25 March: a GW day

Monday, 25 March 2019

The predicted cold rain fell all day.  I did not mind one bit.

We began by watching the segment of The Great British Garden Revival that features Charlie Dimmock making a quick and easy formal water feature.  I was hoping that Allan would be inspired, so that he would share my enthusiasm for copying her plan next weekend. It will involve moving plants, and early spring is the best time for that, and I hope to fill it with rain water, another reason to do it soon.

He did get interested and even went out in the afternoon to check on the availability of the two long pieces (and one shorter) of large lumber that we would need.

On the way back, he photographed the Ilwaco Community Building in the rain. A second patch of salal should be trimmed on the right to match the freshly pruned one on the left. 

It turns out that the lumber would be over $125 for each long piece.  After some pondering, we have decided to make the pond out of concrete H blocks instead, which will be more work and more careful leveling but will be much less expensive.  I simply cannot afford Charlie’s simpler version.  Allan’s ideas about the dimensions of the pond are just a bit grander than hers (and we don’t want part of it to be a bog garden).  The liner will be the biggest expense.

Here is a wonderful sight:

Frosty and Skooter sleeping together

I then watched many the episode of Gardeners’ World 2013 via my subscription to Inside Outside TV.

Eventually, Frosty came to my lap…

…and so did Skooter….

…in a screen-blocking way at first…

I gleaned another good tip about composting.  Monty does not keep turning all four bins.  He lets the well rotted compost finish off in one undisturbed bin, a practice which I will adopt now that my autumnal debris is reduced in volume.

I offended the cats by rising from my chair occasionally, so they returned to their mutual nap elsewhere.

The rain continued all day.

from the north window

I noted yesterday that the deer are squeezing through my front garden fortifications and chowing down on bulb foliage and roses.  I do wish we could have an eight foot fence along the front.  Zoning does not allow that.

As I write this, I have only three episodes of GW 2013 left.  It is a great luxury to have all the episodes lined up in order rather than having to quest around the internet for them.  2013 and 2014 are seasons that have resisted my most determined searching, so I hope Inside Outside acquires 2014 soon.

The end of the pre-dinner evening was spent writing four blog posts, as I was all out!