And then came the sun....and the repairs

Now I know that many of you reading this will be in parts of the world where spring has just been non-existent so far. It did come here for a few days at the start of the month and the garden went ballistic, putting up the roses and clematis with blossoms twice their normal size and weeds the size of small town buildings. And then the rain came again and we plumetted to 4 degrees in the mornings. So, having cleaned out the log burners and given them their once a year blacking and polishing, we gave in and had fires for a week to keep the damp at bay.

The view from our second terrace back to the house, taken on the gardening day by Gerrit.

But just before the rain on the first Thursday of the month we had a load of people from our local gardening group ('Beiras Grass Roots') visit to see what we are doing with our patch to try to create a bit more bio-diversity and habitiats for wildlife.  
They are mainly interested Dutch, Belgian and British expats who meet up once a month and over coffee and cake swap plants, seeds and ideas. 
They also wanted to hear about what we are doing to try and identify the wild flowers around here and sowing more wild flowers each year. 
It was a bit intimidating because I am not a 'gardener' and what we do kind of happens by accident...you do something and a space appears and you think...'hmmm what can we put there' and if it survives all well and good. Likewise if a 'weed/wildflower' happens to be pretty and grow in alongside everthing else then it stays.

We put up the patio awning because the sun actually came out!

So I talked to them abour our 'serendipity garden' and plans to replant the terraces and fields with different varieties of trees and hardy shrubs,so along with the ponds and the slow return to natural growth someone in about 50 years will think we have done a good job.
Anyway it was a good morning and very relaxed and everyone had a good wander around and had lots of nice things to say which was pleasing. A few friends stayed on for lunch too so it was a nice day altogether.

Checking out the fenced off loose tongued orchids!

After the rainy and cold week we decided that we had to sort out the damp coming into the kitchen from the empty goatshed next to the house. 

Water soaks through the wall of the shed and then the damp inside permeates the house. So Steve, dug a trench and Ness and Fraser cleared the debris to see what was happening.
It turned out that there were several holes in the wall below the surface and to add to our problems the down pipe from the gutter was also leaking and just went into the ground!
So the holes were rendered, the trench was lined with pond liner up to the surface and gravel in the base, angled towards the down steps to the next terrace flower bed and then filled back up. 4 hours later you couldn't tell the difference, except that the gutter pipe now runs across the tiled top and onto the flower bed below! 

Great job!

The next day I cleared out the mess inside the shed. Steve and Fraser had already ripped out the manger on the back wall and now it is just a case of allowing the inside of the shed to dry before we render and damp proof the right hand corner and wall to the house.

Meanwhile Fraser decided it was time to rebuild our back staircase to the house which, after 9 years needed a lot of TLC.

Original build and...... 9 years later it all had to come down!       

New platform frame done!

But this time he is changing the layout of the steps and the platform supports and stairs are held off the ground by rebar spikes to prevent rot. 

Now waiting for the cement to set off and we have to organise new stairs. The platform is going to be done with the residue of our composite plastic decking.
So watch this space for how it finally all comes together!

Fraser has re-tied our wild and wavy fence with new willow and we have added a few more interesting bits of driftwood from the river beach.
 
And we aren't the only ones who have been busy. One of our resident male wrens has been frantically building nests for his female to choose from. This one wasn't chosen sadly, probably because it is outside our utility room so just a bit too busy for her liking. Shame...it would have been nice to have them there.


My two drawing classes continue and if you are interested in taking a look at how they are doing you can click on the link below our header 'Drawing Diaries'.

 The biggest pleasure this month? Sitting outside at last, on the kitchen patio early evening on some days, overwhelmed by the smell of jasmine and honeysuckle with a glass of wine or other relevant alcoholic beverage of our choice. YESSSS! Maybe summer is here at last!

CHEERS. HAPPY BANK HOLIDAY WEEKEND!

Changeable April

April has certaily been less than kind. The rains continued, then it got hot and now, right at the end of the month, there was ice on the windshield of the Honda this morning and we've had a couple of days of frosts. We'd put the summer weight bedding on the bed, cleaned out the woodburners...OK, that was probably asking for it! There'll be a fire in the livingroom stove tonight....It's only about 16C in the house today. 12C outside at noon. Weird stuff this global warming.

We also had some very high winds which were worrying as there was a very tall, dead pine just across the road from the house, waving about in the wind, not flexing at all. Amandeo, who owns that bit of forest got a couple of foresters to drop it, controlling the fall with a cable to a tractor - off at a safe distance!

 

Neat job.

During the warm bit we had our first BBQ of the year on my birthday...

Well smoked Chicken...

Nice to be able to eat outside again. I turned 66 and the track up to the house got a tiny bit steeper..

(Still lookin' good though Sx)

This is the time of year when there is the most work to be done and the sun finally brought on the early garden colour.

Having had so much rain the long-delayed clear up was needed...but we got stuck in at last and the land has had a haircut, except for the patches that still have wild flowers. Took 4 of us a day to get this far.

The water feature has had its annual clear out and we have added a water lily to make it a bit more colourful this year. Now need to add gambusia (mosquito fish) to eat the inevitable influx of mosquito larvae.

Meanwhile, there are Irises up all over the place!

I have been using them to brush up on my botanical illustration skills, such as they are!

Sylvi has started to collate an on-line catalogue of the wildflowers that we find here on the land and in the woods. Early days and she isn't a professional at identifying what they are, but you can see her first attempt on a local gardener's group blog here

Neighbour Antonio pitched up to rotavate the field he'd earlier ploughed. Hit the soft bit and went in nearly up to his axles, but still managed to complete the job, avoiding a repeat run through the wet spot... 

Sylvi has been sowing wildflowers, Sunflowers and planting cabbages in the nice soft ground.

We planted a few more trees today too, including two Sequoias which might give someone a headache - in a few hundred years!

Hope that the weather wherever you are is improving.....tonight we are freezing our butts off so..........off to light the fire.

Mad, Muddy March

Rain, rain and more rain. Sun here and gone, frost, and yet more rain. Basically that has been this month of March.

The fields are marshes and the small water reservoir by the second field has overflowed to add to the deluge.




We asked a neighbour, Antonio to come and plough and harrow the second field since it hasn't been tended for more than 20 years and we wanted to aerate it and level it up.

We are removing the centre line of old vines (bar one) and planting forest trees there instead.

However the ploughing was combined with opening up the reservoir to direct the overflow into the tiny brook that runs to the side of the field. That was two weeks ago and it is still running!
So we are still waiting for the harrowing and levelling to happen so we can plant the trees and sow a couple of rows of sunflowers and scatter some wild flowers round the trees.

We dug out the exit point for the original pipe that comes from the reservoir only to discover that the closure is old and of course not working so we will have to lay a new pipe once the field is dry.

So in the meantime we have cut

 carried  

and stripped cane to use to reinforce our outdoor log shelter to prevent the rain from creating great bulges of water in the 
plastic.

 

 The dry husk that was left over makes great tinder to start our log fires.

The veggie patch has gone this year, too much hard work for too little return so........
Fraser stripped out the fencing and rotavated the area and we have made it into an open orchard and planted  2 apricots, a pear, 2 persimmons and a plum. We really love the open look of the little terrace..good decision!
The trees have since been mulched and we have cast wild flower seeds around the tree perimeters, so we will see what happens.






Once the rain has stopped we will plant the odd crop of easy care veg in the spaces too to help keep the weeds at bay. Planning for spinach, chard, pumpkins, courgette, sweet potatoes and yard long beans.

Bonfires this month too and all the trimmings from the olives, fruit trees and vines have been burned before the bonfire ban comes in, usually late April but maybe not this year with all the wet weather








Having cleared and mulched round all the fruit trees now,  hopefully they will do better this year than last, if the rain doesn't take all of the blossom off!



Managed to find tubs of grease too so that we can band the trees to stop the ants from using them as green fly breeding farms this year.

Fraser found this gorgeous little wild orchid growing in the field, 4 inches (10 cms) high. With the help of friends and some useful websites we were able to name it for our collection. Hoping to make a kind of virtual flora list with photos of the wild stuff we find on our land and in close proximity.

Once it is over though we are going to have to move it to a safe place as it is in the direct path of where we drive the jeep into the field.

Another exciting evening was spent looking for Comet Pan Starrs as it heads away on its long interplanetary orbit. We were lucky and had clear skies on 13th March and although we thought that the speck we could see through our binoculars to the left of the moon was a star, Fraser's camera revealed that it had a tail!!! Fraser was very chuffed to have seen it, although a bit disappointed with the size of the thing. You can just see it at about 10 o'clock from the moon.

So still waiting for the rain to stop so that we can complete tending the land ready for full spring. I have to say when we do get the odd 20 minutes of sunshine it looks deliciously fertile.