General Notes about what is appearing and what I have planted

Somewhat remiss in the blog-writing recently. Well, not so recently, actually, I see. It is a problem, writing things about a building project when it has virtually ended. All I really have is the report of three months’ worth of wild flowers, which I find interesting, but which may seem dull to some, plus a discussion of trees and one visit to Alasdair about snagging.

Simply in the interests of recording what I may later find has died on me, I note that I have moved some plants from St Andrews and put them at the top of the bank on the south side of the house. So far there are these: the small scented jonquil-like daffodils with slightly twisted petals and a small cup; iris reticulata; erythronium revolutum; narcissus Tete a Tete; iris Katherine Hodgkin, a spectacular spring-flowering miniature; ranunculus aconitifolius plenus, the double white buttercup; some hybrid geranium renardii which have not come out in that lovely grey colour of flower, as they are hybrids; and astrantia. Mike has let me take a root of golden oreganum from Tomdoun. I have also sown some seeds of orleya grandiflora, given me by Gardens Illustrated, and some aquilegia seeds from St Andrews. At the back of the house, on the bank, I have sown some white foxgloves, also from GI. Beside the track, I have cast a weird collection of seeds given by someone. They include cornflower, achillea, some sort of daisy flower, poppies and more aquilegias. In the difficult area in front of Klarg I have buried a thank you letter impregnated with wildflower seeds. Heaven knows what will come up; it felt like an odd thing to do.

The wild flowers already in residence have gone through several waves since I last wrote. Bluebells, wood anemones, wood sorrel and violets gave way to chickweed wintergreen, orchids, tomentil and cinquefoils. (I know the difference, I think.) There is also tick wort, milkwort and those succulent bog flowers that I can’t look up because the wildflower books are elsewhere. Now the bog asphodel has come out in huge swathes, very noticeably behind the house, where it makes a harmonious sweep of yellow surrounded by lines of the different greens of grass, bog myrtle and bracken. Things here seem to go in for monoculture.

The bare banks are greening up reasonably well. Livy has posted some pictures taken several weeks ago which show this; and I am taking some more this weekend. Except in the areas immediately beside the house, where the builders put a layer of peat taken from the meadow, over the brickbats and pieces of wire which I fully expect to find down there one day, the bare earth has had two summers to recover. It is doing particularly well in the place where the original track to the meadow was made and then abandoned. The back of the quarry and the sides of the track are not doing too badly; the banks to the north and south of the house are starting to recover, except the place to the north which is pure scree. The only really slow bit is the long barrow of subsoil up the slope behind the north bank.