Storm damage!

These recent storms have wreaked havoc here in Caithness and the Orkneys and so many people have experienced damage to homes and properties. We were lucky to a degree as we didn't suffer any damage to the house (testament to MrTGs fabulous building skills) nor to 90% of the land and for that I am extremely grateful.
My garden (and therefore my own building skills) did not fair quite so well. In fact when I got up yesterday morning and noticed that despite 100 mile an hour winds the open land we have was debris free and the sheds and the poly tunnel were still standing in one piece, I was secretly smug - after all we had been told to expect some degree of damage.
You can well imagine my total shock then as I stood at the rear patio doors, crunchy nut cornflakes in hand and saw this

The wishing well that you can see on its side in the very top of the above image weighed so much that initially it had to be moved into place in 2 parts by a digger and then built on site. Yet this wind toppled it right over and as it went down it took down a Yucca that I loved. The Yucca self seeded itself a few years ago and has grown well since then - it's now disappeared from view.
The pergola was actually bolted down as well yet that has also been demolished.

This fence has took some serious batterings over the years but until this year has never actually been damaged.

Honestly, I was gutted! I seriously could have cried.

When I informed MrTG of what had happened I have to say I was unimpressed with his response - it didn't even warrant getting out of bed to take a look and then say nice things to make me feel better. OK so there was a power cut and no real reason to get up but that's not the point!
I should have realised that he understood how upset I was though because today he was out there fixing what could be fixed and helping me attempt to save the Yucca that had been flattened.

I don't hold out much hope for this Yucca because about 1/3rd of the trunk was snapped at the base but I'm not ready to give up on it when so much of it was still intact - you never know it might sprout from the base. So I held it upright while MrTG bashed a support into the ground so I could then tie the Yucca to it - the support is actually a scaffold pole and because they're hollow they go well into the ground, this one is at least 3ft down. It aint moving!
I then packed some straw round the base and held it down with the slates that had come off the wishing well roof. This is only a temporary repair but it will suffice for now.

MrTG then set to on refixing the pergola that I built a couple of years ago.
I guess he did understand my dissappointment and sorrow after all - love him!

He did straighten it up I promise lol.

Of all the things that got destroyed in the courtyard area of the garden there was one thing that got blown about and yet still managed to stay in one piece.

That is the birdbath I made a couple of years ago from old vases and bowls all stuck together with clear silicon. Glass held together with silicon and not one bit of it breaks - bizarre!

I hope you guys all got off lightly in the recent storms. I have to admit we were lucky - garden damage is nowhere near as devastating as damge to life or home and for that I'm grateful.

Have treess, must plant!

Although we sit on approx 4 acres of land the majority of it is taken over by horrible spiny Gorse bush which is pretty much impossible to kill off. When we first moved here we spent the first year pulling all the Gorse up with the digger, piling it and setting fire to it - we figured that would be enough to kill it. What we didn't realise was every piece of root that got left behind would simply re shoot and run riot again within 2 years, not only that but we discovered our soil is peat based and the fires we started would re ignite up to 2 years later with just the slightest gust of wind.
Since then Mr TG has strimmed some of the land each year to keep the Gorse at bay but most of the land has just been left to do what it does. We have a lovely burn that runs through the edge of our land and is surrounded by native deciduous trees (a sight that is very rare here in caithness as most trees are Firs), unfortunately we cannot access the burn without extremely padded clothing because when Gorse prickles stab you they huuuurt, plus they leave a mark that can easily go septic.

See those spines - impossible to walk through this stuff, it forms thick dense hedges  and grows as tall as me (5ft 4) BUT the flowers are beautiful, they smell gorgeous and make the loveliest popping sound when the pods explode (although any joy is marred by the knowledge that the popping will be followed by millions of seeds setting themselves)

This year Mr TG decided he was going to make a start on clearing the land. He wanted it turned over and levelled so that we could mow it and eventually kill off the Gorse. To cut a long story short, due to the Gorse and Marsh grass no local farmer is willing to risk their machinery on it and the one company who does have the machinery won't do it because we helped a neighbour who had a dispute with them. This means Mr TG had to set about it himself - which involved strimming the area, raking it, rotovating an area several times, removing boulders and then levelling it. Bless him, I didn't think he'd be able to do it but all spring he worked on one area when he had the time between contracts and that little area now looks great. He had to stop for the summer partly because we have other more demanding jobs to do and partly because the weeds were growing back quicker than he had time to clear them so the next area will now be started on in Autumn.
His progress so far though looks great

The area to the right hand side is pretty much what the rest of the land looks like except it's covered in Gorse also. He has to go further up the way too, right up to our boundary at the house at the top.
Anyway the idea is to have land that is safe for the dogs to pelt across as currently it is full of deep digger rutts and holes so when Mr TG asked if he could have my Mountain ash trees that I had grown from seed I had assumed he would plant them around the edge or maybe in 2 or 3 clumps. Nope Mr TG decided to dot them all over the lovely green area (about 12 of them) and then pinched my garden markers I made to protect the trees! We now have a lovely green lawn that is a nuisance to mow because we have to go around so many tiny trees  and the dogs can't pelt across it because there's too many trees on it.
I'm looking forward to more of the land being completed but I think we're going to have to invest in a ride on lawn mower, just the new area takes at least an hour to mow already (it's a larger area that it looks in the photo), but I'm also keeping it tree free!

Birds, flowers and Pergolas

Despite the wind today I got the pergola finished. I didn't get the trellis up as well though because I came across a problem that could see me damaging a pipe that I would really rather not damage, so I'm going to have to think it through first.
Here's the finished pergola though

I'm not sure what to do with the sides yet (if anything), I'll make a decision once the trellis is up.

Remember those Bamboo plants that my daughter saved for me from work, the ones that were in the skip? The ones that were about 15ft tall and we had to transport them home in a car? Well it seems that not even Homebase can kill Golden bamboo - a bit of repotting, feed, lots of water and some TLC and they're paying me back

I'm so pleased they survived even though they looked just about had it, I now have £120.00 worth of bamboo for free.

I've never grown Verbena but I picked up 3 plants on sale at a garden centre earlier in the year. The 3 plants are still in pots and growing well but a week ago I thought I'd snip the tops off, bung them in some compost and put them in the heated propagator.
I'm not the best cutting taker and 99% of what I cut usually dies but lookit

Only a week old and they're shooting up. Think I'm going to take some more!

Finally can anyone name this plant, I got it from my mums old garden and left it in a pot just to see what it does. I'd love to know what it is.

Oh, one more thing. After 3 years absence look what has come back to the new feeding station in my garden

Siskins - I think!

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The Bees are finally buzzing...at least one is anyway!

I had the best surprise ever when I went into the Polytunnel yesterday - a Bee! But not just any Bee, this is the first Bee I have seen this year and I have a Pear tree and a Plum tree in there that could seriously do with some pollinating.
Shame the little guy took off from this position though and proceeded to buzz around the plastic

This is where I need the little guy to be

I did try hand pollinating as all my fruit trees are self fertile but I don't think I did a good job of it - much better if Mr Bee does it.

I also managed to get some of the veggies pricked out and potted up individually. It's going to be a fair few weeks before it's safe to plant these guys out though

The original Sweetcorn that I sowed died. I thought I may have been able to save them but it wasn't to be and luckily I made another sowing just in case they didn't make it, so thankfully I have more Sweetcorn on its way.
I have plenty of Cabbage (Greyhound & Golden Acre) and Cauli (All the year round) for the first sowing, I'll make another sowing in a few weeks.
The Tomatoes (Roma, Black Russian & Gardeners delight) all seem to be doing well. The Swede (Invitation), Cucumbers and Courgettes (I must post the varieties) are all romping away in the polytunnel.
I've got French beans growing too but they won't be able to go out for a few weeks neither will the Leeks.
The ground is still quite cold at the moment so I am going to have cover it with plastic to warm it up a bit so that I can get the Parsnips in.
So far I have had absolutely no success with the Celeriac sowings. I've done two seperate sowings and tried one in the heated propagator and one in the polytunnel. The propagator ones grew sporadically then just withered away and the polytunnel ones have yet to show any life at all.

And because all the veggies are growing I needed to make some more veg markers. I didn't want to make completely wooden ones for the veggies though because I needed something that would be quick to make and require nothing more than cutting and nailing, plus I wanted whatever I wrote the veggie name on to be weather proof so here's what I came up with

Granted they're not the most stunning of markers but they were quick, easy and free to make. All I did was cut that wood to the length I wanted, cut up an old milk carton to get the plastic I wanted then folded the plastic over on top and nailed it to the wood

I'll make the more ornamental ones I posted about HERE for the garden plants or plants that are in tubs.

DIY Plant supports

It's been a strange day today weather wise. Yesterday was probably the warmest day so far this year and then today we were working away amid snow flurries - yet it didn't actually feel that cold.
Much has been done outside though and despite me promising myself not to I'm still milling about from garden to greenhouse to polytunnel, but at least jobs are getting done.
Have to say though when we get gorgeous days it is kinda difficult to not stop and stare every few minutes at the scenery around us. This field will be full of Spring lambs soon but we are very close to the sea and unfortunately I have always found the Ocean to be mesmerising

I had an idea the other day, one of those ideas that blindsides you at 4am. I'd been thinking about making some plant supports for some of my garden flowers (thinking waaaaaay ahead here) and I've always found bamboo canes to be the best and most resilient supports but let's face it - dey ugly man! Plus I always have this vision of me falling on the end and skewering an eyeball or one of the dogs getting impaled on them so I needed some end caps that wouldn't cost anything (totally hate buying what can be made). I have hundreds of wine corks (I'm not a drinker they were donated, I honestly haven't gotten through hundreds of bottles of wine - honest) but lets face it they're about as appealing as the bamboo canes - stick a boring wine cork on top of a boring cane and what do you have ...... boring plant supports.
So that 4am idea that woke me up (It honestly did happen like that too ) was to spray the canes with whatever spray I already have and then paint the wine corks with nail varnish.
For ages I'd been contemplating what to paint the corks with because it had to be durable and weather resistant so Nail varnish made complete sense ......... at 4am.
Armed with canes, silver sparkle spray and various colours of nail varnish I headed to the greenhouse / workshop and put my funky plan into action. Here are various colours waiting for approval (or not as the case turned out to be)

The best colour by far was the bottom greeny one, it looked quite fabulous against the silver of the cane. The Pink one just looked too washed out and was discarded. At this point I've only used the greeny one, the navy blue and the deep red (top left that looks black) plus some gold ones as I found an old can of Xmas gold spray.

I've made quite a few now and at the moment they're keeping the dogs off areas of my garden borders that have been planted up. I had to resort to all kinds of deterrant measures because Huntly the little ........ erm... fecking horror sweetie is determined to dig up every plant I plant and thinks that all the new soil I barrowed over from what seems like 3 miles away is there for him to dig straight back out again. I seriously cannot wait until we have another area for the dogs to play in.

I also decided to finally get round to moving Mahonia 'Winter Sun' to another location. It's been situated under a tree for about 9 years now and has never flourished or flowered. I've been meaning to move it for ages and as the whole area is going to get an overhaul this year (hopefully)  I figured now was a pretty good time to do it

See how cruddy the ground is. I had a fab idea years ago to polythene the ground and gravel it on top cos that would stop weeds right? Nope, not so much. Seems weeds grow in gravel and can puncture thick polythene in the bid to wage war on my garden.
When it's been completely renovated all the gravel will be gone and there'll be fresh soil with bark chippings on top in its place.
Anyway that's where the sickly Mahonia lived and now it lives here

Mahonia 'Winter sun'.

That's its new home with lots more sunshine (I previously believed they needed heavy shade) plus a good prune to encourage it to bush out a little. Now we just wait and see if it responds the way I hope it will.

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