Wisteria

Another lovely day and unusually for me I spent a lot of it in the garden. First job was to mow the lawn and it's the last time I'll do some of it. Part of our lawn is permanently shaded by trees and there's no grass left despite having it re-turfed a few years ago. We're having that part relevelled and some paving will be put in with flower beds in the middle. The head gardener has a plan.

I got a new freestanding bird table for my birthday and I thought I'd improve its placement so it doesn't have to be moved when I'm cutting the grass. It's now sited closer to the hedge which also gives it a little more shelter and hopefully makes the little birds feel more secure when they're feeding. After lunch Marian went back out in the garden and was working near the pond. "What are we going to do about this pond," she said in that tone that says 'it needs to go'. It's a pathetic little pond. It's a preformed plastic pond and I was going to pull it out not long after we moved here. As I emptied it, I discovered a small goldfish, so the disposal plan was put on hold and I cleaned it out and put some new pondweed in and put the little chap back. Several years later, the goldfish moved to the great pond in the sky and once again I decided to pull the pond out. this time I discovered a newt (smooth variety, I think) so once again the plan was halted.

On this occasion having seen no signs of life for a while I started to empty it and what should I find? Several newts and a large frog, so once again the pond was cleaned out and it will stay but the plan now is to re-site it in the new garden where it might become a more interesting feature.

Anyway with all that time in the garden it seemed to make sense to do a garden blip and the Wisteria is looking pretty good at the moment.