Winter/Spring
We do much of our gardening in the early part of the year and in fact I prefer being outside doing jobs when the weather is chilly than when it is really hot. However when it snows there is not an awful lot that can be achieved other than help the children make snowmen and igloos and take “scenic pictures”. Of course the best thing is to lock the gate and stay at home until it goes away.
This year saw snow lying on the ground during much of January and February and temperatures down to minus 13C.
Apart from the children enjoying playing in the snow the other bonus was the amount of wildlife that visited, some bird species haven’t been seen in the garden since.
As the snow started to thaw we started to think about improvements in the back garden and decided to extend the yew hedge that we had planted the year before and to dig a flower bed. It took a while to decide on the exact size and shape and after many false starts marking different shapes out in the snow we finally decided on a long ribbon like bed echoing the curves of the terrace around the back of the house. With more turf to lift we took the sensible route and hired a machine which made the job very easy and quick.
Spring/Summer
With a lovely big flower bed dug and ready for planting we started off by planting more small yew hedging plants and then were ready to start on the rest of the planting. I grow as much as I can from seed, divisions and cuttings so had many plants waiting for a new home and it was fun to go out and buy new plants too. Delphiniums, Foxgloves,Hostas, Iris Sibirica, Oriental Poppies, Dicentra just to name a few soon found a home together with annual poppies and sweet peas.
This was the only big gardening project we undertook this year and so were able to concentrate on enjoying the garden and weeding! However towards the end of the summer amidst great excitement we became beekeepers! An experienced beekeeper lived in the village and he agreed to start us off with the next swarm he caught and to mentor us throughout a complete beekeeping year. We were so excited when he rang to let us know that he had some bees for us and so we prepared an area in the orchard where they could live relatively undisturbed although we did take the precaution of putting up a small fence around the hive to stop Milly our Springer Spaniel bounding into the hive and getting stung. Our youngest son then decided that he didn’t want to be left out so was also equipped with a bee suit.
To start with I took great pleasure in going out every day to say ‘good morning’ to the bees, however as the years have gone on and we have more hives and therefore many thousands of bees I have stopped doing this. I hope the bees don’t take offence but I have learnt a very painful lesson about going too close to hives without a bee suit on!
Autumn/Winter
The year ended much as it had begun with very low temperatures for weeks on end, by the end of November we had recorded a temperature of minus 10c, the lowest being minus 14c at the end of December along with around 6 inches of snow. Not gardening weather! All we could do was enjoy the wildlife that visited the garden and hope that the plants were snug and warm underground.
Tales from a Country Garden 