Have scythe, will travel!

My new shed

 At the beginning of July my friend, Karen, and I went shed shopping, as she wanted a new shed too. After the disastrous experience with my on-line shed purchase, I decided to ‘shop local’ and as there was a highly recommended timber yard near Frome, off we went. The builders had put down a concrete base suitable for an 8’ x 6’ shed and I thought I would buy another apex shed but when I saw the ‘Sunflower’ potting shed I completely changed my mind! With our sheds duly ordered we sat back to await delivery, quoted as being 3 – 5 weeks. I’d opted to have my shed erected by their contractor rather than try to round up help of my own, but Karen and Ade were going to self-erect theirs.

The finished shed - exterior

On 13^th August at 7.30am, on a day predicted to be one of the hottest of the year so far, the sheds were delivered and the contractor and his 14-year-old son got straight to work. There was much sawing and banging from the bottom of the garden and by 10.15am my shed was up and finished! I couldn’t believe how quickly it had all gone together. Since then, I have put in shelving under the potting bench and a long shelf up high on the opposite wall plus tool hanging brackets on the wall opposite the door. I love my new shed and aim to spend quite a bit of time in there once the weather cools off a bit.

The finished shed - interior

During the incredibly hot, dry summer I have been battling an infestation of red mite in my chicken house. They are horrible, blood-sucking parasites that hide in the cracks and crevices in a hen house during the day and then feast on the chickens at night! I had tried pretty much every treatment available to me and still they multiplied. I suspected that the death of one of my young hens was due to acute anaemia and so I closed up the hen house and made a temporary outdoor perch in the secure, covered chicken run. The hens took to this arrangement remarkably well, even laying their eggs in the cardboard box I’d supplied as a temporary laying box. I think they quite enjoyed camping out while it was so hot! Knowing that the good weather would not last I ordered a new plastic hen house, manufactured in this country from waste farm plastics (silage wrap, etc) and much less likely to harbour red mite than the wooden house I’d had previously. After a couple of days of having to be put to bed after dark, the girls have got the hang of the new house and seem to be happy with their new accommodation.

The new chicken house arrives

New chicken house in position

The remains of the old chicken house!

Right at the beginning of August Jeni asked if I would like to go away for a couple of days to Moreton-in-Marsh in the Cotswolds. Her ulterior motive was that they had won an online auction for a couple of stools for their new kitchen breakfast bar and they were at an auction house in Moreton and needed to be collected, but I thought it would be lovely to stay in an hotel overnight, have a nice evening meal and then go on to Hidcote Manor to visit the gardens on the Saturday, so readily agreed.

Our hotel in Moreton

Hotel bedroom

Hidcote Manor gardens were interesting although, owing to the ongoing drought and their policy of only occasional watering, a lot of the plants were past their best. Jeni took many photos of plants that were coping best with the dry conditions to add to her portfolio of work for her Garden Design Diploma, which is now nearing an end. Although she has been struggling with her fibromyalgia throughout the course, I am very proud of her determination to keep going and do her best with each project.

This tree was home to wild honey bees

The 'hive' entrance

A week later I was back on the road again and heading north to Sheffield to stay with my sister and brother-in-law for a few days. Lynda had half jokingly asked if I could bring my scythe to cut her wild flower meadow aka the lawn, so I loaded up the scythe and sharpening tools, packed a few clothing essentials and off I went! I broke my journey at a hotel near Coventry which was not quite as lovely as the previous week’s one, but did do a very nice evening meal. Breakfast was not very inspiring but I knew Lynda and Paul would feed me very well when I got there, so a coffee and a croissant was quite sufficient! My brother, Richard, was also there over the weekend and we all went for a lovely walk along the river in Calver, where they used to live, before stopping off for a restorative drink at the pub.

The Family - Rich, Paul, Lynda & Victoria

The next day we went to the Yorkshire Sculpture Park near Doncaster, which is a lovely place to visit, if you’re in the vicinity. There are many permanent displays by the likes of Barbara Hepworth and Henry Moore but also an indoor space for visiting exhibitions. The one on display at the moment is of modern Native American art and was very interesting – I particularly liked the ceramic figures. In a decommissioned chapel there was an installation made of sheep’s wool, which actually looked quite menacing with its multiple ‘feet’ made from hand shears.

Flowing wool sculpture

Terracotta figure

Terracotta mother & child

Lynda and Paul looked after their grandsons on Monday and Tuesday and we took them on an open top bus ride from Calver to Castleton and back, hopping off at Hathersage for lunch and a play in the park. The following day we went to Manor Lodge Park in Sheffield, the scene of Mary Queen of Scots’ incarceration for many years. The boys got busy with interactive games based on codes and secret messages and then played in the park area while we sat in the shade and drank tea – all very civilised!

The view from the top of the bus

Having scythed the lawn so that the mower could cope with the residue, I repacked my car and headed homeward. I decided to do the whole journey in one go with a couple of comfort stops along the way, so it took me about 6 hours to get home, but was quite an easy drive once I’d negotiated the M1 and M69 and got back on the Fosse Way. It felt good to be back on the road again – I still miss my WWOOFing days!

The lawn - before ...

... and after!

Garden Progress

My new wildlife pond

 

While I was looking after Reg and the cats back in late April my team of builders returned to put in some concrete infrastructure in my garden. Since I got the first shed, nearly two years ago, I have wanted another one to site at the bottom of the garden where I can store garden tools and chicken feed and bedding. I also wanted to replace and extend the cracked and uneven concrete path from the back door to two thirds of the way down the garden and put in footings for an 8 foot x 10 foot greenhouse (also on my future wish list). I felt that once these major bits of construction had happened the garden could be left to settle and repair itself with no more mini diggers, stump grinders etc to dig up and/or compact the soil.

The old path

The new extended path

During one early morning discussion I also decided to let the builders put a concrete hard standing area between the back of the existing shed and the front of the proposed green house. I had originally thought to extend the paving slabs from under the shed but the guys persuaded me that it would be far easier to lay a concrete slab, especially as they had a large concrete lorry turning up the next morning to pour all the rest of the concrete!

Area designated for greenhouse

Greenhouse footings and hard standing

The previous year, when I had some more mini digger work done, I had created the beginnings of a wildlife pond, roughly rectangular in shape with a gently shelving beach area. However, I felt that the slope could be extended a little more so Steve, the builder, who is a maestro on a mini digger, kindly obliged.

At about the same time as this work was going on, my next door neighbour put up his new fence which has really defined the right hand edge of my garden. Unfortunately, it has put paid to our chats over the previous non-existent fence but at least we won't distract each other when we're out in our gardens and he doesn't have to constantly look at my slightly unkempt garden!

Neighbour's new fence-in-waiting!

About a month after the builders had finished, my brother came to stay for a long weekend. I asked him what he would like to do while he was here – we could visit Wells Cathedral, the Bishop’s Palace, Glastonbury, go for walks on Mendip, but he said he wanted to garden! He knew there were several jobs in the garden that I couldn’t tackle by myself and, when he saw the hole in the ground, he said, ”Let’s do the pond!”

The pond begins

Beginning the fill

I’d bought the liner and under liner some time last year so everything we needed was to hand, and so we set to. Of course, this happened to be the unseasonably hot, dry period in May and the pond area was in full sun for most of the day, but he was determined to get it at least to the stage where we could introduce water. Getting the levels right was the most difficult thing as the site sloped slightly from one side of the pond to the other and it was crucial to get that right so that the pond liner was not exposed more on one side than the other and that the overflow was where I wanted it to be. We finally got it to the point where I was happy with it (!) and then lifted the under liner and then the liner into place. My intention had been to fill the pond using stored rainwater from my water butts but they were a distance away from the pond and there wasn’t enough in them so we partially filled using watering cans but also connected the hose to the outside tap – it took ages to fill! We buried the edges of the liner in a shallow trench around the perimeter and back filled with soil and Rich started to dig the bog garden area into which the overflow from the pond will go, but it was just too hot to continue and the weekend was nearly over, so that was how we left it.

The finished construction

A few weeks later Jeni came up and we built the beach area using bought bags of cobbles and shingle. We also bought a few pond plants and within days, we noticed small bugs and beasties already colonising the pond. We even had a visiting pair of dragonflies checking out the neighbourhood whilst we were constructing the beach and were amazed when the female dipped her abdomen into the water, a sure sign that she was egg-laying! Since then the male has been an almost permanent fixture, chasing off any other dragonfly intruders, although I did see a beautiful green female Emperor Dragonfly also laying her eggs in the pond. It’s all really exciting and I’m looking forward to the arrival of some larger pond dwellers once it has matured a bit and I have more plants in place.

The beach area and some plants

4-spot Chaser Dragonfly (male)

Green Emperor Dragonfly (female)

The wet weather, followed by the hot dry spell has meant that all the weeds and grass have shot away and the garden looks pretty jungle-like, especially in the bottom third, designated the wildflower meadow and orchard area. I’ve been hampered in my activities by a recurring back problem since the beginning of June, but I did manage to get my scythe out at one point and made some inroads into the abundant growth. I enjoy scything , even though I’m no expert, as it is a quiet, rhythmic occupation and you can achieve a lot in a short time, as long as you sharpen the blade every few minutes. I really do think, at times, that I was born in the wrong century!

In other news, we finally completed on the sale of Mum’s house at the beginning of June, more than twelve months after it first went on the market. This was a huge relief but also rather sad as I now have no reason to return to the town of my birth or visit my childhood haunts, except in my memories. ☹

Guarding his territory from his lookout post! 

More Rambles with Reg

 

Green-veined White butterfly

Common Blue butterfly

Reg, the Labrador, was so chuffed to have been included in my September blog that he has asked to feature again! I am currently doing a house sit at the farm 15 minutes from home and have been here a week, during which time we have had some glorious weather!

'Princess' Spice on my jigsaw puzzle box

Since I was here in September a new cat has joined the household – Hilary’s Mum’s cat, Spice. She is a long haired tortoiseshell cat with an imperious air and I’ve taken to calling her Princess Spice as she seems to think that everyone, including me, is there purely for her benefit! I brought a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle with me to while away the evenings and set it all out carefully on the dining table only for Princess Spice to leap gracefully onto the table and sit on the box, thereby obscuring the picture that I needed to refer to all the time. She obviously objected to my being distracted from her majesty by such a paltry thing as a jigsaw! Another time I was sitting, reading but she decided that she wanted a cuddle so climbed onto my lap and settled down – it’s immensely difficult to read a book with a large, fluffy cat curled up on your lap. She is rather beautiful, though, so I can forgive her a lot.

Because this little valley is so secluded and edged on two sides by woodland, there are plenty of birds and wildlife around. I sleep with my window open and have been greeted by the morning chorus every day, which starts at about 5.00am. Most of the birds are relatively quiet at first but there is a cock pheasant and his two wives who arrive under the front garden bird feeder early on and he does the loudest call and wing flutter! It almost sounds as if he’s in the room with me.

My favourite walk (and I suspect, Reg’s too) is the one I described in my September blog, but it is totally different in the Spring: the trees are just unfurling their soft green leaves and in the sun-dappled glades there are drifts of beautiful bluebells that scent the area with their delicate perfume, closely followed by huge swathes of wild garlic, now fully in flower, which also scent the area with their not-so-delicate perfume. I remember bluebell woods from my childhood, but I don’t recall wild garlic at all – perhaps it doesn’t grow as prolifically in Cotswold soils but here, on the Mendip Hills it grows everywhere! You could easily set up a lucrative business just making Wild Garlic Pesto. (My only foray into wild garlic pesto making was not a resounding success – it tasted delicious but quickly fermented in the jars and oozed oily green sauce everywhere. I still have no idea what I did wrong.)

Bluebells

Wild garlic

I now have a very good bird app on my phone (Merlin) which identifies songs in real time so that I can walk along with my phone out identifying which birds are calling at any one time. I know the more common birdsongs and these are here in abundance – robin, wren, blackbird, song thrush, the various tits, but there are others that I don’t recognise such as blackcaps and chiffchaffs. There is also a pair of Dippers that have a favourite vantage point on a rock in the stream by the farm entrance gate, but you have to creep up extremely stealthily to see them before they fly further downstream – needless to say I’ve only caught a glimpse of them once when I’ve been out with Reg – I don’t think ‘stealthy’ is in his repertoire.

Victims of ash die-back in Edford Wood

The other day Reg and I went on a walk that was new to me and in the opposite direction to Harridge Woods. Again we started off in woodland (Edford Wood) and this had a sign on the gate saying that the footpath was closed indefinitely due to the number of dead and dying ash trees that could shed branches but, as it was obviously still a very well-used footpath I decided to risk it – I guess the Woodland Trust who own these woods have to cover themselves against litigation. Once through the woods the footpath skirted a farm/industrial yard and headed uphill but Reg and I were unable to take it because, try as he might, Reg could not get through the bars of the stile – the first time this has happened on our walks as there is usually a dog-sized gap left to one side of the stile or there’s a kissing gate arrangement. In the end we had to walk through the farmyard onto the lane and continue on the road for about half-a-mile before we could regain the footpath in the village of Edford near a rather nice-looking farmshop and café (note to self:  must come back here, without a dog in tow, and investigate further). The track we turned onto was obviously an ancient trackway linking Edford to the village of Pitcot as it had been ‘surfaced’ at one time with hard-packed stones. On this walk, as on many others, we saw lots of wildflowers in the hedgerows and fields: violets, primroses, bluebells, more wild garlic, greater stitchwort, cuckoo flowers, jack-by-the-hedge, and lousewort (a new one for me). In a few week’s time it will all have changed again and other flowers will be dominant.

Ancient trackway between villages

Violets

Lousewort

Cuckoo flower (or Lady's Smock)

When I was last here in September there were thousands of acorns on the ground, but also thousands of beech nuts. I picked up a few acorns and planted them but every single one was carefully removed from the seed tray by a rodent of some description - possibly a squirrel. However the beech seeds had to be treated differently in that they had to overwinter in my fridge to simulate a cold winter! In February I noticed that a lot of the seeds had roots growing so I popped them into seed trays and left them in the shed to see what would happen. Imagine my surprise and delight when the majority of them sprouted  - I now have about 15 beech seedlings that I have no idea what to do with!

Beech seedlings

The mummy/daddy beech trees

Reg is not really interested in all this flora and fauna (he didn’t even chase a squirrel that leaped across the path in front of him!) His main interests are finding interesting ‘sniffs’ and collecting sticks/logs that he will carry for some distance to bring them home – he obviously takes his firewood collecting duties very seriously, as shown in my September blog! His other great love is to throw himself into streams, preferably after a stick. He seems to still be very fussy about the sticks he will bring back for me to throw again – if they don’t meet his exacting standards he just stands chest deep in the water and chews them to splinters before giving me a look that asks me to find something more suitable. Because a lot of dog-walkers frequent Harridge Woods and obviously play the same games, it is difficult to find a suitable stick in the immediate locality. I decided to take one of Reg’s many tennis balls with me so that we wouldn’t have to carry sticks for long distances but this was obviously not an acceptable substitution as he just stood and watched as it got swept away downstream – I wonder how far it got before it snagged on a branch or got washed into the shallows?

Reg enjoying a dip

Reg and stick

The house has a first floor outside decking area over the kitchen extension and this made a super spot for me to watch some wildlife one evening. I’d spotted four roe deer a few evenings before on the edge of the woods but, on this particular occasion there were just two, a buck and a doe, and I watched them for ages just outside the garden in the field. Then, my attention was caught by another deer, but it wasn’t a roe deer, it was a muntjac. These little deer stand about the same height as Reg and, at first, I thought it was a dog but then it came nearer and nearer until it was in the furthest part of the garden browsing on a small tree on the boundary. They are not a native species and were originally part of the collection at Woburn Abbey in Bedfordshire from where a few escaped. They obviously found the English countryside to their liking and have rapidly spread across the country – unlike our native deer they can breed all year round with rapid increases in population.

Roe Doe

Roe Buck

Muntjac deer nibbling a tree

After ten days it was time for me to go home so I bid a sad farewell to my walking buddy – until next time.

Spring is just around the corner!!

Signs of Spring awakenings

 

A belated and very wet Happy New Year from the Mendip Hills in Somerset! As you may have seen on the news (or indeed, be experiencing for yourselves at first hand!) Somerset is pretty much underwater at the moment and, with no let up in the rain in the foreseeable future, is likely to stay that way for some time. At approximately 800 feet (244m) above sea level I am unlikely to be flooded out but the ground is heavy clay and completely waterlogged, making it very unpleasant to attempt any sort of garden tidy up.

Jeni and I have done no gardening jobs for 2 months now and I, for one, am beginning to seize up from lack of regular exercise! My weekly Pilates class is becoming increasingly important to stop me creaking as I move about! I’ve had to give myself a stern talking to as I realised that every time I sat down I said “Ooof!” and every  time I got up it was accompanied by a loud groan – neither of these noises is necessary or in any way helpful to the task in hand!

Since the beginning of January my neighbour and best friend, Karen, and I have been aiming to walk her dogs every morning, except when it’s blowing a hoolie and pouring with rain at the same time. There are three road walks around our part of the village which are usually passable, if a bit muddy, whatever the weather and help us clock up a 2 mile start to our day. Our favourite of these walks is along a little-used lane which is slightly lower than the fields on either side and sheltered from most of the bad weather by the hedges. Unfortunately, it is not a circular walk and we usually turn round at a particularly deep lane-wide puddle that stays in situ for most of the winter. Looking at old maps, I discovered that this lane is part of a minor Roman road that ran at right angles to the more major road across the top of the Mendips and was probably used to transport goods from one place to another within this industrial Roman landscape, hence it’s previous name of Portway Lane. A bit later in the Spring we’ll find clumps of purple and white violets growing on the banks and the old stone walls are covered in moss and lichen with several varieties of ferns growing in the gaps.

Ferns and moss on stone walls

Not only did the Romans leave a legacy of roads criss-crossing the Mendip Hills, and lead-workings at nearby Priddy, but they also introduced the Roman snail, which is larger than our native garden snail, and edible. For many years the miners at the leadworks had snails in their diet and this dish was revived as a gastronomic treat by the Miners Arms pub which, in its heyday in the late 1990s was serving up more than 4000 snail meals a year. I have it on good authority that the youngsters of Mendip were paid money to collect buckets of these snails which were glamourised by the new name of Mendip Wallfish! The dish was similar to French escargots but used a variety of fresh herbs in the butter sauce rather than garlic.

Another of our walks (again not circular) takes us towards the site of the old railway bridge as, at one time, Binegar had a station on the Somerset & Dorset Railway and also served a narrow gauge railway that came from the Oakhill Brewery situated a few miles away. This successful brewery sent beer all over the country via the railways but, following a devastating fire in 1924, it closed down. Several attempts were made to re-start the brewery during the 20^th century but none were ultimately successful. From the railway bridge we turn along a lane that runs alongside a large disused quarry and turn at Emborough Pond (real name Lechmere Water) which is now a privately-owned fishing lake. Originally it was a fish lake constructed  for the nearby monks of Wells centuries ago. During the winter months there are often mallard ducks and Canada geese to be seen on the water and squirrels race through the trees on the wooded slopes which make the two dogs get very excited!

Lechmere Water covered in ice

In other news, my six chickens have settled in well and I think 5 of them are laying, although not on the same day yet. Even with the clear plastic roof covering their entire run, the rain has still blown in and made the pen a sea of liquid mud. Concerned that they would grow webbed feet or actually become ill, I have invested in electrified poultry netting and fencer so that they can come out onto a grassy area, which they love. I did try letting them free-range in the entire garden, while I was outside, but they soon found that it was more fun to cross the non-existent fence into my neighbour’s garden from where they were reluctant to return home. Luckily, I have trained them to come for sunflower seeds (a favourite morning treat) so could lure them back by rattling the tin and calling ‘Chook, chook, chook!’. They then follow me down the garden in a long line and happily return to their pen. By having an electrified netted area I can safely leave them out when I’m not there, as it would be a very determined fox that crossed that barrier.

Some of the girls on excavating duties!

December seems a long time ago now but Jeni and I managed to attend three markets in the Town Hall during the month. We had successful markets each time which made up, somewhat, for the poor markets we'd experienced for most of the year. By far and away the most popular items were the needle-felted Christmas tree decorations and we ended up creating all sorts, from snowmen and penguins through to highland cows, foxes, hedgehogs, badgers, swans and even a sprout with googly eyes! I also sold quite a few pairs of my hand-knitted socks which is just as well as I have been doing a lot of knitting during this bad weather, so can replenish my stocks for next year. We probably will confine ourselves to October, November and December markets in 2026.

Highland cow bauble

Penguin baubles

As it was our first Christmas without Mum, we decided to have a different sort of Christmas to the one that had become established. In recent years we have decamped to my sister’s house in Sheffield and she and Paul have taken on the mammoth task of feeding us all – I understand this involves many lists and spreadsheets, but they make it look effortless! This year Lynda and Paul opted to have a year off and have a quiet family Christmas with their daughters and the two grandsons, Rich and family went to Jo’s family in Ireland (which they do every other year) and Jeni, Dave and I spent a quiet time in Somerset. I realised that I had not cooked a Christmas dinner for about 15 years and got quite stressed about it. However, it all went off relatively well although ‘lunch’ was eventually dished up at 5.15!

It is now more than a year since Mum died, which seems unbelievable at times. The house sale has still not been finalised although none of us has been back to Cheltenham since the house clearance people emptied it back in September/October. I sometimes imagine how the garden would be looking at this time of year with the snowdrops appearing in little clumps around the beds and the winter aconites blooming under the weeping silver birch tree, the magnolia buds growing long and fat and daffodil bulbs beginning to poke through the soil. I was pleased to see that a few of the snowdrops and one lone aconite have appeared under my apple tree, where I planted them last year and the cuttings of the climbing rose that I took appear to have all ‘taken’, so a little part of Mum’s garden will live on in mine.

Well, that’s about it for now. Let’s hope that the next time I write a blog the weather will have improved and I’ll be back gardening in earnest and basking in warm sunshine!