Swaying in the strong breezes of our front garden and supported by canes are the six sunflowers that we have grown from seed this year which shelter behind the hedge in the warmest spot. They are from one packet, so although the flowers are single or double, the common shade is a strong lemony yellow. I am glad to see that they attract bumblebees.
Hidden in the herb area of the back garden this year is a sunflower that came in the compost. That is not strictly true; we chucked it into a compost bin after a Sunday morning guided meditation and prayer. It is not actually a cultivated variety, but came from a packet of birdseed. (This church is not richly endowed.) It germinated among our salads in the veg-table and was transplanted to its present spot. It may or may not catch up this season sufficiently to flower.
Meanwhile, we shall leave the heads on our front garden ones to see if we in turn can provide our own home-grown bird seed. In the warm south the parakeets descended from the cemetery upon the sunflowers that grew up randomly and in profusion on our plot from the communal compost and stripped them bare. The nearest parakeets to us are in Chorlton Water Park, Manchester and have not ventured this far north. Well, regardless, we will feed whatever turns up.
Friday 26 August 2016
Thursday 25 August 2016
Garden Pets
My husband received a charming and whimsical card on his 60th birthday depicting a gardener and three cats behaving themselves very nicely on an allotment. This set me thinking about gardening and pets.
We have no pets because we enjoy the bird life of our back garden. Our resident blackbirds become tamer every year: last month I eyeballed a young one sneaking under the netting for a raspberry. We are also regularly visited by pigeons, collared doves, robins, now starting to sing their autumn songs, sparrows, bluetits and the occasional wren. We do not use insecticides, and any snails we find are thrown over the hedge into the park. Cabbage white butterflies frustrate me, but I reason that caterpillars only attack weak plants and can be quickly dealt with. Leaf miners annoy me but I accept this is the price I pay for organic spinach and cut out the affected bits.
We have at least three frogs in the front and back borders: one medium large and two small; ants who have avoided nesting under the greenhouse this year, and bats that I see at dusk. The house martins who nested up the road have left for Africa, another indication of the changing seasons.
No cats. My allotment experience of cats is not of well behaved moggies who sit in wheelbarrows, rather cats who dig holes in the middle of vegetable beds and then poo. Cats are not welcome. Having said that, I met a charming animal at a barbecue this weekend who follows her owner around the garden. She looked like a neat and respectable black and white cat, a paragon of good behaviour. Our hosts' veggie plot was doing well. I hope my assumptions are correct.
We have no pets because we enjoy the bird life of our back garden. Our resident blackbirds become tamer every year: last month I eyeballed a young one sneaking under the netting for a raspberry. We are also regularly visited by pigeons, collared doves, robins, now starting to sing their autumn songs, sparrows, bluetits and the occasional wren. We do not use insecticides, and any snails we find are thrown over the hedge into the park. Cabbage white butterflies frustrate me, but I reason that caterpillars only attack weak plants and can be quickly dealt with. Leaf miners annoy me but I accept this is the price I pay for organic spinach and cut out the affected bits.
We have at least three frogs in the front and back borders: one medium large and two small; ants who have avoided nesting under the greenhouse this year, and bats that I see at dusk. The house martins who nested up the road have left for Africa, another indication of the changing seasons.
No cats. My allotment experience of cats is not of well behaved moggies who sit in wheelbarrows, rather cats who dig holes in the middle of vegetable beds and then poo. Cats are not welcome. Having said that, I met a charming animal at a barbecue this weekend who follows her owner around the garden. She looked like a neat and respectable black and white cat, a paragon of good behaviour. Our hosts' veggie plot was doing well. I hope my assumptions are correct.
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