The patio needs re-laying, but not today!