Building Borders
Welcome to our garden! I am really looking forward to sharing my gardening experiences with you over the coming months. At the moment I am concentrating my efforts on the spring borders. When we moved here seven years ago this area was dominated by several large conifers along with oak trees and a silver birch. Over a period of a couple of years we removed the conifers, revealing a large expanse of bare earth. The ground was almost impossible to dig because of the tree roots so instead we used some of the branches from the conifers to mark out three beds, which were then filled with garden compost. This has made managing the area much easier because we can plant without having to dig too deeply among tree roots. I am now taking advantage of breaks in the rain to weed the beds thoroughly and mulch them with more garden compost. There are clumps of snowdrops there that are slowly increasing and I will split them up once they have finished flowering. I’ve planted several good forms of hellebores bought from a local specialist nursery. Their first flower spikes are now pushing up through the compost mulch and they should start to look good soon. One of the beds is carpeted with Crocus tommasinianus – it is a treat on a sunny spring day to sit by this bed and watch our honeybees collecting pollen from the flowers. Elsewhere in the garden the mahonias are already in flower. Their scent is wonderful and already I have noticed one or two bees visiting them on sunny days. Cyclamen coum are also flowering well. The majority of the other borders have now been mulched and I hope this will preserve some much needed moisture in our free draining soil.
Tales from a Country Garden 