A few wildlife jobs on the allotment

Last week was a chilly week with snow again, but earlier in the week before the snow came we tackled a few wildlife jobs on the allotment.

The woodland area at the top of the allotment is an area where we can't grow anything because of the big sycamore tree which dominates. The good thing about this is that it provides a home for a lot of wildlife. I've written before about how we cleared the area to make somewhere for the grandchildren to play. They are teenagers now  and are no longer interested, but I still love this area. 

Our seating area is just below the big tree and when we sit there having our tea breaks there is so much activity from the birds flying in and out. There is a privet hedge behind the tree between our plot and the next one up. Also there is elder which provides us with lovely blossom in the spring and berries in the autumn. I pick the blossom  to use when I am making jam. It goes well in gooseberry or strawberry jam. 

When I first created this wildlife area I planted bulbs and shade loving plants. There are crocuses, snowdrops, Tete a Tete daffodils and bluebells. The bluebells do well and I am happy for them to spread. I've tried to get some foxgloves going too. 

The downside of the sycamore tree is all the leaves which fall all over the plot in the autumn and need clearing up especially from the paths. I don't clear them from under the hedge and around the base of the tree and any other nooks and crannies. Then in the spring the plot is covered with the little sycamore spinning Jenny seeds which fall everywhere then germinate and I am constantly trying to hoe them out.

The tete a tete and crocuses are flowering now and I can see the new growth of the  woodland plants I put in there.  Soon it will look more colourful like the picture below which was taken last year when all the euphorbias were out. I like them but they tend to take over, popping up all over the place as they send out runners underground. 

Last week I did one of the  jobs I do on the allotment every year at this time. That is to have a bit of a tidy up in the woodland area. It might seem the wrong thing to do, to tidy up a wildlife area, but it needs to be kept under control so that the weeds don't start to encroach on the vegetable beds and the rest of the allotment. And I pull up those euphorbias from places where they are not wanted. When it has all been tidied up I put bark chippings down on the pathway which goes around the tree. At the moment there are no chippings available to use so I am waiting for some to be dumped on the allotment site. Then it will be a race with our wheelbarrows as we and  all the other plot holders get their share of them.

Our other wildlife area is the pond. We built this a few years ago out of an old tin bath which was left on the allotment by the previous tenant. It was in good condition with no holes. We have had frog spawn each year which is always exciting. I give it a clean out every year in the spring to get rid of leaves and excess mud. 

This year I did the same, it was in a bit of a bad state with overgrown pond plants which I removed. Then I set to scooping out some of the excess mud and added more water as the water level was quite low. I soon realized that the pond was leaking because of a hole in the side where the metal had rusted. So we decided instead of getting rid of the tin bath we would leave it in place and put a pond liner in it. This was Richard's job last weekend. It wasn't as big a job as as I had thought and he completed it in one afternoon.

He needed to empty the bath completely of the stones and mud and to our delight he found frogs in the mud at the bottom and another one under one of the big stones around the edge. 

There must have been about four frogs and we think a toad. We kept them safe in a bucket while he finished off lining the pond and when the stones were back in place I gently popped them back into the pond. It must have been a bit of a shock to them, to be wakened up from their hibernation. We're hoping we haven't upset them too much and when the weather warms up will soon have  spawn back in the pond.

Our new garden project 5--creating a woodland and stumpery

Once the seating area in our new garden was completed, the next phase in our garden project was to do something with the bottom left hand corner of the garden.  This is the bit just below the seating area. We spent quite some time thinking what to do here. The silver birch tree had been planted near to the fence and the rest of the space was just grass. Should we leave it grassed or should we have a planting area?

A bit of digging revealed that right down in the bottom corner was just stones. We had come across this problem when we had done the other side of the garden and had turned that corner into a bird feeding area. I didn't need another bird feeding area, so I decided that I would plant a few shrubs just below the seating area and the silver birch tree and put some logs and tree stumps in the stony corner where it was impossible to plant anything. This would create a little woodland stumpery and wildlife area.  I have seen stumperies when we have visited open gardens and often thought I would like to build one.

        

We had a few tree stumps down at the allotment which we brought back to the garden and arranged in the corner. I obtained another stump from our local builders merchants where we buy a lot of the materials for our garden project. I spotted the stump amongst a pile of logs and asked if it was for sale.  They very kindly said I could have it for free. So that made me very happy.

Over the winter I planted a few shrubs-- a yellow stemmed dogwood, a contorted Hazel a witch hazel and a choiysia.

In the spring I planted crocus, mini daffodils, snowdrops and hellebores. There are some ferns around the tree stumps. In the bottom corner where the stony ground is I had to leave the ferns in pots but I was able to plant others in the ground away from the stones.

In a previous blog post I wrote about bringing plants from my old garden and I had a lovely time planting up the stumpery with foxgloves, aquilegia, pulmonaria, tellima, to name a few. To finish off the soil was covered with a layer of bark chippings which gives a nice woodland look. I am going to put a few stepping stones down to avoid having to keep walking on the soil as it is quite a big bed. 

  

I'm quite pleased with this little garden area, it should look good once the plants are more established and hopefully will attract the wildlife. 

Through the garden gate in January

There's not a lot you can do in the garden in January and being such a long, dull, dark and dreary month, if you like to be out gardening it can be quite depressing.

But I find signs of hope as I wander around. The snowdrops are peeping through the soil now, so I know it won't be long before they are in flower. Walking around the garden I can also see the crocus and daffodils poking through the soil. Soon there will be little clumps of colour, it's something to look forward to.

I like to plant up pots of bulbs as well as having them in the garden borders. So I went off to the garden centre recently and bought little pots of snowdrops and  crocus to plant up. They will go on the garden table or potting benches.

I did some tidying up in the woodland garden last week.  It gets full of leaves from the lime tree, and although they do provide a good mulch,there are lots of little bulbs in the ground which get hidden. So I cleared the leaves away from the areas where the bulbs are coming through so that we will get a good display in a few weeks. There's also a hellebore plant which has big buds on now and will be in flower soon. I cut off the leaves to expose the flower buds. Hellebores are quite hardy and can manage without the protection of their big leaves which hide the flowers.

Around the garden borders there are still a lot of leaves, debris, dead plants and seedheads. I will gradually clear these over the next few weeks to get ready for spring.

Richard has been doing repairs to paths and fences over the last week or two. In the woodland garden he made a new fence panel to replace one which had blown down and fallen to pieces in the bad weather.  The wooden path through the woodland area was rotting  and he has repaired that too. Another path through the garden down to the drive was breaking up, so he has redone that with gravel. It looks really good and is much easier to walk on now.

So although January may seem like a month where there is not much to do in the garden, we have been keeping ourselves busy. What about you?

This monthly post is  linking to 'Through the garden gate' on Sarah's blog Down by the Sea

A few little jobs

On Saturday I popped down to the allotment  to do a couple of jobs whilst Richard was busy in the garden doing repairs to the fence. I went just to fill up the bird feeders, pull some leeks and the last of the cabbages. But once I was there, I decided to hoe and tidy the beds where I had been pulling up the veg. Then I decided to give the leeks a boost with some chicken manure pellets. I also noticed that the purple sprouting broccoli needed staking so I sorted that out too. There are always jobs to be done even in the winter.

When I arrived at the allotment site there was a pile of bark shreddings on the car park which had been left for the allotment people to take. I was quite pleased about that as I had been wanting to renew the bark mulch which I had put down on the path through the woodland wildlife area at the top of our plot.

The woodland wildlife area was originally made as a play area and den for the grandchildren. But they have grown a little older and have lost interest  in the allotment. Not me though, I love this little space. There is a bug hotel, a nest box on the big sycamore tree and shade and woodland loving plants. There's an old bench at the top, where it's good to sit and look down on the allotment. I found that putting the bark down has helped to suppress the weeds and it looks good too.

So another job I decided to do was to take a couple of barrow loads of bark from the pile on the car park. We both returned on Sunday to continue with the work, Richard barrowing the bark whilst I did a bit of tidying up and then spreading out the bark. The woodland garden is looking much better now.

Through the garden gate

This week I am joining with Sarah at Down by the Sea for her monthly garden slot--'Through the Garden Gate'. In this slot you are invited through the gate into my garden.

This is the gate which leads out of my garden, but I thought I would show it to you as I rather like this view. Of course the photo  was taken in the summer, but it's good to remind myself in the dreary winter months when there's not much colour in the garden that things do get better.

As we move through February and into March I am now looking forward to new growth in the garden. I am also thinking about new projects and plans I have for this year.

It's taken me a few weeks but I have finally finished clearing the borders of all the dead plant material in both the front and back gardens. The work never ends though, I'm sure in a week or two I will be starting again with the weeding. As I worked in the borders I noticed areas which needed re planning, some of them I have been thinking about for a while and am not sure what to do about them.  They keep getting put off each year.

In the front garden there is a bed where at the end of last year we removed a couple of very old and tired looking hydrangeas and lots of crocosmias. Crocosmias are really difficult to get rid off so I know they will keep reappearing . But I now have a big space in this bed and I'm wondering what to plant there.

At the moment I am enjoying the spots of colour coming from the tete a tete daffodils, but as I look around I can see other flowers just starting to open up. There's pulmonaria, anemone blanda and vinca-- lots of blue. Also there's a euphorbia with yellow bracts providing a bit of brightness in the shady areas. The back garden has a lot of shade and I have to work with that and just see what will grow. Spring  is usually a good time for these areas, before the trees get into full leaf.

cyclamen and snowdrops in a shady spot

Here's another gate in my garden. it leads into what we call the woodland garden.  There's only one tree, a lime tree but it's big and so the area gets very shady in the summer.  I've got three white foxgloves  to plant which a gardening friend grew from seed.  I think they will look lovely in the woodland garden later in the year.  In the meantime the daffodils and crocus are looking good.

Woodland planting

 The woodland area in our garden tends to get a bit neglected. That's because it's hidden away at the top of the garden through a little gate. I clear it up about two or three times a year. But as it's a bit of a wildlife area it doesn't look too bad for being left to look after itself. Spring is the time when It gets its first tidy up. There are lots of crocuses which start to emerge about now so I like to clear up all the leaves and tree branches which have fallen during the autumn and winter and reveal some colour from these flowers. There's ivy, vinca and honeysuckle scrambling along the fence too which always need cutting back. I noticed this week that the vinca is flowering, I love those little blue flowers at this time of year. There's also a clump of hellebores which is looking lovely.

I started the clear up last week. Once I'd cleared away all the debris and done the cutting back I was able to see what else is coming through and soon to flower. There was a small clump of mini daffodils amongst the crocus. I thought some snowdrops were needed, every woodland garden should have snowdrops. I planted three little pots, but they looked lost--you don't get many snowdrops in a little pot. I shall have to get more. I also bought some trays of tete a tete daffodils for some more instant colour. Holly the cat joined me as I planted and must have thought it was some sort of game as she kept digging up the bulbs--naughty cat!

Planting  so early in the year I had to be careful of not disturbing any other plants which had not started to show through.  The soil is  a bit compacted with roots which can make planting difficult.   Plant labels always seem to disappear through the winter and I often struggle to remember what is in there. What are those tiny leaves just poking through the soil? Ah yes I know--Brunnera!
It's looking much better now, more colourful and very spring like.

Watching and waiting

There's a lot of watching and waiting going on in the garden and the allotment  at the moment. I'm watching the weather each day to see if it's OK to dig or hoe the soil. Can't do that if the soil is frozen. I'm watching the weather reports --waiting for the weather to warm up, planning the week ahead--can we go to the allotment? Is it going to be dry? We 've actually had some really lovely dry days this last week . Cold but not enough to stop us working, and sunny too. There's so much I want to do but it's too early. But there are other things I can do while I'm waiting.

I've been watching for signs of Spring--new shoots emerging . And I've seen them! In the woodland garden at home the crocus are there almost ready to flower, the hellebores are flowering and the daffodils are poking their heads through the soil. So are the bluebells, but that's a few months away yet. At the allotment the primroses are flowering under the big tree and the bulbs pots I planted last year are emerging again--mini daffodils, crocus, snowdrops.

I've been watching the birds. There are lots about in the garden and the allotment. I have put up some bird feeders on the allotments. Plot 8 is just so full of birds it's wonderful to watch them in the hedge and on the feeders. There are sparrows in the privet behind the shed--so much activity there. There are birds in the shed roof too, we can hear them. I joined the RSPB after I'd done the Big Garden Bird Watch and I got a bird nest box as part of my new members pack. Richard fixed it to the big tree so we will be watching for signs of activity in there.

Watching and waiting. The allotments are quiet at the moment but there is a feeling that something will happen soon. The weather will warm up and work will begin. This waiting time is good in a way because it gives us chance to catch up with other jobs which sometimes get neglected when there's a lot of sowing, planting and growing to do. This week I have been cutting back a spirea which grows  against the fence in different places around the plot. In some places it's a bit of a nuisance, it seems to have taken over and gets in the way when we are working. So I've cut it right back and I'm going to plant something like a clematis or honeysuckle which will scramble along the fence between ours and the next door plot. I've also done some work in the woodland garden at home, clearing up debris, cutting back and planting  snowdrops. My next job is to clean out the growhouses.

Soon everything will burst into life and all the hard work will begin, in the meantime I'm enjoying the peace and calm that the watching and waiting brings.

 

Making a woodland garden

The first day of the half term holidays, Helen and the grandchildren arrived to whisk me off to the allotment.  I was surprised. Firstly because it was raining and secondly because the children are not usually so enthusiastic about going to the allotment.  Gardening with children is often a bit hit and miss, so when they are keen to go it's best to encourage them. And I had a few jobs for them to do which I thought they would enjoy.

Last year I helped them to make a woodland den at the top of plot 8. It's an area where we can't grow any fruit or vegetables, there's a big sycamore tree, an elder bush and a holly, with a privet hedge along the plot boundary at the top and lots of ivy. The ground slopes down from the privet hedge forming a steep bank. Last year this bank was full of weeds, but I thought we could make a woodland wildlife garden here.  There are a lot of birds about in the trees and shrubs, we have put bird feeders up around the plot and built a bug house.

A couple of weeks ago I tried digging the soil in this area. As I expected, it was full of roots from the trees and shrubs, but after getting rid of some weeds I did find some pockets of soil where I could dig to some depth. So I cleared a few patches where I thought we could grow some woodland plants and made a start by planting some pots of spring bulbs, crocus, snowdrops, tete a tete narcissus and also some bluebells which Richard had dug up last year when he was clearing some of the ground in another part of the plot.

When we arrived at the allotment this week the grandchildren were quite enthusiastic about having a garden area in and around their den.  They set to work defining these planting spots with stones and pebbles and making paths.  Somehow I managed to end up being the labourer, collecting buckets of stones. We also planted up another little border with spring flowers.

By the time they had finished their jobs, it was all looking really good. I'm looking forward to seeing the woodland garden spring into life soon and we will be adding more plants as time goes on.

Secret garden

I often talk about our woodland garden. It sounds a bit grand to have a woodland garden, but mine is nothing like that. It's just an attempt at a little woodland space.  There's only one tree in it, a massive lime, but there are other trees around in neighbours' gardens which all help to create the shade.

The woodland garden was created a few years ago when my husband had the idea of doing something with a small, unused and very rough area at the top end of the garden.  The area is elevated looking down onto the drive and garage. There had been a compost bin beyond the tree, a very rickety fence and a sloping boggy path leading to the compost bin, all a bit treacherous at times.We decided to move the compost bin and have a new composting area in another part of the garden. This provided us with lots of lovely compost to use to improve the soil in the woodland area. Richard made a new fence, and because it is a sloping site, a stepped wooden boardwalk type of path running alongside it.

I loved planting up the border, which was surprisingly quite large. I planted shade loving plants taken from cuttings in other parts of the garden and I  looked around the garden centres for woodland plants. The area gets some sunshine for part of the day. Early in the year spring bulbs do very well, snowdrops, crocus, daffodils followed by primroses and bluebells. Later on dicentras, hardy geraniums, Solomon's seal and aquilegia bring in some colour. From about July onwards, when the trees are in full leaf the woodland garden becomes less colourful and more shady and the ferns take over the show.

As the garden has developed it has become not just a woodland garden but a secret garden.  It's hidden away at the top of the main garden, accessed through a little gate. We put the gate there to stop the grandchildren from getting in when they were younger as we were worried they would try to climb over the fence onto the garage roof. They can now open the gate themselves and there's no stopping them, they love going down into that secret place.

I often visit other gardens and if there is a woodland area I like to get ideas for planting.  But I've noticed that 'proper' woodland gardens are very shady and are often left to nature.  Mine is very full of shade loving garden plants. I wonder if I have gone overboard with the planting.  One day I might redo the border, if I ever have the time. But for now I quite like it as it is.