how late is late

Finally a spell back in the gardens. This week a new hedge or two got planted - one mixed dogwoods and guelder rose, one rather surprising choice a short hedge of amelanchier, it just might work and I couldn't resist it when I discovered the trees available bareroot. And as I was digging ground to plant the little specimens I threw in the rest of the bridal crown narcissi that I didn't get round to planting in the autumn. I know they were supposed to be flowering in huge pots in the tunnel weeks ago rather than languishing in their net sacks in the shed but life really is like that sometimes, things get forgotten about because there just isn't the opportunity to remember. I will note if and when they appear and flower, whatever happens I reckon they are better in the ground than out.

Today the crew were back and we made a row of new compost bins and got stuck into pruning the roses, a job that always seems to take ages. Last year's compost bins were tucked up for a year - closed  over with old corrugated sheets to front and top and they will now be left until we open them to use the compost next winter, pots were sorted ready for the rush of propagation that should start any day soon, shredded landscape fabric was tidied up - never again will I use it on very exposed areas, even the edges that were trenched in with soil over them had managed to tear out of the ground, leading to fraying ends trying to wrap their horrible fingers round anything they could touch, I'm surprised the sheep in the adjoining part of the field got away without bondage. In future I use either bonded fray free stuff overlaid with a generous amount of old concrete slabs to keep it down, or I get tons and tons and tons more of municipal compost in before the ground gets too wet when a lorry can't get access.

One small area of the gardens is briefly looking contented, neatly pruned and covered with muck or compost, but I know it is a brief illusion and chaos will soon re-appear as elsewhere.