An autumn clean.

Well, what a lovely day we had today. Whilst cold, it was still incredibly sunny and instead of painting the loft room as intended I chose to enjoy the dry weather and get out in the garden on a cat poo finding mission and from there, to dig over the vegetable patch. As anyone with chickens will tell you, there's little they enjoy more than digging around a newly turned over piece of ground (before the cat decides it's an outdoor litter tray just for them). So I should have known that the minute I started I would be joined by my three feathered friends. That was okay until I weeded in between our carrots. Those immature green shoots proved irresistible to the hens and I had to keep shooing them off the patch until I could bear it no more and put them back in their run. They had been out for about five hours by then so I didn't feel too bad about it and besides they couldn't be trusted not to eat the carrot tops whilst my back was turned.

I started the day by pulling up the courgettes as the last courgette had great soggy holes taken out of it by slugs. Once they had been pulled out and thrown in the green waste I was onto the Trail of Tears beans. These beans provided a bumper crop for us this first summer only to end up being thrown away last week by what seems like the truck load after our fridge freezer conked out. All that topping and tailing, blanching and fast freezing and all for nothing. But never mind, it's not the end of the world and now I have collected up the beans to dry out for next year so all is not lost.


Whilst Luke finished off the rendering on the front wall I managed to pull up the ornamental gourd plant, fish out tiny little weeds and pull up large leggy brambles. The green waste bin is now completely full.
I was thrilled to see that the roses I had plonked (still in their pots) in the side border were again flowering (a month after I'd decided it was time for their feed because I assumed they would not be flowering again! )

The sun was fading as I finished up and the cold weather was well on it's way but looking at the garden from the warmth of the house made me feel like a good day's gardening had been done. Smug am I! It's lovely to think that will help enormously throughout the winter months and the work I have put in now will carry us through into the Spring. However, I know that by this time tomorrow that patch will have been christened somewhere by the next door neighbours cat. Nature reigns supreme! Sigh.