Tag Archives: sparrows

Dug for Victory

As lockdown starts to ease up, the Midlife Garden is is offering a new habitat for the residents and, perhaps, those who might have travelled from farther afield (albeit under exceptional circumstances and with strictly legal and reasonable grounds, of course). Responding to the growing pressure for living space, emergency planning permission has been pushed through to combat the expected second peak of young frogs and newts who will be finding it increasingly difficult to socially distance in their current accommodation.

In the old pond, life is – to quote 10cc – a minestrone, choked as it is with weed and lilies. So with the proposed re-development of the area for the expanded kitchen, the siting of a larger, clearer, pond on a greenfield site was quickly approved with the first turf being cut on a Saturday morning at the start of the month. This was followed moments later by the first contact between spade and concrete – six inches of it. Despite this, the main ground work was completed in a weekend and the intervening weeks have been spent planting and landscaping to ensure the pond meets the requirements of its ‘stakeholders’.

So who is this new facility designed for and who has actually been using it? Of course, we are expecting the frogs and newts to transfer soon, but totally understand their reticence in moving from their current swamp. After all, in newt terms, the distance from the old pond to the new is the equivalent of 260 miles and they, like the rest of us, are unsure of how rules regarding travel relate to mere pondlife…

Early tenants include the Water Boatmen who hitched a ride on the water lilies’ roots. But the main users of the pond are the birds, who spend their time on the beach like a stag weekend in Brighton, drinking and bathing. While blackbirds, tits, pigeons, robins and even the occasional woodpecker have availed themselves of the facilities, it is the sparrows that are the most rowdy and vociferous. Like a bunch of year 8s their diminutive size is inversely proportional to their potential for trouble. They argue and squabble in the branches of the pyrocanthus or hang out on the higher rungs of the wooden fence like the cool kids in the bleachers. And when they come down to the pond water sprays like fountains in Trafalgar Square as they bathe with the energy of over-wound clockwork toys. It is hardly surprising that the water level has dropped. But these are the same sparrows that vandalise the lettuce and chard in the veg garden and have, on several occasions, been caught out of bounds in the greenhouse. Will they never learn?!

So the pond awaits the hardcore denizens who will take advantage of its cool depths (OK, its only a couple of feet deep, but you try digging that much top soil and breaking up the gardening equivalent of the Maginot Line). The irises, rushes and water forget-me-nots are looking great for which we have to thank Ben from Water Artisans who provided materials and plants as well as his advice and encouragement, and without whom all of this would not have been possible.

From the newts, frogs and – especially – the sparrows: thank you, Ben.

Veronica or Veronicastrum Virginicum?*

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Let ’em Dangle

I read a good article by James Wong in the Grauniad this weekend in which he gave his four top tips for beginners in the garden. I never feel like I have a great well of knowledge about gardening, although I have friends who see me as the expert in gardening, in relative terms that is, because I actually plant stuff, grow stuff and harvest or cut other stuff at the end of the process.  Although I still regard myself as a beginner in this big green-fingered world, reading James Wong’s article made me think that perhaps, in the horticultural educational ladder, I would most probably be in a position to now graduate from beginners’ to improvers classes.

James Wong says persistence is key – to not be put off by things dying on you.  Well, I think I do that.  There have been times when growing veg this summer has felt like a Sisyphean task – as successive batches of chard and peas have perished on the raised bed killing fields like ranks of yeomanry heading over the top to be mown down by slugs, sparrows or simple drought.  But I have rolled that metaphorical rock back up the hill and actually made it stick on occasion to reap the benefits in plentiful courgettes and beans, amongst other things.

Second piece of advice is to avoid worrying about weeds, which are simply flowers int the wrong place.   Using new raised beds has been a real treat this summer, especially with the dry weather so there has been little or no weeding to be done, but I have taken James’s idea to one extreme by allowing some of the random seedlings that emerged from the mudslide of the great greenhouse disaster to flourish in the warm indoor beds.  So I now have a sprinkling of zinnias and Ammi poking through the sweet peppers and tomatoes.  Why not?

Tip number three is simply to plant stuff in the ground and not bother with pots too much.  This is something I could take heed of as I am the worst helicopter parent when it comes to germinating and growing seeds.  I put them in lovingly sieved compost in individual seed trays and then check on them everyday – perhaps every hour – until they are poking through.  Then fuss over them even more watering and watching until they are bursting out of the trays and need to be potted on or planted out.  Then – to my amazement – when let loose from their molly coddled world of shop-bought compost and careful watering, planted out in the naked earth, they flourish.  Like grumpy teenagers living away from home for the first time they suddenly take flight, get on with growing up properly and become sensible members of the community.  So why not sow more seeds direct into the earth?  It might be what they really want.  Perhaps I’ll try that…

And finally Mr Wong advises using Latin names for everything.  Just get out and learn them he says:  no one really knows how Latin – a dead language – should be pronounced so no worries there.  And by using the correct Latin name you can be sure of what you are buying rather than vaguely describing the blue one of this or that flower, you can be pedantically specific.  But as someone whose school coerced him into taking Latin O-Level (My fault: I was one of only a few who actually revised for the exam in the second form) and subsequently scraped a C grade at sixteen (a “4” in today’s exciting GCSE grading), I have never been keen on the language even in horticultural use.   Until recently I would have assumed that streptocarpus was a fish flavoured throat lozenge.  But I will perhaps try the Latin way more often.  Does that include more gesticulation when I speak, suffering wild swings of emotion and using the horn on my car with impunity?  If it makes the broad beans grow, I’ll give it a shot.

I may not have been happy with being made to do latin as a schoolboy, but if things don’t go as planned, it is better to laugh than to cry.   As a latin student might have said of my designated superiors at the last educational establishment I left:

“Eos si iocus non possint pedicabo…”

 

“What a Good Year for the Courgettes…”
Peas in our Time?
The Other Side of Summer
Indoor Zinnias…
…Accidents will Happen
This Year’s Models
Pump it up…Jersey Devil
Tamp the Dirt Down

 

*With apologies to Elvis Costello

The Birds, The Birds

Male-Blackbird-Singing
Blackbird on a wire.  Well, fruit tree actually.

One of my former flatmates had a phobia about birds flapping anywhere near her.  I thought of her recently when we found a jackdaw in the shed when we were clearing out the Old Man’s place the other day.  One of my brothers screamed like a girl when he opened the door and onlookers would have been amused to watch four men in their mid-to-late 50s (I’ll be kind to my eldest sibling) flapping more than the startled bird as it – and they – tried to get out of the door.

Trapped birds seem to be a theme this week, as I found a black bird in the new greenhouse hiding under the basil and tomatoes.  I ushered the relieved bird to the exit and got on with weeding, picking out side shoots and cutting salad.

But then things got more sinister as, in a scene lifted from Hitchcock, I visited the greenhouse a few days later to check on my (now ripening) tomatoes.  The Sweet Millions are my little darlings – they are being produced in burgeoning numbers.  Under my careful direction they are my leading actors in the annual greenhouse summer blockbuster.  But the dismay and horror (the horror!) I felt when I stepped into the greenhouse, like Tippi Hedren into the old farmer’s house, to find a scene of devastation and lying in a corner, behind the basil, the red eviscerated remains of my cherry tomatoes.

Cut to the next scene as, with the symphonic score rising in a crescendo, I ran breathlessly from the scene, unable to scream or even explain what I had witnessed as I got into my old ford truck and drove away.

Ok, so perhaps I over-dramatise.  There were no dead bodies in the greenhouse – it was only a couple of tomatoes that had been eaten.  I was not so upset that I screamed but I did utter an expletive, which Tippi would not have been allowed to do on-screen.  Nor did I  jump into my Ford truck:  the only car in the vicinity was Mrs B’s Honda Civic.  And I probably did discuss the situation with the only sentient being in the vicinity – Ella the Labrador – as I tried to work out what had been eating my tomatoes.

She did not have much to contribute to the discussion.

In retrospect it is obvious, but in the absence of smashed glass, or birds impaled on the windows, it was not entirely clear who was harvesting the tomatoes twenty-four hours prior to me picking them.  It did finally dawn on me later when I saw another blackbird in the greenhouse.  This bird clearly knew exactly how to get in and out, and it’s motivation was obvious as the remains for more nearly ripe toms were left on the soil.

Birds have been a problem this year.  In addition to the usual attacks from pigeons, sparrows have destroyed my pea crop and the blackbirds had also had a good go at the blueberries and raspberries.  So now, in addition to the soft fruit being covered in netting, the greenhouse has netting draped over the roof and door to deter any airborne invasion.

The tomatoes are ripening nicely but I remain wary of flocks of birds gathering on the wires, in the trees, peas or anywhere near the greenhouse.

 

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The evidence