I've spent a fortune in the garden centre!

The great thing about this garden is that we are spending a lot less on it than we did on our last garden - however I did go mad last week! I've always wanted some citrus fruits and an olive tree, and they are all very expensive. I also ordered an arch to go over our bench out in the front garden, and that arrived last week. Keith erected the whole thing himself, with me checking with the spirit level then basically just looking and doing it by eye, as it's practically imposible to get the posts in perfectly straight, especially when you have stony soil! He also gave most of it a darker stain as it was supposed to be dark brown (to match the bench and shutters etc), only it wasn't anything like the colour of the online picture. Never mind, hopefully in a few years it will be covered with climbers and not very noticeable.

The next photos are once it was in its permanent position with the wooden legs inside the metal booties (or whatever they are called) which are hammered into the ground. I chose a light blue clematis for one side (couldn't find a dark blue, annoyingly) and a bignone (Campsis radicans) for the other side. That is an orange, trumpet like vine which is quite vigorous, so I might be having to keep it well pruned! We also planted a buddleia between the last bambooey thing and the hedge. This will be my third attempt at growing buddleia. So far out of two shrubs I have had one white butterfly on one and a moth on the other, and not that many flowers either. So much for calling them butterfly bushes! But I will not be put off..... 😀

The really good news is that the soil was much better here than where I made my herb bed. I think because that was beside a wall next to the house, where the ground had been levelled with machinery, it's possible that clay subsoil got dumped there. A shame for the herbs, but they are all growing well now and every one got a good inch or two of gravel underneath them for drainage.

Part of the view from the bench:

I hadn't noticed that you can see the old windmill from the bench - this is a zoomed in pic from my phone so not very good quality (all the pics are phone ones) - originally in the 19th century there were three windmills on that bit of hill but this is the only one that remains. We can't go in it as there is an old millkeepers house next to it which presumably belongs to someone as it isn't derelict.

Here is my new olive tree - it has been pruned in a pompom fashion (that's what it said on the label). I guess it is the beginning of cloud pruning, although I don't want to keep it so clipped as that, but as I'm planting it in the back garden I do want the size constrained a bit, so think this is a good shape.

Do you like my rusty ornaments? I wish I had bought a couple more now! I got them from a Xmas market we went to soon after moving here.

I bought a Meyer lemon which you can see in the background, that tiny tree cost about 40 euros. However I was so chuffed to find out that I could buy a "Lime Leaf plant"! This is the kind of lime that we use in Thai cooking, mostly for the leaves. I haven't ever used the lime fruit before but they are supposed to add an interesting flavour to Asian dishes, so can't wait to get some fruit on it. The lime tree is much bigger than the lemon and cost a whopping 80 euros!!! The olive was 80 euros too, but I was expecting to pay more, to be honest. Add in the shrubs and climbers that I bought, plus some lavenders and an oregano, and you will understand the title of this post!

The tulips are flowering now and I'm really pleased that the colour goes so well with the pansies.

I have been learning decoupage from the many tutorials online. It's not easy doing it with napkin paper as it's so thin (you only use the ply with the printing on it), but doing this kind of decoupage where you cut out the paper in shapes is a lot easier than trying to put whole napkins on the bottom of a tray, which I have also done. That one is not photo worthy 😀, well it's not finished yet anyway. But you have to practice to gain experience.

This one below was originally a green and white striped planter, but I don't like green in my house unless it's a plant!

I meant to take photos of the cherry and plum trees which are covered in blossom but that will have to wait until the next post, as I want to get this published. We are going out tomorrow to the coast, to an area we went to with the birding group last year. First an area of old salt pans which had waders, then a disused quarry that had resident Blue Rock Thrushes, then up the hill to a big area of garrigue. I hope there will be some interesting wild flowers blooming. 

President Macron is due to discuss the virus/lockdown with his cronies tomorrow, and we fear another lockdown on the cards, as the Kent variant is on the spread. Paris and north east France are already in lockdown. Anyhow, I am very pleased for you lot in the UK now you have semi freedom after your awful three month long lockdown. I have felt for you, what a bloody nightmare that must have been.

Take care xx

A walk around the block

This post should really come after our long weekend getting acquainted with the Motorhome, but I've yet to sort the photos so that will come next. After putting it away in its rented garage on Monday, the sun was shining, the weather was cold but lovely, so I felt inspired to take my camera and go for a walk, rather than start some gardening in the late-ish afternoon.

I surprised my OH after I came home as I mentioned things I'd seen and where I'd seen them, as he hadn't realised I meant I was actually going round the block (as in turn right going out of the house and keep turning right (or vice versa) until one arrives back at the house again). He thought I was just going for a potter up the road and back again! I surprised myself too for having the motivation to get out in the fresh air and away from the house. The walk takes about an hour when you are walking at middling pace and taking lots of photos. It was great to get some exercise and I felt really good in myself for having done this. 

Looking back towards my property which is where all the trees are.

Everything is starting to turn yellow - I thought these fields had been planted with a yellow flowered mustard which is a green manure, but now think this is the rape crop, but very early this year, like everything else!

Still a few holly berries on this bush.

This is the Melodious Warbler Walk! Looking very different as the verges and ditches have been cut and cleared of all the brambles and vegetation which was going a bit crazy and swamping the place by late summer. This will be great for the wildflowers in the spring (and butterflies) which I am looking forward to seeing, as I only started checking this place out last summer. On the other hand, cutting down the vegetation is apparently not good for the Wasp Spiders' egg sacs which must have been destroyed, yet they seemed to be abundant here. Again, it will be interesting to see if they are around this year because if so, that means that the cutting back of vegetation has not affected their ability to reproduce.

A lifer bird! At first I thought it was a discarded bucket, as they were near the entrance to a field where dairy cattle go in and out. When I looked through my camera lens I could see there were two birds, one hiding behind the other. They are so cute - I've seen Red Legged Partridges before but never a Grey Partridge. They stood still looking at me for quite a while until I tried to get a little closer, and then of course they ran off!

We've noticed this year that gorse is doing really well and is in full flower everywhere.

There are lots of primroses flowering on the banks.

This umbellifer is a bit previous - I think it's Hogweed but can't be sure.

The only people I met were my neighbours, Armand and Marie-Jo, who walk this route often for exercise. I'd get bored doing the same route over and over. As you can see from Armand's lack of hands, it was rather cold and fresh!

Beside a farm there was a hedge of flowering currants.

Typical Breton winter scenery - strangely pruned trees although these ones are covered in ivy.

Coming back into the hamlet.

The oldest of the two manor houses in the hamlet. Parts of this one date back to the 1500s.

A view of my house and the back of the barn and chicken/duck sheds from across the field.

As I rounded the corner to come back to my house I noticed the lambs in the paddock on the corner. As I stood taking photos they started gambolling towards me, mother bleating, until they all arrived at the fence, bleating like crazy. Of course they wanted food!!

Home Sweet Home - I've nearly finished tidying this front bed and spreading compost. The Euphorbia characias is looking stunning already.

I feel I can't not mention the very sudden sad loss of a fellow blogger who despite never having met, I would like to call a friend. She commented on all my posts and vice versa. She and her husband moved to Bulgaria three years ago to start a smallholding there.... Sara's husband Dave has said he will keep the blog "NEW START, NEW LIFE IN BULGARIA" going in her memory.

http://debrazzaman.blogspot.fr/2016/03/and-so-life-goes-on.html 

Spring has sprung

Part 1 - Plants

It doesn't matter to me whether it's the end of February or the end of March, the blossoming of the first daffodils will happen when the time is right, and this is the best indication that spring has well and truly started. Coupled with the sounds of the birds singing, the yellow blooms bring a bright cheeriness to the stark winter landscape and my senses are heightened every time I step outside.

There are a number of plants flowering and trees in bud right now, with early blossoms starting to open and little hints of green on some of the shrubs. Our little hamlet seems to be a bit colder and behind the villages and towns at the start of spring, so we can enjoy the trees in blossom when we are passing through, then a week or so later enjoy the same sights in our own garden.

It can and will turn colder (snow forecast next week!) but we have some colour and interest in the garden now, and March is a month where we could be either freezing or wearing T-shirts, so there is light at the end of the winter tunnel.

On top of all that, the UK's best known TV gardening series (Gardeners' World) started again last night, so it must be spring..... and has reminded me of all the jobs that need doing!  

I planted all sorts of unnamed varieties of daffodil years ago
and they flower at different times, prolonging the season

Monday - the first bloom was almost open, by Wednesday suddenly there were dozens!

Pretty blossom from the spindly Mirabelle plum
which grows but doesn't fruit in our woodland area

I only know this tree as 'Purple Leafed Prunus'. It is very common and is very early to blossom
then is covered with attractive purple foliage.

I could pretend that I meant for this photo to look soft focus
- I didn't, but sometimes 'mistakes' can look better than the intention.
Here is 'Japonica' or Japanese Quince (Chaenomeles japonica)

My Euphorbias are already looking interesting and I now know what two of the self seeded plants are! I'm so pleased as one of them has come from my lost E. martinii, which died either last year or the year before. The other one I've found out has come from my E. characias. I say 'come from' as I don't know for sure that they have come true, or if they are crosses. I love that they self seed all over the place and in the photo below, all three Euphorbias are self seeded. Once upon a time a spindly rose bush lived here and never did well in this very light dry soil, plus it's beside the steps leading to the garage at the front of the house, and was never a great place for a rose bush! I wrote about my different Euphorbias last year here.

Top - looks like Euphorbia amygdaloides, the Wood Spurge
Centre - E. martinii ?
Bottom - E. myrsinitis

It's the red centre of the bracts which show this came from
my original plant, Euphorbia martinii

This is my original Euphorbia characias, which has now self seeded

Shade loving plants have been flowering for a while now. I love finding the occasional pink primrose in amongst the more common yellow ones.

Pink Primrose (Primula vulgaris) at the base of a Honeysuckle

Snowdrops are going over now but the Hellebores are still looking good

Pulmonaria continues to look pretty and I will be weeding
out lots of baby plants as they self seed like crazy!

The wild hazel catkins are over but my Corylus avellana contorta
is in the coldest part of the garden and is only now flowering.
The Weeping Willow (back left) is just starting to come to life.

And in veg patch news.... I have had some help with the digging and weeding.

I did dig some of it! And no, he didn't weed this entire patch by hand.... :-)
But the truth is, he can do a whole plot in a couple of afternoons,
whereas it would take me a month of Sundays

Potato and allium beds are done - 3 more plots still to go.
Left in for now are leeks in the background as food for us, and in the foreground,
rocket and a chinese cabbage which are both flowering, as food for pollinators

I've also had some help with weeding in the flower beds :-)

Rusty 'helping'.
After heavy rain Thursday night the ground is quite wet again

Part 2 will be about insects and birds, as in spring I could go on and on ad nauseum and I have many photos to share, and if I don't do it soon the garden will have changed and I will have to take a load more photos.... and so it goes on!

Woodland and wildflowers

Just to let you know if you haven't already seen it, I've added an About Chateau Moorhen page on the right just below my profile photo - this gives some info about us, the grounds and a map of our property.

In between the showers I've been getting out and taking photos in my little woodland area. It's slowly coming to life and getting greener by the day. Once all the leaves are out it becomes a dark mysterious place but at the moment it is still quite bright and light so the woodland spring flowers are flourishing.

The same trees (wild cherry on left, sycamore on right) from a different perspective. The wild cherries are flowering now but it's very hard to take photos as I can't get far enough away as there's always another tree in the way!

There are mown pathways and open glades which make a relatively small space appear larger as there's a choice of different paths to walk around. 

I don't know what these tiny flowers are,
but they provide pretty blasts of lime green colour here and there.

Herb Robert (Geranium robertianum) with
Ground Ivy in the left foreground

Thanks to the sun coming out suddenly the woodland appears to have turned brooding and quite menacing. I was trying to show the tree in the centre which is a dead Elm which long ago succumbed to Dutch Elm Disease but is much loved by birds for nesting places as it's full of holes. The one thing I'm disappointed about with my camera is that the zoom on this compact is not much good for photographing birds. One day I'll get a DSLR and make myself a little hide, as there is so much bird life here. Of course I'll get even less done in the garden then!

I have bluebells too! They may not be the English bluebells but I love them. There's also the odd pink one in amongst them.

A few weeks ago I noticed loads of tiny stripy spiders scuttling around in amongst the dry leaves (this was before the weather broke).

Another common wildflower is Greater Stitchwort (Stellaria holostea). It's been flowering on the ditch banks out in the sun for longer but just coming to life in the shadier places. It's one of my favourite spring wildflowers.

Greater Stitchwort blowing in the breeze

A close up, just as this flower is getting a bit tatty
and the seed pod is forming

Looking up at the canopy coming to life.

And, as it's on the woodland side of the lake.... Moorhen nest no. 2!