What Jobs Are We Doing in the Garden Today... MK3.. 2013

I did a quick inspection of my fences to see how they have stood up to the Winter and winds. I'll be buying two more new panels from the local Timber Merchant as they are cheaper and they also do free delivery. I'll wait until the winds die down before I knock out the old fence panels and install the new ones.

 

I've had some tree surgeons in this morning to sort out some of our laurel on the front. Mrs Shiney and I (mainly Mrs Shiney) have reduced the width of the laurel over the last six months and I was going to reduce the height, but my chainsaw wasn't good enough for the job.

We're trying to make the garden easier to manage and the height of the laurel was 8ft with an average width of 7ft and about 80ft long. Cutting it has been getting more difficult with standing on ladders and trying to stretch across the width. Hopefully it will become a lot easier once the work has been done.

It's going to look a bit rough for Open Day as it'll take a good year or more to sprout and cover the bare wood with leaves. There will also be some big gaps as some very large branches will be cut off. The hedge has been there for sixty years.

They're putting everything through a chipper as it would be impossible to drag it all through to the back of the garden and burn it. They'll also be reducing part of a conifer hedge from 11ft to 8ft.

The hedge is a vee shape and these are a few shots I took the other year when I was working on it from the top of a ladder.

This was the short side of the vee.



And across some of the width - which we have now reduced





And along the longer side



The weather was very dull this morning so the photos are rather dark.

They climbed up into the laurel

 

There was an enormous amount of waste that needed chipping. He told Mrs Shiney that he takes all the chippings to Norfolk where it gets mixed with chicken pooh and turned into electricity. She didn't ask them how they did it



The hedge is rather gappy now!

 

I took advantage of the Sunny, but cold, weather to get down on my knees and sort out the front borders of the House. The front path is lined with Achilles Mollis [Lady's Mantle] which appears every year and softens the hard lines of the path. The only annual job is to cut way the old foliage and debris with sharp scissors and blades which results in two sack fulls of it [straight on the compost heap]. Tomorrow is a day for the late planting of around 80 Gladioli, a Sprekelia, some Dutch Iris, Anemones, Triteleia, 15 Dahlia, 23 Liatris, perennials Heliopsis, Phylsalis, 8 varieties of Clematis, some Agapanthus, some primroses and around 200 or more Lilies......but that's tomorrow!