Non-Gardener builds an Observatory, Garden Railway and even Dabbles with Plants!

You have been busy! It's looking very good though and I like your forward planning.

 

It's coming along well and a nice selection of shrubs around the wood.

 

8th March 2025

We've had a busy weekend in the garden on the hottest weekend of the year so far. Last year, the first half of the year was too wet to scarify the lawn. Our neighbour and us took the opportunity to scarify this weekend. We started our lawn on Saturday morning. The first pass was lengthwise along the lawn.

I did the top first, while Lynne raked up all the mess. I then moved to the lower half of the lawn, giving Lynne more time raking. Once I finished the lower lawn, I returned to the top and made a second pass at an angle, which brought more out. The railway lawn also had one pass. The woodland trailcam was triggering all day as I passed the wood!

Once the whole lawn had its second pass with the scarifier, we mowed the lawn to pick up the remaining moss, as this was easier than raking, despite having to empty the mower bag after two passes. It's about a mile and a half walk to mow the lawn, so I clocked up quite a few miles of pushing the scarifier and mower.



In the woodland, a number of the mini daffodils are now flowering and the daisy pompoms seem to be enjoying woodland life. Several of the snowdrops are now starting to droop. At the front edge of the wood, nearest the house, the Hydrangea is covered in new shoots and our wedding anniversary rose is waking from its Winter sleep. This rose is a cutting, from a cutting, taken from the original anniversary rose in our Washington garden.

 

There's no major changes at the railway at present, though all the plants are showing new growth and some with flowers. It's almost a year since we planted the railway embankment.



I didn't notice when I was planting in the wood the other day, but below the dogwood is covered is shoots from bulbs. No idea what they are and I don't remember anything flowering here last year! Time will tell. That was Saturday over, finished with coffee on the patio for the first time this year.

 

9th March 2025

It was a very misty and damp start to Sunday, despite what the BBC weather and met office website said! We didn't go out until after lunch, but after the busy previous day, we probably needed a rest. By early afternoon, the sun had burnt off the mist and we were working once more. This Hebe was moved from the circled location to nearer the path. It was too close to a Showy Stonecrop on the edge of the lawn and flowered in a similar colour.



Lynne dug out a load of daffodils, strangling this Hebe in the side border and also several clumps from elsewhere along the side of the house. The Hebe now has some light and breathing room.

 

In another spot, liberated from Daffodils, we planted another of the anniversary roses that have been living in pots on the back corridor window sill. This was one of the four original cuttings taken from Washington before we moved out.



Further along the side border, near the front gate, a number of the Daffodils were replanted. They don't look too great at present, as they were in deep and put up a fight during removal. They may not flower now, but should spring back next year in what was a rather bare area.

 

The last bit of gardening action was more Daffodils from the side of the house, moved to the kitchen border, to give a bit of early colour in this area.



The last job was another anniversary rose, planted at the bottom end of the woodland, between the recently planted Ilex Aquifoleum and a darker Holly bush. This leaves us two unplanted anniversary roses, one of which is going to a friend, while the other may go to the inlaws.

It was a very busy, but satisfying weekend in the garden, made more pleasant by the nice weather. In fact, on Saturday, when my scarifying triggered the trailcam, it recorded the temperature at 19 degrees C.

 

It's good to see plants coming to life after the winter and it'll be interesting to identify the bulbs under the Dogwood. It's too early for Bluebells but they could be Tulips.

 

7th March 2025

Jumping back to just before we scarified the lawn, on the morning of Friday the 7th, I saw something black on the lawn from the kitchen window. While walking down the lawn to download the camera, I realised it was a dead Jackdaw. It was raining and it was rather soggy, so I wasn't inclined to do anything about it straight away.

Later in the day, I pondered whether the fox would take it and save me the trouble. I decided to leave it where it was and to move it on Saturday before scarifying. Come Saturday morning, the black lump had gone. Upon downloading the trailcam that morning, I found that the fox had indeed tidied up for me. What's more, he picked it up from mid way down the lawn, then carried it back through the woodland, so I had the evidence on the trailcam. A still from the video is shown below. He could have just walked on down the lawn, but it was kind of him to make a detour via the camera!

 

15th March 2025

Near the top entrance to the wood, there are several Majorcan hellebores, all of which had fallen/drooped forwards onto the lawn. They were all going to be in the way when I get to adding the lawn edging in this area.



So on the 15th, which was a nice warm day, I hammered a number of stakes into the ground behind them and tied them up, standing more upright. This gets them up off the edge of the lawn and also closes up the gaps between the other plants.

 

18th March 2025

We've had some nice sunsets over the last few days. This one from the 18th, also shows the planet Venus, close to the horizon, shortly after sun set and getting closer to the Sun. Venus is now pretty much between the Earth and the Sun and in a few days, it will start appearing in the morning sky, just before dawn.



Here's Venus from early January, showing it's half phase, before it caught up with Earth's orbit.

 

21st March 2025

This morning, after downloading the trailcam videos from the night before, I went for a wander around the garden, so see what's going on. The shoots that were popping up at the bottom of the garden, next to the Maple, are now flowering. My plant app says Hyacinths. I'm still not sure what's coming up under the dogwood.



Further up the wood, near the middle entrance, there's more Hyacinths starting to flower.

 

The Red flowering currant has now got flowers all over it and the newly planted Viburnum tinus seems to have settled in. Despite several sub zero frosty nights recently, that also has plenty of flowers.



Over at the railway, the Water avens have plenty of leaves again and the first flowers are forming. The once 9 feet tall fuchsia, was cut back a bit further, bring both trunks to within six to eight inches of the ground. Both are now covered in new leaves and shoots. I plan on keeping the height of this more comparable to the Hebe and Choisya next to it.

Several of the other railway plants are flowering or regenerating, with the Lupin leafing up again and plenty of other plants waking up from Winter.



Over the last few days, we've also had some unusual daytime visits by the fox, once at 2:20pm and another visit around noon. See the video below. Looking at some of the day and night videos, we may have more than one fox visiting. One could be pregnant, one has an injured eye and last night, we had a much thinner, younger looking fox who seemed very timid compared to other visitors.

We also had a rather dizzy pheasant, chasing a Jackdaw that was spinning around on the bird feeder.

 

Your fox looks very healthy @ArmyAirForce. I think the pheasant was trying to encourage the jackdaw to spill more seed from the feeder .​

 

19th March 2025

Hopping back in time a few days, I finally got the bedroom finished after four and a half months. The wardrobes were fitted at the beginning of the month, with the carpet around ten days later. Then there were some final touch ups and measure up the units for glass tops.

The wardrobe company could cut some, but going direct to Pilkington's reduced the price to one third of the original quote. I pick up the glass tomorrow. It's strange that the room looks bigger now, despite having units in the same place as before.



25th March 2025

With the weather finally warming up, I spent the 25th in the garden doing some weeding. Actually, a lot of weeding! All of the railway embankment was dug over around the plants, pulling out the weeds and moss.



At the left end of the embankment, the red circled Water Avens are now returning to life, as is the yellow circled Lady's Mantle. It wasn't long ago, that they were just brown twigs.