Garden Update 2

22 February 2020

Another day of planting and arranging in the garden.

 First thing was the paving arrived at the foot of the decking stairs, but the workforce had to take cover from some rain.  While drinking coffee on the cathedral windowsill they noticed the water butt off the Solarium roof overflowing, and asked why we didn't pipe it down to the new storage tanks?  I don't know why we hadn't already thought of this, but we leapt into action to get a pipe in before the pavers covered the route.

Overflow pipe rushed into position - luckily we had enough leftover pieces to get the critical bit laid so paving work could continue.

 'Landi' hard at work shovelling sand.  

The vast amount of stone chips left by the deliveries and stone shaping in the foreground (and to the right, and out of sight in the background ...) are a nuisance.  Many are sharp as knives and I don't want them loose around the land.  

The solution is to put them into the 'landfill' area under the washing line, which is being levelled up to the little brick wall.  The workforce were going to do this, but they are too busy and their time too precious, so we have taken it on.  The least back-breaking way to do this involves sitting on the ground and picking up the pieces by hand and throwing them into the barrow.  A spade just hits a stone and jars your back!  It's going to be a long job.

 The first black iris we've seen this year.  In the long grass by the lavender seat.

 This is the top of the dry-stoned bank, before the outer edge of the wiggly raised bed.  I asked for it to be left clear for planting, and I have now put in alternating nasturtiums and prostrate rosemary.  Hopefully they will grow down over the bank.

 Something I did with a few of the larger stone-chips.  

I saw this on an ecological garden designer's site: sidhillecogardens.com (his are bigger and better than my first attempt).  It is a little dry stone cairn which is placed in a sheltered spot as a habitat for various garden critters.  It has a nice architectural quality as well as encouraging beneficial insects.  We shall have a few dotted around once we know how much stone needs to be used up.

This is the end of the washing line area - it was just plunging over the bank, which meant the stone chips wouldn't stay in place, so I used the last of the big stones to make rough steps down the bank.