SIGNS OF SPRING On the homeward leg of my daily constitutional, I swung left along a barbed wire fence below the slippage underneath fields adjacent to what was Church Farm. The ground was squelchy; stud-bottomed trainers sunk uncomfortably deep. Leg over an iron gate, across the Very Steep Hill, another gate and shimmy through a [...]
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Posts Tagged ‘elder’
16 January 2010 DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman SIGNS OF SPRING
Saturday, January 16th, 201026 December 2009 DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman NOT BEING DISTURBED
Saturday, December 26th, 2009NOT BEING DISTURBED Temperature dropped at 2.15pm. It happened at the moment a brief but squally shower arrived. I cut a few more logs, then left Mrs Nails tidying up the flower garden to walk round Breech and fetch my van. An extended family was waiting with good humour for ‘dad’ (who apparently is always late) [...]
Read More »19 November 2009 DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman WINDY DAYBREAK
Thursday, November 19th, 2009Out the back, only elder and the lowest whiskers of lime hold on to any semblance of foliage. The rest, blown inside-out by recent winds, are skeletal-naked. Hilltop trees Mexican Wave their outer branches in an elastic ripple. A stones’ throw from my back-against-a-wall vantage in the veg garden, I can see whole elephantine lime limbs [...]
Read More »21 August 2009 DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman BLACKBIRD IN THE GUTTER, BLOWSY BORDERS
Friday, August 21st, 200913 August 2009 DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman APPLE DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN, PIGEONS SQUABBLE OVER ELDERBERRIES, SPIDERS AT 10.15AM
Thursday, August 13th, 200913 August 2009 APPLE DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN Just had the first home-grown apple of this season. A Merton Knave. It dangled from a step over tree, or ‘single tier espalier’, which I’ve nurtured for seven years from a maiden whip in front of the south-facing greenhouse as a decorative and productive edge. It just [...]
Read More »12 June 2009: DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman MR BULLFINCH, DOWN ON STUDLAND
Friday, June 12th, 200912 June 2009 MR BULLFINCH A soft short whistle is emitting from the elders. It sounds like there’s an old boy pedalling slowly down the street on an old bone-shaker of a bike. Actually it’s the discreet song of a male bullfinch, not exactly a rare occurrence in the garden but certainly noteworthy and always [...]
Read More »2 June 2009: DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman ‘THE BIG LUNCH’ LATEST
Tuesday, June 2nd, 20092 June 2009 ‘THE BIG LUNCH’ LATEST… This is an Eden Project inspired national event happening wherever people feel the urge to get thier local communities together on Sunday 19th July 2009. If you Google The Big Lunch then all you need to know is there. Essentially the idea is to stop what you’re doing [...]
Read More »27 May 2009: DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman SOME RAIN AT LAST, SAY IT WITH ASPARAGUS
Wednesday, May 27th, 200927 May 2009 SOME RAIN AT LAST Some rain has fallen at last. To me, crucial; to my plants, essential; to wildlife in general, more than welcome. A barbeque summer of searing heat and wide open blue skies may please deck chair vendors, builders and folk who want to cultivate a tan, but for the [...]
Read More »17 May 2009: DIRTY NAILS’ BLOG by Joe Hashman POSSIBLE BEES NEST BEHIND THE BACK WALL, GREAT LANE AT 17.05
Sunday, May 17th, 200917 May 2009 POSSIBLE BEES NEST BEHIND THE BACK WALL Just beyond the back garden wall I think I’ve discovered a bumblebees nest. It was pure happenchance. I’d climbed up to cut down an elder branch which was knocking the greenhouse roof. Job done, I laid the brash where it fell and popped back over. [...]
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