March 2020 – Garden Gate Flowers

Lockdown: You’ve Got to Roll With It

When I was young, quarantine was for dogs. Specifically, those coming from abroad. A stay of six months was the norm, although that was increased to twelve months for a while when a dog named Sessan died of rabies in Newmarket. These days quarantine is for humans – and it seems that dogs are our best way out of it, as it has been accepted that they need two exercises a day while we are allowed just the one.

Our Labrador Retriever celebrated the first day of lockdown by rolling in something unspeakable during our single excursion from the house. We have various names for the fields that we walk in, based on previous sightings and happenings. There is the Old Deer Field, the New Deer Field and the Ducking Pool (where Ella wades and slurps water before coughing like a Covid patient). There is also the Manor field, and the more descriptively labelled Dead Badger Field. To that list we can now add the Second Dead Badger Field (DBF II). We had to keep the dog down wind from us as we strode home.

I was deputed to put on my own Personal Protection Equipment, consisting of rubber gloves and an old anorak, which is not dissimilar to what the Government is supplying “our” NHS, it seems. The dog herself could not understand the fuss and took it all as her own PPE (Personal Pampering for Ella). So, after anointing herself with the odour of badger carcass, she now got to choose from a range of shampoos, left over from the Christmas hamper, with which to have a wash and shake. She went for ‘After the Rain’ (from Arran Aromatics) and she looked gorgeous on it. Fluffy and happy, smelling like a Highland Hunting party: notes of heather and gorse, with a hint of rotting cadaver on the finish.

Ella does not see Lockdown as a problem and does not understand the concept of Social Distancing either; wandering out into the lane every time another villager walks past on their daily exercise. It is not that she is being sociable – she is simply checking their pockets for biscuits.

Self-isolation is something that the hen has decided she is going to rebel against too, as she escaped from her run twice yesterday and attempted to scratch away at the flowers coming up in the cold spring sunshine. We sent her packing with a warning – next time it will be a fine, or perhaps a really hard stare from our Prime Minister.

That should do it.

Back in Isolation

Daffs and stuff

Tulip testing the cold air

Crocuses & Tulip leaves

Perennial seedlings

Trees of Life

Two years ago this week it snowed.

I know that because it was the day my father died. It was the final freeze in a bitterly cold winter. The Old Man had survived the Beast from the East but not the after-shock of the early spring snowfall on the night of 17th March. The doctor had to trudge across the snow-filled fields with her dog to certify his death.

Two weeks ago they held the inquest into Josh’s death. We have not, as yet, heard what the findings were but prior to it we had been sent the statements that formed the basis of the short inquest at which no witnesses were called. The first item was a simple police confirmation of identity.

The other statement was the hospital record detailing the treatment that Josh had received in hospital in those 27 days as the staff strove to save his life. It made for awful reading: an account of his gradual decline which, like a movie to which you know the ending, felt as though the outcome was somehow inevitable, in stark contrast to our feelings of desperate hope at the time.

So it was, last weekend we planted trees in Josh’s memory to start the construction of a part of the garden which will be dedicated to him. We thought of Josh as we did it, but I was also remembering my father. I have said before how my parents are often on my mind when I’m in the garden. Trees evoke memories of my The Old Man, who invested in planting a good number of trees at the Old Place. I particularly recalled the six maples that he bought – three copper, three variegated – for the end of the garden. It must have been the school holidays, because my mother and I were the ones who sunk the not- inconsiderable trees into position. When my father returned at the end of the day, his only comment was that they were not quite in the right position. My mother’s response was to offer him the spade and suggest he move them himself, if he so wished.

The trees stayed where they were and flourished, providing a handsome screen.

So this thought was playing on my mind as Mrs B and I took a spade to the sodden turf and planted three Silver Birch (Snow Queen) and a Sorbus (of an as-yet-unconfirmed type). I was naturally concerned that we planted them in the right place, which I think we did. But a couple of concerns linger.

Concern No.1: Have I left enough room for the stump grinder? If not I am going to have to lift the trees when we come to prepare the rest of the bed by grinding out the roots of the old shrubs.

Concern No.2: Have I planted the right tree? The Mountain Ash (Sorbus Aucuparia Cardinal Royal) is evocative of my childhood when a rowan tree adorned the church yard opposite my bedroom window. I have a nasty suspicion that, in a labelling mix up, the nursery delivered a Whitebeam (Sorbus Aria Lutescens) but we had planted it before we realised the possible cock-up. The nice lady at the nursery seems to think we have the right tree though it is difficult to tell when they are not in leaf. But, as she said to me, we will soon know, won’t we?

And then there is every chance that, like my father before me, I will be wanting to shift all the trees I have just planted.

I will keep my fingers crossed – and look forward to the re-birth of spring.

Reading the instructions

Silver Birch…

…Three Snow Queens

Birch bark

No bark

Sowing the Seeds

When I started this post a week ago the immediate concerns surrounded the aftermath of another weekend bringing another storm – Jorge. It seemed that our post-Brexit freedoms did not extend to naming our own storms with those Europeans coming over here, bringing their continental storms, messing with our rivers and flooding our golf courses.

Now we have the non-specifically named Covid-19 coming over here threatening to mess with everything and everyone we hold dear. I wonder if we can comprehend the enormity of what we might have to face and the steps we can take to mitigate the the effects of the impending epidemic. Back in 1976 when my father decided to buy a property with 6 1/2 acres of land it was, in no small part, because he wanted to be able to sustain a degree of self-sufficiency in case of a break down in the supply chain through either economic uncertainty of nuclear disaster. I am not sure if he saw Opec or Russia as a bigger threat, but he was determined to be ready.

It seems many think we might be facing such a scenario now – which would explain the bizarre headline shortages in toilet rolls and hand sanitizer. Really? In his day, my father was concerned about shortages in proper essentials like, um, food. So he grew vegetables on an industrial scale. I cannot compete with him in the scale of my veg growing operation, but I have managed to maintain an element of self-sufficiency and am hoping that Mrs B and I will have a decent crop of vegetables for the summer.

This week we cooked the last of the stored squashes: the recipe required “one large squash, 1 Kg”. Half of my last Crown Prince squash weighed a whopping 2kg so perhaps it pays to grow your own. We have almost finished the kale but the purple sprouting is doing as described (sprouting, in purple). There are still leeks in the garden and the rocket has got its act together in the greenhouse, so we have green leaves. And our hen – plucky Agatha – continues to lay eggs at regular intervals. For the new season there are the green shoots of new garlic and shallots. It might not be enough to ward off the prospect of self-isolation, but it is, if nothing else, pleasing to know that we can provide at least some of our diet for ourselves.

Most of the recent horticultural work has revolved around sowing seeds. I have ordered all my veg seeds, which I will start sowing in trays this weekend, but in some ways the more emotionally rewarding work has been in planning the flower garden for the summer. There will be a new border to be planted in Josh’s memory and I plan for the rest of the garden to be vibrant with colour and flowers for cutting. Ultimately the new beds will be planted with perennials, but as these will take a year or two to mature, I am sowing more annuals than I have ever done to ensure the borders are more packed than the Greco-Turkish equivalent. For flower seeds my go-to source is always Higgledy Garden and he includes old favourites such as cosmos, nicotiana and sweet peas, as well as newbies like Cleome Spinosa, amongst others, and a free packet of Godetia.

My father used to say that if you could not eat it, he did not want to grow it, but as I see the seedlings poking through and I look forward to sunny summer days and blooming borders in the garden it is a good time of year to remember Jesus being tempted in the desert and remind ourselves that we cannot live on bread alone.

Or toilet rolls for that matter.