Forty acres and a mule.

I was listening to the Paul Jones radio show the other night and he played a song called '40 acres and a mule'.I've heard this line before in blues song but never knew it had any significance until Paul explained.Apparently in the 19Th century when America freed its African slaves they gave them 40acres and a mule. The cynic in me tells me this would not have been prime land hence the reference in so many songs. As you would expect I then spent quite some time wondering what I would do with 40 acres. With the present pension crisis would it not be better to give us a few acres instead of money, or at least the option. I would settle for that even if it was not as much as 40 acres.
I was thinking about this the next day when I was cutting pea sticks. It was a beautiful afternoon and I was working my way along the hedge following a fairly large flock of long tailed tits who were quietly keeping just a few yards ahead of me. I always cut the twigs as late as possible so that they stay flexible during the growing season. I have cut them earlier before but by August when you really need them they go all brittle and snap easily.

I have been watching Monty Don's latest couple of series - Mastercrafts ,thumbs up and My Dream Farm emphatically thumbs down. Mastercrafts is a slow leisurely programme looking at old crafts and letting people try them. It is beautiful television and makes you hope that all these crafts will not die out. The one on thatching was my favourite, what an amazingly complex craft.A newly thatched roof is a beautiful sight. Surely with grants and a more updated image these could become more popular.The ultimate in sustainability. The other series, My Dream Farm was the the same old tosh,the running before you can walk syndrome that has got us all into the current mess we are in. Borrow a dollop of money and dive in head first. Each week people with no idea about a craft or how to run a business are given a leg up from Monty that they have not had the gumption to do themselves. More worryingly Monty advises them to get pigs or sheep or cattle with little or no experience and no reserve cash in case things go wrong. A follow up show a couple of years later might be interesting - bet it would never get comissioned.
Back to cutting pea sticks and dreaming about 40 acres. Grow loads of vegetables and make jam and chutney, sell the surplus at the local farmers market or at the gate. Not going to make me a fortune but my idea of heaven. No , the real solution would be apply for planning permission and stick a couple of hundred cheap houses masquerading as a twee village and give it a poncey village name ( ring any bells your Highness) on it - now thats more like it.
The raised beds are now finished so now the next task is to build a new compost heap the power house of any vegetable plot, and the more mundane but equally useful job of sorting the paths out.In the greenhouse the seeds I sowed last week have now started germinating. I think I will sow a few chard and perpetual spinach seeds to get an earlier crop. I will also try a few beetroot in modules for an early start.

Is February the most boring month to get through?

What a contrast the days are in February.Thursday was the most miserable wet day interspersed with sleet and hail.When it is like this and I cannot work inside I pick the most boring job I can find and get my head down and plod on.It's not so bad, after all, I spent twenty years working in an office so I'm used to tedium.To help me I listen to something on my ipod.I have a pretty varied collection of music, lots of folky things,Tamla, plenty of his Bobness, (Bob Dylan) heavy metal for when I feel so inclined and joy of the twenty first century - podcasts. Most of the BBC stuff ,The Archers,Gardeners Question Time,Mark Kermode and so on is, as you would expect,superb.The Guardian Daily podcast keeps me in touch with the outside world. There are also some great independant productions - Wiggly Wigglers are very good ,as a bit of a tech head Cnet.uk is very interesting.Over the pond NPR have some great stuff. With this to keep me company in the rain I set about filling the raised beds with topsoil and levelling them off so that they could settle down before sowing. I covered one of them over with black plastic to dry it out and warm it up a bit.That kept me busy in the morning.
The afternoon was spent in the greenhouse thank goodness for the start of the growing season.
As I am lucky to have a heated greenhouse I can now get on with sowing seeds.
I normally start in January but it was so cold and covered in snow that I left it until now.
I have started with broad beans, Master Green Longpod as usual ,Parsnip Princess,and tomatoes -Favorita,Cherry,and Shirley.
Not so many flowers this year just some dahlias and cosmos and a few tagetes to keep the bugs off the vegetables.
Friday was by contrast a beautiful day, no ipod today.I was at the same place where yesterday it felt like the Battle of the Somme. The sky was clear and blue, the birds were singing their hearts out, and the lowish sun was shining through the willows reflecting the most georgeous reds and yellows.The snowdrops are at their best now and being joined by the crocuses and everything is on the starting blocks.
The raised beds are part of a new venture for me and a new and exciting garden.The new venture , - hopefully more of that in the future.In October I started a new project working for a habitat company http://www.habitataid.co.uk/ Please visit, it is very inspiring .Nick -the boss wants to create a wildlife pond which will be the subject of a course in the spring. We started by planting a wildlife hedge to surround this, and an extension to the vegetable garden. As this was part of a field still inhabited by sheep I stripped the turf to give the hedging a chance to get going.We have created some raised beds from railway sleepers which I will fill with this stripped turf. I have sown some vegetable seeds for that and am chitting some potatoes to go in next month - hopefully. This has been an exciting project and I am looking forward to the results. When the ajacent pond is dug we are hoping that all the frogs and beneficial insects will keep the vegetable garden free of all the usual culprits.

The Real Start of the year

This is my very first post and what a good time to start. Yesterday I received my batch of seeds and seed potatoes for the year. Such an exciting time. I will start today, okay I know its Sunday but I am very impatient. After all these years I still think there is not a moment to spare.The last few weeks of snow has put me behind my schedule.
Just a little bit about the garden. At present I am working as a sole gardener on a 30 acre garden in Somerset. I have a tied cottage on the job and have been here nine years. Much has changed in the last nine years. Apart from adding new herbaceous borders and an ornamental pond a new lake and woodland has been created. I have also managed to persuade my boss to get a polytunnel which has been very useful. He was bemused - he's not a gardener, but he has been impressed by the results,earlier vegetables and flowers, and tomatoes and peppers. Many of the shrubs were leggy and overgrown when I came and infested with vinca (I'm not a fan) this had been used at first as groundcover, but very quickly had been taking over. The lawns were very weedy and full of moss, mostly because they had been mowed with a mulching mower ,which together with heavy clay had made the problem worse. I have still not completely eradicated the problem but it is quite a bit better.The added bonus is that the lawn clippings together with leaf mould and other rubbish has given me a fine supply of compost which has made the soil easier to work and a much needed feed.
Well thats enough for now the greenhouse calls.