Quick update

This is the view from our bedroom window, towards the woodlands. We get a good view of the pond, and the dining area, and usually see what the children are up to.

I quite often spend time looking out over the garden, making plans of what I'd like to do next. Its a good exercise in disipline, as I always make far too many plans, and have to reduce all the ideas in line with the space I have available.

The pond has progressed a little, I've started putting hessian bags filled with soil around the outside to disguise the edges. I'll be using plants from the bog gardens, divided and plant them into the sacks, hopefully they will fill out and hide them by the spring. The weather is still too wet to do an awful lot outside, but every available minute is spent out there.

The herbaceous gardens are starting to go over at last, they seem to have kept hold of their leaves longer than usual, perhaps as they were delayed at the beginning of the season. Once things start to die down naturally, I'll think about clearing up, although I don't usually start until after Christmas. I find the dead and decaying leaves act as a good mulch and its much easier to clear the garden in Jan & Feb.

Pond In Progress

I managed to line the ponds with extensive carpet donations, this hopefully protects the liner and stops the moles digging through and ruining the pond, perhaps the weight of the water will stop too much damage...they just seem to dig under the swimming pool. With the help of one of the children I managed to get the liner laid out in an afternoon, it looks easy, but I assure you its not..I waited for rain, I tried to rig up the pump from the stream to pump water in, but the pond is too high above the river. Eventually I filled it up with water from the hose, then it rained for 4 days........typical. I planned to hide the divide from the 2nd pond with rocks and hessian sacks filled with soil. I didn't appreciate how hard it is to manouvre heavy rocks without damaging the liner, I managed with the aid of some carpet and felt I've made a good job, but its taken me 4 days to stand up straight again !! I've got to do it again to hide the divide between the 2nd & 3rd ponds(when/if I ever finished digging it out.) I've also got to hide the edges of the pond, build a path down one side, finish the beach area, plant up the whole area, perhaps I might finish by next summer!



Whilst digging out the pond, tidying up etc etc we've also started on the other raised grass circle area. There are no natural flat area's in the woodland gardens, so after the success of the 1st circle, I decided that it would be good to mirror the flat area nearer the house and make it available to swimmers whilst drying off. It will also be a good vantage place to study the ponds. This circle will be higher than the other, so again I have a huge amount of soil moving to do, some of the surplus from the 3rd pond will be dumped here, along with spoil already dumped here from the large pond. Perhaps if I get to dig the overgrown borders over, all that can go here too.