The life and loves of a time-poor plantsman
Since the end of August the garden has taken one battering after another. In Broadstairs we have experienced gales from every point on the compass, heavy rain and unusually chilly nights. By the end of September both the Jungle Garden and the Gin & Tonic Garden looked more like they usually do in early November. […]
Read More
Like many folk, we’ve barely spent a night away from home since the New Year. I love The Watch House with all my heart, but being there is not a holiday. Everywhere I look there’s a job to be done: a plant to be watered, a bulb to be planted, a wall to be painted […]
Read More
I’ve been getting increasingly frustrated with myself for posting so infrequently. Okay, so I no longer have a long commute to London and I can’t wait to get out from behind my laptop at the end of each working day, but surely there must be time to draft a post or two? Seemingly not. Then […]
Read More
Where, oh where did May go? No sooner had it started than June was upon us. Now it’s midsummer, the longest day is almost here, and I am way behind with my garden diary. As I explained to our allotment neighbour at the weekend, May is a month where doing takes priority over writing about […]
Read More
April was a bittersweet month. Among many positives were the beautiful weather and being able to spend extra time in the garden with The Beau, Max and Millie. It is hard to conceive of going back to work as I did only six weeks ago, commuting five hours a day. I am achieving so much […]
Read More
Who could have predicted that the Month of March would end as it did? Over the course of two weeks our daily routines changed in ways we never imagined possible and there is more of this to come for sure. We are living in a new reality, in the short term at least. We must […]
Read More
Late last summer we paid a flying visit to Dyson’s Nurseries at Great Comp near Sevenoaks in Kent. It was all rather unsatisfactory as we were short of time and had our pups Max and Millie in tow. We couldn’t take them into the garden (although I snuck in to use the loo, which was […]
Read More
I have decided to start a garden diary. It’s been over 30 years since I last kept any form of journal so I can’t be certain whether I’ll stick with it. I guess there’s only one way to find out. Now we have an allotment I feel I should keep better records of our gardening […]
Read More
Oh, the inconvenience; first Ciara, now Dennis, putting paid to any plans we had to tend our allotment or work in the garden this weekend. We could have braved the elements, but it would have been no fun at all and terrible for the earth. Nothing for it other than to stay indoors and wait […]
Read More
Winter thus far has consisted of a handful of slightly chilly nights with a lot of benign, mild, wet weather in between. The garden is bursting with signs of spring, some of which I have captured to illustrate this post. Rosa banksiae ‘Lutea’ is already blooming, at least 2 months earlier than usual. Legions of […]
Read More