Dratted Rabbits

The bunnies in the garden have got to go! As we made our way to the vegetable patch yesterday morning the first thing we saw was a rabbit, this being despite our best efforts to fence the area off. It quickly became apparent that there had been a rabbit party going on, all the onions, leeks and cabbages had been nibbled to within an inch of their lives, particularly annoying for me because I planted the majority of them! With no hope of catching the offending creatures as Shandy was absent that day, we spent much of our time attempting to cobble together some rabbit deterrents to save what remained of our crops. Then we had to construct a piece of netting by sowing two large pieces together to drape over the currants to stop the marauding birds eating all of those. Sometimes gardeners fight a constant battle with Mother Nature in order to get our portion, we don't mind sharing but leaving nothing for us is just too much!
"There is no delight in owning anything unshared"
Seneca

An Exotic Visitor

We get many visitors in the garden at Norton Conyers, although none as exotic as yesterdays. A big do was planned for invited guests of the national open gardens scheme hosted by the sponsors Investec, whose logo happens to be a zebra. A good job it wasn't a real one as the peonies might have been in danger! Imagine our surprise when the beast arrived in a large wagon during the morning, it was nothing compared with that of the real horse that happened to be grazing in the paddock next door though!
The garden is just about reaching its peek now and if you visit in the next couple of weeks you'll see the peony border in all its glory.

"Flowers seem intended for the solace of ordinary humanity"
John Ruskin

Floral Fireworks And Fidos

The walled garden of Norton Conyers has suddenly exploded into colour, and no plant represents this floral firework display as aptly as Allium cristophii. I never cease to wonder how nature manages this star burst arrangement of flowers with such panache and the metallic sheen of purple is magical. I have only two in my own garden and so look forward to them emerging, only without fail for one of the dogs to knock the heads off! I speak about more than one dog because we have acquired a pound pooch recently. Tommy is a very sweet Border/Lakeland cross with one or two problems we hope to sort out with time. He has taken to my garden rather enthusiastically having created one or two new paths in order to "converse" with next door's cat, and has dug a special hole at the base of the plum tree. I can only be thankful that he seems disinclined to actually eat the plants, only time will tell!
Here he is looking angelic, which he certainly is not,

and here is one of Shandy performing her duties as garden guard dog!

"Dogs are not our whole life, but they make our life whole"
Roger Caras

Wretched Wind

What an unseasonal May we have had, the weather as unpredictable as I've ever known it in this normally cheery month, and the wretched wind just will not go away. We have been leaving work with cheeks as cherry red as if we had worked a day in October. They say it is something to do with El Niño upsetting the weather patterns around the world and that we shall have a bad winter as a result, there's a piece of good news for you! Meanwhile it has not been helping us gardeners especially as we have been busy with the big plant out. Dahlias, salvias and vegetables have all been placed out in the garden, but you try planting tiny thin leeks when the wind is blowing a hooley! Hopefully we shall see better things to come soon as a little heat is just what we all need now.

"The pessimist complains about the wind, the optimist expects it to change, the realist adjusts his sails"
William Arthur Ward