Hello

It always amazes me how quickly the gardens become wild again. Just one week off and the bindweed, thistles and grass have taken over some of the beds. What is lovely though, is that as the grounds people are cutting the grass less we have lots of flowers popping up in the grass. I found pink clover yesterday for the first time, along with the daisies, buttercups and forget me nots. 

We have been given more comfrey, bees love it and we are going to plant it around the bases of the apple trees in our orchard. We have our first broad beans appearing on our black fly-infested plants, I’m hoping some ladybirds turn up soon and balance out the population for us. We’ve got some tomato plants and parsley in the polytunnel, the potatoes are coming along too. 

I found currants and jostaberries under the bindweed yesterday so pulled it back a bit to let some light in. The bindweed does help keep the berries out of sight of the birds a bit for us and is pretty in flower, another great food for bees and other pollinators. The gooseberries have all disappeared, not one left, I don’t know if it is due to birds or children, but I’ve never managed to taste 1 ripe gooseberry here in 7 years!!!

I’ve been drying dandelion stems so we can have a go at weaving them sometime. 

Our compost bins have gone from full to the brim to 2/3rds of the way down in just a week too!

We are continuing to plant seeds and transplant our successes. Yesterday, year 3 children were following on from their pollination lesson in the classroom and watching the bees in the garden, busily pollinating the borage as well as eating a few of the flowers themselves!

To some the gardens may be looking a bit rampant but to others, they are becoming a bio-diverse wildlife haven. We are finding our way with this wildness and trialling how much to manage and how much to leave to nature.

It will be an interesting 6 weeks until we break up for the summer and I hope you enjoy the updates as much as we will be enjoying our time in the gardens.

Karen 

And a lovely treat from the end of the day, when it was all quiet!