I have made a start on the back garden.

I have at last made a start on the back garden. These are all my bargain shrubs underplanted with daffodils. I will probably plant some geraniums for ground cover over the summer, and hopefully some asters for the autumn. There is little point having too much of the herbaceous stuff as the children will just kick their footballs into the beds. This will be a spring and autumn garden.

A very long hot summer.

One day I hope to make this into the next part of the woodland bed. Its covered with nettles, although a load of foxgloves did self seed here earlier in the spring. I've been cutting the grass in the shape of the border, hopefully I might get some time in the winter to dig it out.

These beds are still going strong, I wish in a way we could have a hard frost and I could have a good clear out. This year I actually left the big clean up untill March/April, a bit too late really, but it didn't take long as most of it had rotted and it was just a couple of days going around picking up dead stuff.

This Ricinus is an absolute stunning plant, highly poisionous if the seeds are eaten although they were high enough that the children couldn't reach them.

Again this has grown beyond our wildest expectations this year, obviously the manure and years of sheeps droppings has worked to feed the garden well, hopefully it will continue for a while longer.

Last burst before Autumn

The growth in the garden has been astronomical this year, I can't believe we've only been here just over 2 1/2 years. I have manured the ground quite well in the spring but there seems to be some other force at hand.

Again the bamboo by the bog pond has grown from a couple of canes to a huge clump, its also doubled in height.

The growth is amazing, this garden looks like its been here for years.

This border is only 1 year old, hopefully the climbing roses will catch up with all the other growth.

My favorite area of the garden, I love daliha's they are such a vibrant plant, the colour scheme seems to jump out and shock you. One day I hope to have a summerhouse behind these plants with red climbing roses on as well and a vine so to extend the planting upwards.

One Day to Go

One day to go and this is how the garden is looking. We seemed to have a peak about 2 weeks ago and since then a few plants seem to have gone over and got a bit straggly (excuse me if this is not the correct hortcultural term but this is Dave posting and I'm definitely NOT a gardener). But now after a lot of deadheading and even more weeding the garden is looking it's best again.

Having said that, some areas seem to growing a bit too well and we are torn between leaving this area intact or cutting back a bit to allow access to the sunken area.

One of the hard working staff (head gardener actually) making a few last minute adjustments

The newly cleaned out mill wheel should hopefully prove of interest to gardeners and no gardeners alike.

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In the wheel

Next week we are opening the garden for the first time, to a local gardening club as well as the public, so I thought it was about time I did some work rather than leaving it all up to Elaine. As the millwheel hasn't been cleared out since just after we got here the weeds, elder in particular, were starting to obscure the wheel. I had to climb right down in to the millrace to clear it out and found a part of the mill, some sort of governing rod, in the process.

Tulips Galore

The bottom borders tulips are in flower, mostly pinks of various colours of course. The growth generally in the garden is good, won't be long and we won't be able to see any soil .

The colours in the tulips really brighten up the garden at this time of year, and remind me what colours the borders will progress too.

These really dark tulips are 'Queen of night', and 'Hero' a lovely peony type. I'm waiting to see if they will come up again and if they do will they revert to their viral colour of pink ?

Spring is definitely here.

Lilies are starting to erupt everywhere now, they looked stunning last year when they were put in late, so hopefully being in a year they have multiplyed amazingly, hemerocallis are appearing everywhere, and the lupins and delphiniums are putting on masses of greenery.

Some colour in the main borders other than green! Hyacinths, I think, blue sky jacket, the smell is lovely.

The euphorbias in the foreground looking towards the blue/purple section of the main borders.

The tree shadow was so clear today, I just thought it made an interesting photo.

Grass is getting greener.

Things are definately starting to happen in the garden, its getting greener, the borders have considerable new growth in them and I am mowing the lawn once a week already.

Quite a lot of new growth down this end of the garden too. I've planted a lot of new roses and clematis down by the bottom wall to get growing up the fence work. It might take a year or two to get established but hopefully it will soon be covered.

So much colour in this bed still, I'm waiting for a lot more spring bulbs to come into flower, the daffs in the bed behind have not done too well this year, I suspect this is being commercial throw outs (for mothersday) they did not have time to die down naturally, so this year they will be left for six weeks, so hopefully they will bloom like mad next year.

These are my £2/or free bargin shrubs. As the boys still like playing football I've decided I can't take over the back garden yet. So as a compromise I am just planting shrubs and substantial plants. They have asked for some paths to run round in, like in the front, but they will need to establish for a year or so to get the desired effect.

Are things starting to grow?

A sunny, wet day produces yet another rainbow, since moving to Wales we see so many rainbows now, especially in this valley. The garden still seems to be in dormant state.

Still not much happening in the garden, the euphorbias are starting to open their buds, but thats about all.

This is Euphorbia wulfenii a lovely bright acid yellow/green, it really brightens the garden up, I must try and cut back the euphorbias this year, they just look so lovely all year that I don't like to spoil them.

The woods at the back of the back garden, bluebells and primroses are starting to inhabit this area, after the last strong winds a lot of trees were uprooted so we intend to get in their and tidy up a bit, I'd like to make a short woodland walk.

On with spring.

The new orang Utan enclosure! Well I don't think we will be escaping for a while, from the road side the fence only looks about 6' high, but from the garden its probably 10' high by the river. We ended up altering it after the snow as it looked all askew, mainly because there are so many horizons available, with the wall, both roads, pavement, and soil levels. I've planted a few more climbing/rambling roses along the wall to eventually grow up, and I already had some clematis, honeysuckle and Rosa Blairi No 2 (absolutely stunning) growing along so have tied them into the stockwire.

This is an anemone flowered hellebore slightly picotee my favorite type this year.

Another hellebore this time a picotee from Ashwood nurseries from my earlier visit.

One of the Iris reticulata "Pauline" I must admit I bought this from a garden centre in flower, I realize its cheating a bit, but it is nice to see the colour before I plant it.

Another view of the new fence, the road is almost hidden, well it will be when the plants are growing along it. Whilst we realize in the winter it will still look bare, in the summer it will be smothered and hopefully then will blot out the road, the only downside of living here.

The new arbour fitting in nicely, whilst again these will be bare in the winter in the summer they hopefully will be covered with plants and flowers. The curly willow is just starting to come into leaf, I had hoped to get some of it transplanted to the river to act a wind break, so will have to try and find a few minutes.

Snow, here at last !!

1pm Snow has been falling for about 10 minutes, real proper snow, the sort on Christmas cards, I don't suppose it will come to much.

3pm 4" deep snow now, all the kids sent home from school for massive snowmen building in the back garden. The structures are now well defined.

3pm Looks really bitter and cold, but the kids managed about an hour outside without the usual crying of freezing hands. The grasses really stand out with the snow.

Just a pretty picture of the brook that runs down the side of the garden.

5pm Snow has finally stopped, some of the branches really struggling with the weight of the snow. Notice the new structure down by the wall, when we moved in the trees and bushes outside the garden just about blocked the road from view, last year they blocked it completely, so guess what, the council came and cut half of them down, so now the road is in view again. So we've put up the wooden poles to fix stock wire to, and will hopefully train some more roses and climbers along it.

Officially SAD

The long awaited polytunnel..We managed to get second hand hoops and bought the new cover. It only took myself and th'spouse 2 days to put up, including all the usual interruptions, I was well impressed.

Even sadder - a view of the inside - the staging is yet to be built, but I'm afraid th'spouse had been volunteered to put a computer suite in at the school during half term. He's requested that I don't volunteer him for anything else, but I'm sure I'll have too - shouldn't be so clever!!

Some more of the hellebores are comming into flower now and have made a lovely start to the spring.

For those people out there that think hellebores are boring, just look at the range of colours here !! I'm starting to pot on seedlings that have self sown around, it takes about 3 years to get flowering plants, no wonder they are expensive.

A general view of the garden, the lawn is desperate for a cut, there are a lot of plants sprouting already, I've dephiniums, lupins etc already several inches high, hopefully this year will be spectacular.

School trip to Painswick Rococo Gardens

Ok the long awaited trip to Painswick, after finding our way through Gloucester eventually, taking the very scenic route around and about we got there. The gardens were nice, we expected it to be a little bigger, apart from the snowdrops there didn't seem to be many other spring flowering plants about. M'spouse who I'd managed to persuade to drive for us (with the promise of food) was not happy at the ploughman’s lunch he was offered, so all in all a little disappointing.