Gardening
The weather’s gone cool, the days short and the autumn colours have come out strongly this year. Not yet enough wind to blow all the leaves away but the growing season is over and it’s time for cutting back and shaping.
The result of several years of my management is that I’m getting shape and density back in to the hedges and the shrubs are less stringy. The wild bees are still around, even in November. One of the local pheasants came to check me out when I was taking a break. This is all wet growth which my shredder doesn’t work with so it either has to lay on the ground to mulch (and provide cover for wildlife, eg hedgehogs) or it has to go out to the council tip in bags or bins.
Cumberland council mowers are busy on the grass in the parks, Maybe the last cut of the year for the “meadow” in my Keswick garden. The Flymo is hard work, especially grass on slopes as here; sharpening the blade helps but mowing like this is equivalent to a long session on a rower in the gym, plus a core workout.
Cumbrian Mist
Now the weather is back to the Cumbrian Cloud Forest climate and the heatwave is a distant nightmare, I set about tackling a Yew hedge that must be at least as old as the house. A previous gardener trained the young tree to be a hedge, like laying a thorn hedge around a field. Subsequent gardeners have let it sprawl, almost to the point of collapse.
Weeding in the Keswick heatwave. Apples on my trees and Latrigg (368 m.) in the background.
I surprised a hedgehog when I was putting the bins out after dusk. It froze next to the house and had shuffled off before I passed again. Great they are around: they keep the slugs and snails down. There’s plenty of potential hedgehog habitat in the wild part of my Keswick garden but it’s rare that I see them. I put some water out as it’s been dry but there seemed to be no takers - there’s been plenty of dew overnight.
