Christmas time, Mistletoe....... (Cliff Richard comes to mind, I'll stop there)

Many people talk to me about this time of year and tell me how they can't bear the short dark days, they long for Spring and focus on how it always seems to be constantly raining and/or windy/muddy/cold/generally pants. Now, I am not going to suggest I don't agree with some of this BUT I also LOVE the wind and being blown about. I LOVE the sun setting and rising whist I am most definitely awake and I rather like dashing in from the rain (sometimes).

Being out and about this time of year is actually quite a treat in the fresh air and when you wake up in the morning feeling like a sack of potatoes, a bit of gardening outdoors can really sort you out.

These last few weeks have of course been focussed on the build up to Christmas. Lots of jobs involving tidying, leaf blowing, cutting back, pruning, dead heading, clearing old leaves and replacing straw for the Strawberries. Getting ready to start again. In addition, we get involved in the lovely build up stuff, the collection of Ivy and Holly and putting the Christmas tree up.

Despite the bare bones of the garden being on show, there are lots of plants giving fragrance right now, Daphne (Jacqueline Postill/Acutiloba), Chimonanthus. Structure and beauty can be found like the huge beautiful yellowy orange hips on Rosa Meg, which is as big as a soft fruit like an Apricot, truly gorgeous. 

There is much to do in the coming weeks, digging in the veg garden, planting more bulbs, more pruning, weeding, edging, transplanting, not to mention preparing for Snowdrops. 

Lots of wildlife to be seen too, even though the garden is entering dormancy, the weather has been so mild. We have seen Herons, Kingfishers (not me - never seen one!- but HG assures me), Mice, Moles, Bees on the Daphne and of course our regular friends in the garden at Heale, Papadum the Peacock, chickens, Dogs and our Kittens, Fennel and Bo. Never a dull day to be had.

Darker days

My gardening day has been noticeably shorter this week in terms of light. The light starts to go around 3 ish and gently potters off to full darkness around 4pm or so, the Tawny owl hooting to remind us that it is almost night time.

I have been cutting back a big border for a client and transplanting big Salvias from borders to pots for over wintering.

At Heale I spent my days doing lots of jobs. Transplanting Hornbeam hedging and re-planting to a new location. Not finishing the job until the ground had been re turfed and squished down. Tools of the trade include HG's home made (and very useful) Tamper, to flatten the turfs into their new home.

We also spent a morning planting more bulbs, around a 1,000 more, Camassia 'Cusickii' and 'Semiplena', Scilla peruviana and Allium 'Purple Sensation'. Some with a planter, some with a trowel. Should be good.

 Still a bit of cropping of veggies to do. A real pleasure to be handling crops after what seems like an age since we were in full veg flow. The veg garden is bare bones now we have reached December and pretty soon I will be itching to get back in there and get things going.

 The Wisteria in the garden all require their Winter prune and we had a bit of time left to work on the biggest one in the garden this week. Always slowly and methodically. Great job.

This Wisteria is by the most beautiful tall, orangey/brown Miscanthus which stand guard over the river at this time of year and the light was just stunning as it disappeared for another day.