Season’s Greetings from all the animals at Peel Wyke – including us!

The picture on the right was taken last August.  I know that’s a long time ago, but I’ve just found it and realised that it shows you our site very well.  The picture is taken from the hill to the west of us.  Our house is right in the middle of the picture.  You can see the laurel covered bank to the south of the house, and the trees that surround us.  It really is like living in a woodland glade.

We’ve now had a little snow and the pond has frozen over a couple of times, but there’s still a few things in the garden.  It has been so mild up till this time that the fuschias are still blooming!

Datura - or Thornapple - in October

Also, we still have the wilting remains of a Datura that seeded itself in the disturbed area along the stream bank.  I was thrilled to see it.  The last time I saw one was at Caliente in Utah about 30 years ago!  I gather they aren’t really all that rare, but I was pleased to see it anyway!

I’m still hoping the seed pods will dry enough to gather seeds, but it probably won’t happen.  Although it’s illegal to grow Datura (Jimsonweed, Locoweed, Thornapple) in some U.S. states, it’s perfectly legal here although it’s considered a bit of a dangerous weed as it is so poisonous.  Mike tells me he saw a lot of it in the south of France and I believe it does prefer warmer climes.

Ruddy Darter

The stream was dry for about 3 months during the late summer and autumn.  The south of the UK had a bad drought, while the north was inundated with too much rain.  We’re getting more now, though!

The drought helped us to attract wildlife to the pond.  Some mornings it was full of wood pigeons and blackbirds taking baths.  I didn’t realise how dusty birds wings were.  When the flew off they left a film on the surface that looked just like bath scum!

We had lots of visits from dragon flies too!  I thought it would take ages to get them here, but the drought must have helped.  The Ruddy Darter pictured above is taking a post-coital rest!  His broken wing didn’t stop him from chasing down a female, mating with her and dipping her into our pond to lay her eggs.  We watched the whole thing in wonder and delight!  We were also happy to see Southern Hawkers exploring around the pond and bog garden and laying eggs all over the place.

Copepod? Cyclops?

The little guy on the left was one of many swimming around in the pond in late summer.  I’m not sure what he was, but he was only about 1 mm in size!

The pond is quiet now.  Haven’t seen any beetles, newts, pond skaters, etc. for several weeks.  We’ve had a lot of rain in the last week too (over an inch), and the pond and the bog garden are completely full.

Lord Kingslip - eating apple

We’ve had a bumper crop of apples again this year.  In fact they broke some of the branches on the trees.  They ripened quite early and then the wind came and blew them all down, so I didn’t get to keep too many eating apples for later in the winter.  I have frozen some and I have lots of cookers so we’re enjoying some lovely apple pies!

And now I’m going to close up with a few autumnal photos just to show you how it looked a few weeks ago.

The climbers did well this year - in spite of the drought

John cut down the Corn Cockle in the meadow - what will we get next year?

On a warm october evening, the badgers were running about under me while I lay in this hammock!

Cosmos near the patio

Remember the little scrape out the back of the kitchen?  Well it is no longer there.  It has been replaced by a deck which we can access from the kitchen, a pond and a bog garden.  Water from the roof feeds the pond (so far it has remained just about full in spite of a horrible drought), it overflows through a pipe under a causeway into the bog garden and when that overflows the water drains into the stream.  Here is a slide show of the whole thing being built, including the diversion to shore up the crumbling banks of the stream with lovely boulder filled gabions.

Mike Russell and his team have won gold at Shrewsbury Flower Show again this year.  Here’s a link to their blog where you can read about their show garden and all the hard work that went into it:

http://severndalespecialistschoolgarden.wordpress.com/

You may remember the meadow.  As winter approached the first seedlings were struggling to come out of the ground.  We had very cold weather and lots of snow and we weren’t sure anything had survived, but we were pleasantly surprised to see everything coming up when the snow finally cleared.  It seemed to be mainly one plant and after a while we identified it as corn cockle.  It grew and grew and soon grew so tall that we couldn’t see the cairn in the middle.  Then, in early July it all came into bloom and we had a sea of purple.  It was lovely.  Sheltered beneath the canopy of these beautiful annuals we could see poppies and yellow rattle starting to appear and we hope to see more of those in the years to come.

Here are a couple of pictures of the meadow as it was in early summer:

Now the corn cockle is dying back, there are loads of seeds in the seed heads, but we will be cutting it down to allow the perennials to find the light and air they need to thrive and grow for next year.  The corn cockle is just a nursery crop.  The seeds won’t germinate in undisturbed soil, so we won’t see many of them next year.

Originally we had planned mown paths from the various entrances of the meadow to the cairn, but the badgers had other ideas and they have made their own paths through – I guess we’ll be using those!

The dry summer following the very cold winter has damaged a few plants, especially our phormiums, but most things have come through unscathed and some are better because the cold killed off some of the bugs.  Horseflies don’t seem to have suffered at all, in fact everyone is reporting lots of these pesky beasties and I’ve had some humungous bites!  Here are a few pictures of plants and flowers from this summer:

Click to view slideshow.

He hung around in the garden for about half an hour, running about and exploring the snow drifts. At one time, he and a local cat were face to face and eyeing each other, while a crow looked on from the apple tree! He looks alert and full of energy – it’s just his coat that’s a mess.

Maybe he’s eaten the pheasant?

I’d like to introduce you to our latest visitor.  This is Scruffy the Pheasant – so called because his tail is in a terrible mess.  He is very tame and comes running when we open the back door.  In this video he’s taking peanuts off the back step.

He visits at breakfast time, but wanders around the garden most of the morning.  There is a female around too, but we don’t see her very often.  He has started crowing, so it looks as though he’s setting up his territory in our garden.  I wonder how many females he’ll attract with a tail like that!

The garden is frozen, we’re in hibernation.  The snow is thick on the ground, it’s impossible to work outside, even if we wanted to.  We rush outside to fill up the bird feeders and pour boiling water into the birdbaths.  Then we sit in the warm and watch to see who comes.

Blue tits, long-tailed tits, coal tits and great tits, bullfinches and chaffinches, blackbirds, wrens, robins and dunnocks, crows, magpies and jackdaws – all descend on the feeders and take what they can to keep them going through the long, dark, cold nights.

We have a pair of pheasants in regular attendance, now.  They are tame enough to come running when we throw corn or peanuts out onto the patio.  The male has a very ragged tail – many of the barbs are gone from a couple of his tail feathers, leaving the bare shafts to glint white against the brown of the other feathers.  We’ve named him Scruffy!

And at night the badgers come, especially the big fat boar.