A little flock of about a dozen chaffinches was feeding on the grass this morning. It scattered dramatically, accompanied by the alarm rattle of blackbird, as a male sparrowhawk swooped across the garden, landed briefly in the mountain ash and took off again in hot pursuit of a sparrow, into the honeysuckle thicket. After a few moments, the sparrowhawk emerged, empty clawed, and winged swiftly away. The garden was quiet for some time afterwards.
The wind has turned to the west, bringing the Atlantic ocean in its light drizzle. The frost is gone. And the lovely Ice Follies daffodils are open.
Categories: birds · spring flowers
This morning I put together the mini greenhouse I bought on Saturday , working outdoors in the sunshine. It was very easy to assemble and it inspired me to make a sowing of broad beans- a few replacements for the Aquadulce Claudia that are already growing on the plot and a first sowing of a another variety, Masterpiece. I used the deep, root trainer type planting tubes, shaped like toilet roll inners, so the beans can be planted straight into the ground when they are big enough.
Several of the hardy fuchsias and geraniums that have overwintered in pots outside have started into growth, so they have been potted into fresh compost and placed in the mini greenhouse too. I found many vine weevil larvae in the compost-they seem to have had a good season last year-so it was an opportune bit of repotting. With luck, the plants will be able to grow away in their new compost.
The afternoon was truly golden and after some more manure shifting on the allotment and a shared flask of dandelion and burdock cordial with VP, I came home for a well earned wash-cow manure is not my favourite perfume- and a sit in the garden with a cup of tea. No, this is not typical February weather for the UK and no, it isn’t going to last much longer, but it is so welcome after the greyness and wet of the winter.
The garden was full of birds-chaffinches, bullfinches, goldfinches and greenfinches, blue tits, great tits and coal tits, robins, dunnocks, wrens, blackbirds and sparrows. A collection of the common but pretty birds of English gardens. And the sun shone through the daffodils, burnishing them to pure gold.
Categories: birds · broad beans · spring flowers
A little flock of about a dozen chaffinches was feeding on the grass this morning. It scattered dramatically, accompanied by the alarm rattle of blackbird, as a male sparrowhawk swooped across the garden, landed briefly in the mountain ash and took off again in hot pursuit of a sparrow, into the honeysuckle thicket. After a few moments, the sparrowhawk emerged, empty clawed, and winged swiftly away. The garden was quiet for some time afterwards.
