Gardening!

[Richard Brown]

These pictures show stages in the first phase of our rockery makeover. It's a modest start, to see whether the ideas will work, and because I don't want to over load the car etc.
I purchased 3 Cotswold stone rocks from Homebase, along with the herbs planter.
The planter was cracked right through, and I negotiated a very good price for it - from £12.99 down to £3.00! Result!!! My intention was to get damaged goods as I planned to knock out the bottom or back ready for incorporation in the rockery.

Hopefully the finished result looks OK. My wife wasn't over impressed, but I put that down to tiredness after a day's work gardening. The plants will recover and fill ou the spaces nicely.

To the left of the area, I plan to put in a dozen or so rocks with one or two brick infills or small pots to give the feature more presence.

So, there you have it. I hope I can continue with the rescue and recycling of damaged goods.

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[55julie55]

Cotswold stone is a winner.
Love the co our and texture

 

[Hayles66]

Nice rockery Richard! I spent all yesterday tidying up bits and pieces that were getting overgrown and messy. Large task but we are getting there! I hate weeds especially bindweed( I like to call it withy wind). I found this on a weed website.

"Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made
By singing 'Oh how wonderful' and sitting in the shade,
While better men than we go out, and start their working lives
By grubbing weeds from garden paths with broken dinner knives."
Rudyard Kipling

I love that!

We are harvesting new potatoes, mange tout, peas, carrots, rhubarb, etc... Very satisfying!

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[Richard Brown]

Nice rockery Richard! I spent all yesterday tidying up bits and pieces that were getting overgrown and messy. Large task but we are getting there! I hate weeds especially bindweed( I like to call it withy wind). I found this on a weed website.

"Our England is a garden, and such gardens are not made
By singing 'Oh how wonderful' and sitting in the shade,
While better men than we go out, and start their working lives
By grubbing weeds from garden paths with broken dinner knives."
Rudyard Kipling

I love that!

We are harvesting new potatoes, mange tout, peas, carrots, rhubarb, etc... Very satisfying!

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Thanks Hayles. I have my eye on large cracked pots for the next phase or so.

Yes, you made a good choice of verse.   

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[55julie55]

How goes the rockery Richard?

 

[Richard Brown]

In fits and starts, Julie. Flora has been busy planting out the corner I rebuilt.

Other tasks are getting done. I cleaned the deck at the back of the garden ready for repainting.

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[Richard Brown]

In fits and starts, Julie. Flora has been busy planting out the corner I rebuilt.

Other tasks are getting done. I cleaned the deck at the back of the garden ready for repainting.

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I thought you would like this little edit.

The photo is of the robin who keeps bob bobbing along whenever I do any work in the garden. On this occasion I pocketed my camera in the hope I could take his picture. He certainly obliged, posing long enough for me to take 3 or 4 photos. 

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[Hayles66]

Hey! We have a Robin too! Loads of birds singing in the garden yesterday! Despite my daughters cat Trixie, they seem to avoid capture, thank god! I spent a leisurely day in the garden. We have rigged electricity to the patio so I have a kettle and laptop outside now! All the mod cons me!
We already have rope lights around the patio so why not go the whole hog!
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[Richard Brown]

A blackbird follows my wife Flora around. He loves it when we put on the sparkler, sitting on the fence for a wash, or darting through the flower beds in the water spray after grubs etc.

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[55julie55]

We have swifts that swoop around the trees on the beach.
Just lovely to sit gazing out to sea with mr and mrs swifty zooming about

 

[Hayles66]

We have bats as well.

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[Richard Brown]

We have bats as well.

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A protected species in the UK

As small boys in Trinidad, I used to visit a roost with friends. We amused ourselves by stirring up the bats, to see whether we could get the roost to leave their building during daytime. I remember the darkness and the racket of cross bats. 

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[Hayles66]

I don't know why people are scared of bats. They are quite harmless and I've never got one tangled in my hair!!!

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[55julie55]

Not scared of them,
But they sit in our huge trees at night and eat the nuts from the tree which then drop on our tin roof like golf balls.
Very noisy and enoying

 

[Richard Brown]

Not scared of them,
But they sit in our huge trees at night and eat the nuts from the tree which then drop on our tin roof like golf balls.
Very noisy and enoying

Our squirrels do that with the nuts in the copper beech.

How's Australia?

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