Getting ready for a strimming Spring

Our grass is as confused as the rest of the plants in our garden, it doesn't know whether to grow, stop or just be a muddy mess from where we don't have a path and have walked on it as we've nipped up to the shed or the greenhouse, or as I wrote about more recently to retrieve some escaping bubble wrap.

So if your grass is anything like mine, it's probably looking a bit like this, but perhaps not quite so pretty.

IMAGE SOURCE: PIXABAY

Checking our strimmer

Either way, pretty or not our grass is probably already too long to use the lawn mower straight away, so MOH will most likely tackle the longer parts - or the bits we haven't walked on all winter - with the strimmer first. And with it being noticeably lighter in the evenings this week - yay! - this weekend I'll be recommending that MOH checks out our strimmer to make sure it has enough line to do the whole garden in one session. There's no point in him doing half a job now is there?

In his ideal world I'm sure he'd like a petrol strimmer or a cordless one, like these strimmers on the SGS site, but in reality I think he'll be making sure our corded version is still up to the job.

Checking for wildlife

Before he starts though, we'll be checking the grass for wildlife. Although we don't have a pond in our garden, we regularly see toads in our garden and can hear them on summer evenings when they're on manoeuvres, as I call their nightly journeys to the pond next door but one (well, I assume that's where they go).

It's funny as even though I know they're there and I'm used to seeing them, every time they make me jump. I imagine they're pretty surprised to see me peering at them too though...

IMAGE SOURCE: PIXABAY

Here's a couple of tips for alerting your wildlife:

1. Use a stick to rake through longer, tufty grass
2. Walk over the area you're about to cut
3. Cut the tuftier bits of grass with shears, in case any wildlife hadn't got the message.

I read recently that frogs and toads are more likely to be out and about after it's rained or early in the morning when the grass is damp, and that hedgehogs are more likely to be found during the day especially early or late in the year when they may be out looking for food.

So now's the time to check out your strimmer, and before you use it check your grass for any wildlife and give them a chance to move on before you start work.  What other tips do you have?

The RSPB Reserve at Titchwell

I've already shared the walk to the beach along the West Bank path, and the beach so I thought it was time to share more from the actual RSPB Reserve, where my dad volunteers each week.

As we headed back from the beach, guess what we saw?

Yes, I know I shouldn't have been surprised to see a bird given where I was, but it was the first one I'd seen.  And as I tried to get closer he hopped off over the bank on the right and scuppered that plan.

Having walked back inland we took a left instead and headed off around the Meadow trail on the boardwalk. The older wooden boardwalk is gradually being replaced with a plastic kind of boardwalk, made from used carrier bags - which sounds like a great use for them to me.

NEW AND OLD BOARDWALK

We were back up near the Reed beds and that meant I could snap some pictures of the bullrushes close up.

As we got closer to the visitor centre there were plenty of examples of how to give nature a home, which coincidentally (or not) is one of the RSPB's campaigns. You can see how you can give nature a home in your garden too.

Below is a dead hedge for wildlife, and if you want to make one at home you can use cut branches and stems which make a great habitat for insects, small mammals and roosting birds. And you can make one in three easy steps:

1. Knock some uprights into the ground in two staggered rows
2. Lay the smaller branches or pruning sideways on top of each other, alternating in front and behind the uprights in the ground
3. Fill any gaps with leaves, then pile on the rest of the stems - and top it up throughout the year.

And there were a couple of bug hotels too - I've still not got around to making mine, but it's still on my garden to do list (along with many other things!)

The next area was full of shells and represents the sea bed, which given we're so close makes sense. 

The volunteers maintain this garden and there's plenty to keep everyone interested, and you can lift planks up to see what wildlife is underneath - I delegated that part to my dad!

Opposite the visitors centre is an elaborate bird feeding station, well what else would you expect? I suspect for the local bird population it's the equivalent of a Michelin starred restaurant!

And as we left, I spotted this sign leading to an area where you could make a bug hotel - perhaps I should have stopped and picked up some tips! 

It wasn't what I expected from an RSPB reserve, there was a lot more going on than I expected and it was more accessible for non-bird watchers too. It's definitely somewhere I'd go back to - and having a cafe is a bonus, as it's always useful to know where potential cake stops are if I were to be cycling by!

I've got bird feeders - that reminds me, I'll need to buy some fat balls soon and I plan to build a bug hotel at some point, but what do you do to encourage wildlife into your garden?

How my garden fared fending for itself...

Before we headed to Portugal I had some prep work to do with my veg plants as the tomatoes, cucumber, chillies and peppers were still sitting snugly in the greenhouse. If the weather turned nice while we were gone, I knew they wouldn't survive. 

That meant prepping my greenhouse bed, adding some mulch and compost to it before planting the cucumbers, chillies and peppers in it and giving each of them their own little water reservoir made of an old plastic bottle with holes pierced into the cap, filled with water and plunged into the soil and with luck they'd do their job. 

For the tomatoes I potted them on and hoped the time they'd been spending out of the greenhouse each day would be enough to prepare them for permanent outdoor living. Then I placed them on an old wet towel - laced with slug pellets - to give them some water, knowing that the towel would take a while to dry out and would retain any rainwater far longer than newspaper would. 

It's practical and functional, but not very pretty!

As you can see I left the greenhouse door open but left some old mushroom crates in the doorway as a deterrent for anything that might have fancied some shelter. I'm not sure if it really was much of a deterrent, but it made me feel better!

The Borlotti beans, which were just peeking through also got the personal water reservoir treatment.

So did it work?

In the main, it did. All my plants survived - I know there was some rain while we were away so that will have helped - but even so, some of my plants even flourished!  

Some of my climbing beans failed to germinate, and since we've been back I've planted some more so hopefully these will fare better. 

But the greenhouse reservoirs were empty and the plants had grown.

And there were even flowers on the chillies and peppers.  The lettuces were growing well. 

And the tomato towel had done its job. 

And the Borlotti beans were starting to wind their way up the frame. 

Elsewhere in the garden there were successes and some thirsty plants!  The angelicas needed some water to revive them. 

But the sweet peas had shot up - and they've continued to grow, but still no flowers yet!  They're late this year. 

The Philadelphus was starting to flower and fill the end of our garden with its white flowers and scent and the pink jasmine was just coming into bud. 

The local wildlife had also made their mark.  Something - I think, but don't know for sure, a fox - had dug under my veg bed. 

After getting MOH to poke a long stick into the hole - I'm brave like that - and once we were sure there was no sign of life I filled the hole back up.

The next morning I discovered the hole had been re-dug, so I thought I'd better up my game. This was my second response:

It hasn't been re-dug so I was feeling rather smug with myself. That is until I spotted this:

Not only had the hole reappeared from the other side, this time lettuces had also been cast aside and my other seedlings had either been displaced or covered over. Most of the lettuce remain ok and the coriander and some dwarf beans survived - others may also have survived. I guess I'll find out as they grow! But this year I don't think I'll be having the neatly organised veg bed I'd hoped for!

Not to be outfoxed by the wildlife I made my countermove - with imaginative use of the old mushroom boxes and bamboo canes - which has so far remained in place. 

No doubt the wildlife is regrouping and planning its next move.  

So please keep your fingers crossed that it's got bored and moved somewhere else...

Update: the wildlife has made its next move, see my Tweet: