I'm getting excited about the year ahead
There are several shrubs around the garden which are still giving a floral display, Viburnum bodnantense
'Dawn' and Choisya ternata, both with their heady perfume. Fatsia japonica with its almost prehistoriclooking flowers and mahonia 'Charity', whose sulphur-yellow blooms are just beginning to open. We've even got a few roses still producing flowers. A couple of chilly nights meant the new heating in the greenhouse has been used for the first time. I've cuttings of penstemons,
Verbena bonariensis,
lavender and perennial salvias that all need a bit of protection, along with some ragged robin and nigella seedlings I’m growing on, ready to be planted out in the wildflower area next spring, and some lupin seedlings – just in case I need any replacements next year.
The wild bird feeding stations are extremely busy at the moment and the tits seem to have had a very successful breeding season, as the garden is alive with them. They’re particularly fond of the peanuts we provide this time of year.
Rather than using conventional feeders, we try to make them more easily accessible by putting them in open-fronted nest boxes and the constant stream of blue tits, coal tits and great tits, together with magpies, jackdaws, jays and even blackbirds means we have to refill them every day.
The pond has had a thorough tidying, with all the iris cut back and old water lily leaves removed before they begin to decay.
Pete has also tidied up the shrubs that form our front boundary. It's made up of a mixture of large yew, elaeagnus, viburnum and choisya. He uses long-reach loppers, which make the job
much easier and saves the need for ladders close to a busy road.
We do have a few projects planned for the year ahead. The gravel path is in need of a top-up; The new border that we created at the end of the garden a couple of years ago has a path in front of it which, up until now, has only ever had a temporary surfacing with conifer litter, which is beginning to rot down, and now needs a more permanent solution. In the front garden the box parterre is, as the years go by, becoming more difficult to maintain and so needs a rethink. I’ve already decided what I’ll be growing in my little veg garden so there’ll be lots of seed sowing to look forward to. That's the wonderful thing
about gardening – there's always something new to get excited about.