Some Spring Colour in my garden

Great weather

Went sailing this morning and towed some feathers but no sign of mackerel yet, then the dogs got a walk down to the river and a good swim. Wasn't a cloud in the sky most of this last week and I borrowed the excavator again a couple of days ago and made a drainage ditch demolished a wall and got the wall on the road fixed up for its new gate which I'll get next week.

I hope the weather is like this when Paddy visits, he arrives on the 10 th of May. Alan and John are coming to babysit the dogs they arrive on the 22nd May and Angie and I are away to the wedding on the 23rd. Would be nice to get the gate up when they are here and I,m getTing a solar panel for the yacht that Alan can fit.

Another gorgeous day

Spent the day clearing again (slash and burn) and uncovered another bonny spot further down in my garden. This bit has a deep burn run running through it. There is a bank with a wall on top and the bank is covered in ferns. The area is between the big softwoods and an area of birch wood and has great dappled light through it. Tomorrow I have to burn another area that is piled high with branches and then use the weed whacker  to get rid of brambles and the area will be open right though alongside a pond to a bit I cleared when John was up last.

The weather has been great the last couple of days and its a pleasure to be out gardening when it is like this, hopefully the weather will be good when Paddy is across from Australia and we can get plenty fishing in. Alan is coming over from Scotland to babysit the dogs and John is coming up too the weekend of Paddies wedding whe I will be away in England 24th May is the wedding date.

Have to make a best man speech so will have to remember to mention all Paddies old girl friends etc :)

This shot below is my wee yacht alongside a couple of fishing boats at Roundstone about 6 hrs along the coast.

Arabic weather

Well we have Arabic weather here just now it was Shiite all week now it is Sunni. In fact today has been great and I got lots done in the garden. Am starting a hugelkultur bed now,

Had a load of stumps and odd shaped branches not ideal for burning on my stove so have made a large pile of them which I shall cover with soil and see how it goes. Found out about this German idea for horticulture from a website at http://www.richsoil.com/hugelkultur/  normally I would have burnt the smaller stuff but this is killing two birds as the area I am building it on is boggy and I am hoping the water will be diverted away when the mound forms.

Have a great showing of Daffodils this Spring and there is a wee bit colour about now so I took the trusty camera out.

first sail of the season

Well its been a bonny week and more fair weather to come :) John was up for five days and he gave me a wee hand with a couple of bonfires, planting seeds and landscaping so it was great to see him. Things are starting to sprout here now and I took a wee walk round with the camera again.

My meadow area is now ready for seeds after the excavator managed to get rid of the stumps for me, I am just waiting another couple of weeks so the ground will warm up a bit. The photo below is the area I have cleared which was no mean task as it was all brambles and pheasant berry bush thicket to start off with huge tree divots thrown in.

I made an access hole in the wall and a ramp so I can barrow the stack of wood under the blue tarp up to the road and load it on the trailer, it then goes to my wood storage shed which I have made sides for with old pallet wood. Its about half full again after I emptied it for the fire this winter.

I had the boat out yesterday to tune the rigging and check the sails etc and had a nice wee sail down the bay close hauled on the way out and a following 15 knt breeze on the way back, boat was going well as I have not loaded all my gear yet and there is hardly any weight on her.

Another area I am clearing at the moment is down towards the river, the old wall is going to be used for yet another rockery I think and this area is a birch wood and it has another pond that feeds out of the garden pond plus two other burns. I am going to dam this pond dredge it, and raise the level a foot and it will be a lovely wee spot.

This culvert under the main road has now got two wee ponds that the water will cascade over when it rains and probably midgies will breed in the rest of the time.

More land

Well I found out yesterday that I actually own more land than I thought, I was chatting to my neighbour yesterday and it turns out I own a walled off field between our houses that I thought was his. The field is covered in brambles but has about five nice hardwoods and a wee burn running through it. I suppose it's about the size of both the front and back gardens in Kurnell. It will take a while clearing it but hey that's all I do nowadays 😄

There is a six ton excavator going to rip out some stumps I couldn't get with the wee machine tomorrow, he is a neighbour and doing the job really cheap, the stumps are close to the area I,m going to make into a wild flower meadow and I will get him to move the wall stones that make up the field boundary to make up another big rockery in the middle. He mentioned that a job next week has a couple of loads of topsoil so if it's the right price I will get him to dump it in the meadow area.

I dislocated my bliddy anckle yesterday so took it eassier today just did some raking and bits and bobs it takes a while to build up strength in it again and I have to be careful. I gave away some logs today in exchange for the guy clearing the area they are in, it's viewable from the road and I,d like to landscape it plus the logs are pretty wet. I haven't had any new emails from potential helpers so I should update the advert which puts it back on top again.

Helpless and 10.4 kg lighter

Well my helper left yesterday so I shall be working away by myself this next week. The weather is pretty ordinary, wet and windy but things are greening up so Spring must be here somewhere.

Have been on a diet since January and have lost 10.4 kg so far which I am pleased with, I aim to lose another 7.5kg and put another new hole in my belt. It makes a big difference to the pains in my legs losing the weight and I am looking forward to better weather and getting on my push bike. I am best man at Paddy's wedding in May so that was an incentive to look a bit slimmer, he is coming over for a week before the wedding so I aim to get fishing with him on Loch Corrib (Mayfly dabbing) on the Fermoyle river salmon fly fishing and at sea catching what ever is on the bite.

I took a few photos between showers to show what we have been up to recently.

Above are a few rockeries we have been making, obviously they will look better with time when the planting covers the rocks etc. The submerged bath will get pond baskets and I'll transplant a couple of water lilies, it already has a resident frog and three newts, the bank behind gets long thick bladed leaves and an orange flower I cant think of the name of, come summer.

The donkey,s head got put on a bench seat and my garden beds are planted.

 

Spent a while dredging the pond with the excavator the dark patch on the left is material dug out which is drying out before I rake it and sow grass seed there and you can see much more breeze on the water due to thinning out trees behind. Should help keep the midgies away.

Above photo is my composting area with the rebuilt wall that was demolished by falling trees last winter.