...this is getting foolish...

...I keep forgetting to blog. That's not good blogging is it?

I have to get some discipline into this mallarkey and blog like a blogger who blogs like a blogger - perhaps.

Here's some pictures from recent times...

Back end of last summer at Quainton. The re-vamped lawn and a very tall bloke to cut it

Again at Quainton, lots of wood, a bonfire and some
logs for the log burners in the house, transferred to
to the old potting shed for drying out, below 

Compost at Quainton...

...and compost at Buckland, lovely stuff

Snowdrops last week at Buckland

Hellibores at Buckland too

Sorting the compost at Dancer's End I turned round and saw this scene -
when will winter start?

Last of the leaves at Buckland... Or not

Strange winter really, I've only lost 2 days so far, not forgetting I have been totally drenched on several occasions, even with full waterproofs on. Just hasn't been cold enough to call it winter.

A guy who totally changed my life, one way or the other, died a while back and I went back to the scene of many long hours spent getting cold, wet and abused. Here I am with one of my dear comrades, Patrick, from the Non-Stop Picket outside SA House in Trafalgar Square...

It was so wet on that day too, but Nelson Mandela kept us warm.

This was on the day of Madiba's funeral. About 20 old picketers turned up, we had a sing, a coffee in the crypt of St Martin's in the Field and I felt like a big piece of my life had finally come to it's end. The picket and my comrades mean more to me than almost anything in my life. Only my family mean more. I love them all - even the RCG...

And finally, saw this in our local farm shop recently...

...who would want to buy a Poultry Plucker at all, let alone for 250 quid!

Peace innit?

Burn baby burn...

...garden inferno at Quainton today. Perfect for a pyromaniac like me. I've been saving up tons of stuff, built a large bonfire and then set a match to it, woomph!

It looked not unlike this:

...I lied, it looked more like the one below...

...oh dear, lied again...

Yeah, that was it, bit like this one.

Must remember to take my camera to work more often, the one on the new phone is poxy, anyway the fire was splendid, lasted all day and caused no complaints for once, which is nice - not fond of people complaining.

Not long ago I was working on the old compost area at Quainton - which is now the new compost area (see below) - and this old-ish couple leant on the wall and commenced watching what I was doing. It got a bit unnerving after about five minutes, I had smiled but they kind of ignored that, so I said, "Can I help you?" "What you doing?" asked the man. "Clearing the compost area," I replied. "Why?" asked the man - the woman just frowned. "Why not?" I replied. "Just asking," she said. They then moved on. Bizarre some country folk.

I hope to be remember to take the camera tomorrow, Thursday and Friday (yep, working Easter Friday and Monday too, bit hypocritical for an atheist not to really) just so I can update the gardens at Buckland, Hemel, Tring and Pat's in Berkhamsted...

Happy burning baby...

Hello again! Par de uno

Well, the second week of the new gardening season* kicked off with a quick tidy up in Pat's back garden - don't want to take away too much though as there was a heavy frost over night and the old leaves and foliage keep the new shoots nice and warm. Then returned to the front and finished off clearing up the disaster left by some idiot scaffolders who ruined the edging of the grass. Basically drivers tend to turn round on the area of grass in front of Pat's and it churns up the grass, but the scaffolders did a really great (sic) job of making a quagmire out of it, so I have attempted to clean it up, make it look better and with the help of some strategically placed posts (rustic stylee) will make it look good and impossible to do a u-eeee over!

Should have taken a proper "before" but I only thought to do it after about an hour's work 

Then over to the allotment to carry on with the digging. I only have about a third left to do and then I'll be getting the manure/home made compost on it. Very exciting as the potatoes, onions, shallots and garlic turned up on Friday, all nicely chitting and pre-planted in the greenhouse yesterday.


While cleaning out the chickens yesterday there was a very loud bang and crash. Yep! Footballs and greenhouses don't go together... Poor Finlay got shouted at, which is always wrong - note to self, anger management, anger management, anger management...


A few catch-up pictures. The first one is the seed, mixed with sharp sand, for the wild flower meadow at Quainton. A cornucopia of loveliness...

And these are some of the many signs of Spring at Church Farm, Buckland, Julie & Andrew's place...

I do like a daff or two and those hellebores make my heart jump and the narcissi at the bottom even beat the daffs - speaking of daffs, well done the Welsh for winning the Six Nations, marvellous stuff...


Pat left me the keys to let Fergus out today, so he could have a run about and do his "business". The below is as far as he got from the back door! Bless the ol' fella!

And finally, yesterday being Mother's Day, here's a picture of mum and son that I just couldn't resist...

Happy cuddling!


*NB: The new gardening season is a figment of my imagination by the way, I just call it that as I am now back working on all the regular gardens I have and it's a rather lovely sign that Spring is really here and I can stop being a miserable git for the next 8/9 months...

Hey Babes!

I really don't want to offend, but Jesus H Christ it was cold out there today. I was  chopping, pruning and a-cutting shrubs down on the tow path of the Grand Union canal in Berkhamsted. If you know that stretch it was by the very fine pub, The Rising Sun, right on a lovely lock, opposite the grounds of a block of flats I look after. In the remit is the tidying of - sorry, I have the YouToob mix of The Ramones and I am occasionally disappearing into bliss - a small stretch of tow path. 


Before I get on to the work on the tow path, I also do not want to offend with this first picture, but I felt it had to be shown as I would not have been able to work today without these lovelies:

Yes, thermals or, as our forefathers and mothers would say, Long Johns. Today I wore five tops, a scarf, me trusty woolly hat, two pairs of extra thick socks and steel toe caps, with extra thick gloves too. And yes I still froze me bollox off. 

The window of a car at the canal at Berkhamsted this morning

08.30 hours, Friday 03.02.12

10.05 hours

11.30-ish

The ice was permanent all day - damn cold! (Rockaway Beach, ain't The Ramones the best?).

Anyway, the reason for my visit was to clear an area of the tow path that is used by some weirdos to hide clandestine behaviour. As a sort of libertarian geezer I almost find this embarrassing, but as I am convinced the offending individuals are fishermen, fuck 'em! In a previous post I eluded to this area having obvious signs of drug abuse, roaches, etc, but I feel my loathing for fisherman can justify the cutting down of the shrubbery as follows:

BEFORE

AFTER

BEFORE

AFTER

Once again, this is the kind of work I truly enjoy, one can see the results almost immediately. Well, I started at 08.30 and finished at 3pm, so relatively quickly anyway. All done with secateurs and loppers (with extendable arms, wish I had extendable arms... like Twizzle.)

Twizzle was one of Gerry Anderson's weirdest characters. He was a "boy" who had all sorts of adventures with his "extendable arms".

Weird programme, but what the hell did we know back in the 60s anyway? It was akin to the Singing, Ringing Tree (how appropriate that Psycho Therapy is playing now!) and must have disturbed many a kid, perhaps even introducing several serial killers to the world...

As usual I transgress. Just so's I can get up to date with my pictures from the last 4 weeks, here are the rest of what I have been doing:

The old stable block at Quainton - with the trusty Belgrano just
on the right there. It's just behind the block that I am doing a
major re-planting job. Taking out loads of old tired shrubs and
ground cover and replacing with ferns, hellebores and other shade
loving shrubs. 

This will be an on-going exercise over the coming months and will hopefully look as much like a Gertrude Jekyll border as is possible in the shade!

(California Sun, this is when YouTube comes into it's own, there's tons of Ramones on this mix, it's damn fine)

The pond at Quainton. Nice reflection..

 The weather is a-closing in and I feel that I may not be doing too much in the coming week, but nevertheless life as a gardener is rather pleasing at present...

The chicks know how to look after each other
in this inclement weather!

And, I'm nearly there with the compost bins at Buckland!

Happy chilling!


Innit?


PS: I Wanna Be Sedated...

Have yourselves a Merry Little Christmas...

Here we have a few more pix from recent days, still leaf clearing but also digging over compost - as I have said several times before a task I love, compost is sooooooooooo good to play with - and spreading same over huge flower beds. Also dug up a few fruit bushes, gooseberry and blackcurrant and moved them to our allotment. I'll be digging up some raspberry canes tomorrow as well.


Got snowed off last Friday and it looks as though I may get rained off this coming Friday, so that'll be it for this year, except perhaps a couple of days next week. It's a bit stunning that I have built this incy wincy business from absolutely nothing last April to working over 50 hours a week at the height of the season. This time last year we had nothing in the bank, this year I can actually think about taking a few days off without it having a detrimental effect on the bank account. Makes me feel damn good about myself, especially as my main clients have bought me pressies this year too! Must be doing summink right eh?


Don't mean this to be a boasting post, just an update on where I am really, so I hope it doesn't come across as a boast-post. It's the reason I gave up on Twitter, which is a bourgeois excuse for slapping yourself on the back and mostly saying how good you are at whatever your business might be. Boring, boring, boring...


Anyway, cute picture of Daisy, Julie and Andrew's little Westie, taken today:

Last week I took these pictures of what I believe to be an old Mulberry tree, split by lightening some years ago, I really love the bark and the way they have held the trunk together. It's a thing of beauty among many in my working life.

Monday at Pat's place I finished off the re-grouting of the crazy paving outside the back door - I think you call it grouting, but it sounds wrong to me. I am rather pleased with it and thankfully so is Pat!

And finally today at Julie & Andrew's place in Buckland, near Aston Clinton in Bucks. The compost bin revamp is nearly there and I have shifted about 50 barrow loads of it amongst the various flower beds across the gardens. A job I have really enjoyed as it has broken up the leaf clearance - ahhhhhhhhh!

The main compost area and I have cleared all but one of them - at the back there, I feel a nice bonfire coming on, it's pretty dry so should go up nicely. What is it about men and bonfires eh? Love the prospect!

And absolutely finally, here's a picture of the setting sun just as I left, bottle of vintage Port under my arm (my Xmas pressie from Julie), beautiful and it makes the hard work nothing really, I love it!

A very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year, may you get all you desire!


Peace innit?


xxx

Well, hello... Lovely to be here!

My word, how busy can one get? It may have been Autumn for a while, but up 'til last week it's been busy, busy, busy... Which is good of course, but I heard someone say that they saw a gardener out with a light on his head the other evening at about five of the clock - that is ridiculously sad. I mean, what the f**k is that all about. One can buy them at SchmArgos, so they we go, bound to be crap...

'nuff said. I have been chopping, trimming, a-lopping, sawing, chainsawing, slicing and hacking for weeks now and it's been quite delightful - gets rid of a lot of pent up angst and tension my dears. Adds to the compost bins, but whatever, it's what they're they for. Also, BONFIRES! Oh yes, burn baby burn. Is there something wrong with a person who loves setting fire to stuff? Is there? Oh, really... Ooops, have to say I haven't burnt that much but it is such a joy. As is, shredding old paperwork. Oh yeah, especially when you are doing it for the chickens bedding, just feels right you know?


The new chicks are here and they are possibly the cutest things since the last ones...

Harriet left, Clarrie right. Florrie was delivered to us very ill, bless her
so we had to have her put down and Happy Chicks - blah! - are sending us
two new chicks to replace her. We only had her 36 hours and it was
rather heart breaking.

Anyhoo, the name of the game is clearance, clearance, clearance and these pictures show something of what I have been up to recently:

Ooo, sharp!

A nice bit of planting done a couple of weeks ago -
lots of herbs and perennial stuff to give colour
all the year round, lovely!

Next year I shall be planting a load of new shrubs in here, a philadelphus, some more hebes and some flowers to bloom all through the year, looking forward to it. Had to dig in a load of
compost this year 'cos it's been looked after that well in recent years...

 The following four pictures are from the "new" house in Quainton, near Aylesbury. Lovely place, huge house, loads of garden and an absolute delight to work on. The owners have had a lot of trees moved from one area where they are building a tennis court, so we have to place those elsewhere over the next few months. It's very exciting to be working on a project like this. I also get to have my pick of a load of raised beds and such like - that's a bit like an alcoholic having his pick of someone's extensive wine cellar (I did say a bit like...)

Front entrance - it's going to be made more obvious
early next year

Nice bit of clipping & trimming here. I like a straight hedge! Below is
from the other end

Not sure about this, but I quite like the shaping I've done

More bloody apples from yet another garden
that had "too much" - more wine methinks!

The Grand Union at Berkhamsted. We're responsible for keeping this
stretch tidy and I think I got on top of it, just

Sophie, Callum and Finlay, bonfire night at nan & grandad's watching the many displays across
Tring - nice evening had by all...

A new invention, a self-pushing wheelbarrow -
doesn't work yet...

I laid me down, and saw this...

I have such a lovely time doing this and it's so nice to share it with a few people, especially the ones I love. It'd be nice if it went on for a very long time.

Anyway, enough of that mushy stuff, I hope to post a bit more regularly now that the season is actually drawing to a close properly.

Happy wintering my brethren...

Simon (C-Moon...)