The colour and feel of spring is here...even if it’s still a wee bit cold
Plan your summer garden with Agnes Stevenson
Digging becomes tricky when you have a burn, a blister and a paper cut, all on one hand, so while looking for excuses not to wield a spade, I was almost pleased to discover that a bank vole had set up home in precisely that area of the garden that needs most attention.
Voles don’t live to any great age as owls and other predators are always waiting to pounce, but this might be the same one that last summer devoured my sanguisorbas one stalk at a time. Yet I’ve forgiven it because watching it emerge to snack on a seed then disappear under a layer of leaf litter only to pop up further along the border, has become my favourite form of amusement while I drink my morning tea.
Against a backdrop of urban spread and climate change, life is tough for the small creatures with which we share our gardens and so I’ve developed a degree of tolerance for their nibbling and gnawing habits.
I’m not sure that I share such benevolent feelings for the squirrels or mice that have been eating my tulip bulbs, but what should I have expected when I set out a containerised buffet of juicy bulbs in crumbly compost and then forgot to net the tops?
Last year I did the same and not one bulb was eaten, but this year half the bulbs have either been chewed or are missing, which means that there’s not going to be a great show in April. By then however other things will be doing their stuff, including the camellia that I have to cut back every summer to stop it blocking the light from the living room window, and the magnolia might even be in flower.
When we moved here four years ago we didn’t know there was a magnolia, even though it occupies centre spot in front of the kitchen window. It was
only when we hacked back the huge laurel hedge that we discovered the tree, so now we’ve cleared more of the area around it and taken out the flowering currant that grew hard against its trunk, to give it a chance to shine.
Underneath I’ve planted small daffodils, primroses and fritillaries, some of which have not yet been eaten, and so this corner of the garden is beginning to look springlike.
Close by a new flush of buds has opened on the Rhododendron ‘Christmas Cheer’.The last lot were wiped out by frost, but now more have taken their place and I’m enjoying this fresh splash of colour. I suspect that, unless I’m ruthless about cutting it back, this rhododendron will eventually grow too large for the spot where it is growing.
I haven’t made up my mind yet over whether I should move it now while it is still small enough to make the job easy or whether I should just leave it where it is!