Reasonably productive week this week, although once again jumping in and outside to avoid the many heavy showers and hail storms.
The most pleasing thing was that, after almost 2 week’s effort, I finished the week’s job of rebuilding the jungle / tropical bed and we think it looks great and has incorporated the ‘sink’ that used to be one of the original watering points for the village. We are going to use the old trough as our new hosta bed as, we hope, it will be easier to control the ever present menace of slugs …
It has taken 3 trailer loads of soil to fill the expanded space (thanks again to our neighbour for allowing us to take it) but hasn’t used anywhere near enough the amount of slate that we thought it would so I still have plenty to use (lose? ) elsewhere but plenty of plans and ideas for other walls to build.
The plants currently in the centre are waiting to see if another of our neighbours wants to have them, if not we may find a space for them somewhere in our borders, or we may dispose of them – either way, they will not be going back in the jungle bed.
We are going to leave the bed for a couple of weeks to see how much the soil settles (a lesson learned from the wall I built at the rear entrance to Kergudon) before we plant it up with the more interesting plants we have bought. The biggest change will be when we get more gravel for the drive but, as with so much in our lives at the minute, that depends to some degree on progress with Grange, but the gravel will finish it off completely both on the drive but also as a mulch. However, we believe that already it has made a massive difference to how it looked a few short weeks ago.
With the occasional wet day I was able to progress the white plastic lambris on the garage bay ceilings and have completed a second space. Slow progress, but progress!
Finally, you may recall that in our first year at Kergudon, Dave and I bought a pear tree as an anniversary present to ourselves – a tree that gave a fabulous crop last year despite only being on the ground for 18 months or so (it took a year to get from pot to bed!) This year, to continue to improve the gardens, we have done a similar thing and bought 3 flowering cherries (Prunus Serrulata ‘Kanzan’ if interested). One, already planted is to replace the old apple tree in the centre of the newly created orchard bed which was felled last year in Zeus; and the other 2 to go in the bed at the end of orchard when I cut out the existing tatty hazel, alder and other – something for March!
I am afraid there won’t be a blog next week (music to some people’s ears I imagine!) but I will be back with an update in 2 weeks (4 March).
À plus tard.