What a difference six days make.

I wondered about calling this post, "don't take a-fence" as in "don't take offence" but it wasn't particularly funny so I decided against it (although of course I have just said it to you anyway.., sorry!).

Well, what a week!

We have both been off work in order to build a fence at the end of our garden. In six days Luke has made a fence completely from scratch whilst I've tidied up the rockery at the front of the house, replanted the tiny border by the front door with cut price sunny primroses and orange and purple pansies, re potted an unhealthy looking Box plant and the little ornamental wheelbarrow with cheery pink primulas, mowed both lawns, dug in six bags of sharp sand to my very tatty, compacted area under the Acer before repositioning the plants I'd taken out so I could cleanly dig without damaging them , cleaned up the deck, stacked the logs then had a go (a one off, I can assure you!) with the chainsaw.

I also visited the garden centre (what a joy!), ordered some gladioli online, received our wild flower seeds for the end of the garden (a new venture), shooed the hens away from my purple sprouting, dug over half the vegetable patch and tried to bury unearthed worms before the hens ate them, found one decaying lump of cat faeces (eeuugh) and seven sprouting potatoes that had hidden from our view last year when we dug the others up. I have taken down the bubble wrap from the greenhouse, put the three hens in the same hen house together which they are tolerating but not loving, moved bags of ballast from the decking to the back of the shed, raked and redistributing the wood chippings which have been nourished with plenty of chicken manure whilst providing a natural flooring for their run, This now makes a little walkway past the greenhouse and up to the hen house and shed. I've pulled up the very dead lavenders and sage then moved the Box plants from the corners of the vegetable patch (:Luke doesn't appreciate anything that can't be eaten taking up valuable space in the veg patch) . They now reside next to the step into the greenhouse. We had our first and probably last bonfire before I partly cleaned out the shed, helped remove one very dead tree from it's home right where the fence post needed to go. I've admired Luke's tenacity at getting the fence erected by started at 9am every morning and working till the sun goes down each evening. Once we've cooked and eaten we've both fallen asleep on the sofa and retired to bed by 9pm each evening.
The good weather has been a huge help in us getting things done; believe me, if it had been wet and cold I would have been huddled indoors instead of outside, working hard and in the process, getting a decent tan.
I'll post some photos after a good night's sleep and a kind word to Luke (who uploads the photos for me). You'll see how we went from a near waste ground one week ago to a fenced area that is almost ready for sprinkling with the wild flower seed to create, we hope, swathes of bold colour to attract the insects. Watch this space and I hope we won't be disappointed.

Luke and the ladies.

It must be love....., that, or they just want cake from him.

And when not given cake they wait at the door and intimidate him!

Morning visitor.

If you look carefully just above the suet balls you will see a brown bird sitting on the branch. The Sparrowhawk, waiting for rich picking. 

This morning we awoke to see the sparrowhawk sitting in our Acer. It's not surprising because the tree is literally dripping with bird feeders. Suet balls, niger seed, peanuts and wild bird seed feeders all dangle from the branches of the Acer and so it makes sense for the predator to go straight to it's own feeding station. We could hear birds chirruping but the tree was eerily silent and not one bird moved to give away it's hiding place in the shrubs. Whilst we ran for the camera the sparrowhawk flew onto the fence between Jack's house and his other neighbours.

 

Alighting quietly to just underneath the shrubs there was still no movement from any tiny birds and after a few minutes I was sent out to purvey the garden.

 Although I didn't see or hear the bird fly off it took another ten minutes before the birds were prepared to visit out garden again. Here are a couple of gold finches eating the tiny black flecks of the niger seed, a blue tit on the peanuts and two sparrows sitting in the the shrub before attacking the suet balls. It might be worth clicking on the last photo to see the two little dull birds better.

At journey's end.

The crows all congregated in a tree before, with a mass of cawing, they took flight like a black sheet being shaken vigourously.

Lola off to her bed. The other hens have already gone up to roost leaving Lola out in this brilliant pink light.

The oak tips glow with the last of the sunlight.

...Proof positive that we live in a rainbow's arc.

The mountains to the left of us,, golden and lush.

The sun sinking below the horizon.

A little corner of the world.

I have, with the help of two chickens who greedily sucked up the worms unearthed by my fork, created a little curved edge between the raspberries and the vegetable patch. Nothing much, just some cut price polyanthus and the upturned roots of the old cherry tree we dug up two years ago.
It just adds a little springtime colour further up the garden.

 

Long shadows.

Don't you just love a sunny day when the sun is high and the shadows long? Here. two little things are made much larger with tall shadows leaking from their bodies. Shakira trundling towards me is always a delight to see with her tail looking like a tight bun. The butterfly pitched on the fence to warm it's wings possibly? I like the crisp edges of it's shadow,  almost making a new butterfly.

Before pictures.

This is how the corner by the shed looked before today.
I have now moved it all so we can take down the old fence and erect a new, bigger and sturdier one. As always, there is more mess before things get tidy - we live in a constant state of flux; once one part is tidied we have to move onto something else. Hopefully by next weekend we will have a lovely fence and maybe even (though it's doubtful) the other hen house built. As for the area where Lola's run will be, I've dug over the ground and weeded it completely. It need a good amount of sand adding to the soil so that it doesn't get too compact and wet.

The hen house is cleaned up and will need to have some attention to faulty woodwork before putting securely together again. I got the dirty job of cleaning the gunk off it all but Luke gets the difficult job of putting it all together again. Good luck with that!

Until then poor Lola has to reside in the greenhouse and her nesting box is, as you can see, an old cardboard box with sawdust in it. Lola's tail is the only thing visible once she has settled down to lay her daily egg. With that flash of black her tail reminds me of a dorsal fin. I shan't be worried though. Fortunately hens don't have teeth!

Bird baths.

Chickens are such fun. I laugh when I look at Buck Bucky's stance here, legs apart, fluffy bottom. She's a nice little chicken.

At the same time, the other two fluffed up their feathers and bathed in a hole of dusty.

Whilst the girls were in the greenhouse a little sparrow hopped into their run and helped itself to their food.

Watch this space.

We have this week booked off in order to build the back fence. Luke has dug  up the distorted conifer and now I have cleared away the mass of brambles, wood, stones, washing up bowls, old bin and wrought iron planter along with the drain pipe, old wooden posts and two washing line posts we are ready to get out there and build. When I say 'cleared away' I have just moved everything six feet further back in order for Luke to be able to dig the new fence post holes. I was out in my leggings and work tee shirt hoping not to be seen in that state when a chap came meandering along the field. He, like me, was tidying up the back boundary - in his case, cutting down an overgrown shrub that was blocking light from his Mother's garden. Unbelievably it turned out that we had a mutual friend so we chatted away whilst he reminisced about his childhood in this area. He remembered nipping into the field to steal three fat cabbages for the family's Sunday roast then watching the lazy cows graze once the field had been turned over to pasture. Apart from that one day we had traveller horses in there we've never seen the field used for anything but an occasional trespasser walking his excitable spaniels or the lone fox sniffing at the long grass.
Whilst friends fly off to sunnier climes to shake off their winter blues we are staying put and working hard to get the fence erected and the new chicken finally re-homed in a proper hen house (I spent last Saturday scrubbing the entire wooden edifice with Dettol and water before hosing it down and drying it in the sun). To be honest with you I would rather be on a beach or swimming in warm waters but needs must and our tactic of delayed gratification will hopefully pay off when all the jobs are done (one day?)
Here, although we work long and hard so don't have time to properly enjoy it, we have so much to be grateful for that it would be downright churlish to complain. As I often say, I'm a lucky woman.

New beginnings.

Spring is on it's way with these lighter nights and warmer days. The chickens are roaming across our garden and Jack's from the moment they are let out till the sun has dipped behind the hill. Although it's not advised to have chickens in the flower beds I have to say that far from being destructive they have raked over the top layer of the beds and have only broken one small hyacinth. Once the sweet tips of new growth come through we'll have to keep an eye on them.

 

They love every part of one of our favourite plants, Cerinthe, the blue shrimp plant, and will strip that in a matter of minutes; greedily tearing at the leaves and pulling the pendulous beauties from their stalks. We now plant them in the front garden or in pots kept high enough out of their way to avoid total annihilation.

However, these are a few of the plants coming into their own right now.

The hellebores are looking lovely right now although they have again succumbed to the dreaded leaf spot they are susceptible to. Never mind, I just remove the leaves and enjoy the flowers.

Some damage has been done to this blue hyacinth. Still, it will smell as sweet, if only I was heartless enough to cut it for indoor use I could enjoy it's heady scent in the house.

Bonding over yoghurt.

The hens have now come to an understanding. Massive chicken (Lola) and our two bantams (Shakira "Shaksta" & Buck Bucky "Buckster") are all in the greenhouse having a dust bath. The breakthrough came yesterday over a pot of yogurt. Shakira will always ignore everything else when there is food about and so, whilst Buckster had her longed for dust bath (a rare treat now the greenhouse is temporary home to Lola) Shakira chowed down over a pot of yogurt which we give them for good digestion. Lola was given a pot when we first had her but she ignored it and after three days it had a crust of dust on it so I threw it out. She hasn't been used to variety in her diet so studiously ignored the 'treat'. However, seeing Shakira wolfing it down so gluttonously she decided to try it out. In a minute they were like nodding dogs, heads in the pot and then head thrown back to flick the excess all over the deck and themselves. Once Buckster joined them the pot was empty and the girls were nonchalantly ferreting about the garden, looking for young grass tips and bugs.

 Lola wants what Shakira has....., she just doesn't know how good it tastes yet.

 

Look at Shakira's beak, she is such a messy easy!

Chowing down.

Buckster decides she isnt' ready to feel the love yet and has a lone dust bath in the greenhouse.

Where are the others? It's lonely in here!

Here come the girls to join Buckster for a communal bath before a spot of lunch.

 All together in the depleted parsley patch, Lola towers over our bantam girls.

Buckster, who is used to being the boss makes a hasty retreat when Lola encroaches on her space.

Even the cat gets in on the act. Socks, from next door casts a glance in their direction. She's hoping for a fat toad to hop into the undergrowth.