Newsletter
I treated myself to Christopher Lloyd's classic text 'The Well-Tempered Garden' a few weeks ago and have been dipping into it on and off. Visiting Great Dixter was an exercise in free-thinking and this book has much the same effect. It's a
Newsletter
I'm delivering my first evening talk tonight at Frodsham Gardening Club. The presentation is ready, with lots of pictures from GOTY, the nursery and the garden and it does look pretty good, if I say so myself. All would be well except that I have a streaming cold,
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We've moved the bird table and feeders onto the patio, right outside our office area and crammed them with seeds. The birds are loving it and we are getting next to nothing done - the entertainment outside the window is far too good. Our top visitor so far is
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It's not that I have no news, it's just that there is so little to illustrate it with - and I write better with pictures. November is an essentially drab month and we seem to be on a perpetual clean up campaign in the nursery and garden.
Newsletter
With the days shortening, my winter persona emerges. It's probably there all the time, latent and lurking, waiting for the sun to dip below the tree line, waiting for darkness to send me scurrying indoors at 4.30pm and cabin up for another long night. This winter alter-
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The clocks went back this morning at 2am. Now that I am at liberty to work the hours I choose, I am not going to complain about the change this year, since I can choose to start an hour earlier if I wish. But this doesn't change the
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In our endeavour to reduce both our carbon footprint and waste we are experimenting with biodegradeable pots. These are made from some kind of fibre pulp, then glazed to protect it. The idea is that they will last as long as the glaze is intact, but once this is broken
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The tree pictured above is Heptacodium miconioides. Never heard of it? Nor had I until a week ago. In the front garden of the cottage is a gorgeous small tree, half hidden behind other greenery. I've been admiring it all summer, mainly through the bathroom window, with its
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The first cold snap of the year arrived just days after we closed for the year. It seems early to be waking to icy mornings - the clocks don't go back for another week. Annoyingly, a niggling tennis elbow problem I've had for some years has flared
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One of the loveliest plants in the garden waited until the visitors had gone for the year before revealing its beauty. Leucanthemella serotina is a simple white daisy, but with the faintest tint of lemony green and an ethereal luminescence about it which shines out in the low autumnal light.
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I spent Friday shifting piles of heavy turf from the top lawn to a smart new turf stack in the meadow - the opening salvo for our winter development project plan - of which more later. A very strenuous task but once I got going it felt good and was made all
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After two weeks of glorious sunshine, summer signalled its end with two cold nights - enough for ice on Debbie's car in south Manchester. We had no frost here - we are closer to the sea and to sea level, but still cold enough for us to bring in the