Bumblebees in the garden

I have had several instances of wasp nests in my garden. I'm not overly keen on that. That is a slightly too high concentration of a slightly too grumpy insect to my taste. But I do like it if my garden attracts what are traditionally seen as pollinators. And for some reason, it seems to attract more bumblebees than ‘normal’ bees.

One day I was just sitting in the garden and a bumblebee seemed to land on the grass, by a non-flowering plant. I didn't really see the point of that. Bumblebees tend to want flowers. I had a look. There was a little hole in the ground, and it had vanished into it. A bumblebee residence! And I kept watching for a bit; I saw quite some bees flying in and coming out.

Up until then, I had no idea where bumblebees might live. Now I have an example of one of their abodes in my own garden. I like sitting near it and watched them coming in and out. Call me a speciesist, but I prefer that over watching wasps coming into and out of my little garden shed! 

Two bumblebees by the nest entrance (to their right)

Finally planting the vegetables out

I planted beans, kale and beetroot in late April. By early May, I had sizeable seedlings. And then life happened. 

The idea was to let them get so big that I figured they could survive in the garden. And then, obviously, put them in the garden. But I never found the time. And then I went to the Netherlands. Accidentally, that was during a heat wave. The catsitter did say she was watering my seedlings, but the conservatory in a heatwave is quite a hostile environment. When I got back, most of the beetroot plants were still alive, but fewer than half of the bean plants, and none of the kale. 

Now I finally have found the time put them outside! That's four bean plants and quite a lot of beetroot. I hope they will do well. There are many enemies; drought, a cat who thinks this vegetable patch is a cat toilet, and a squirrel who thinks it is a squirrel larder. And potentially slugs and caterpillars. I never had problems with these before when I grew beetroot, nor when I grew peas (and I assume that for a slug, pea plants and bean plants are quite similar). But you never know.

Finally outside! 

Veg enemy #1

I have planted a few more beans now. I don't think it's too late for that yet. And I think I have enough beetroot plants for a while. I might plant some potatoes.

So far the vegetable year has not been very productive, but it might still improve!

Giving the lawnmower some maintenance

I inherited my lawnmower from Rose. I have no idea how long she had it. It might have had quite some years under its belt. 

Sometimes I accidentally run it over a stone. That’s not good for it, obviously. The blade must be getting a bit of a battering. 

If my garden shears suffer a bit of wear and tear, I sharpen them. I had never done that with the lawnmower! I figured it was about time. But I figured the tools needed to be a bit clunkier. I got a file out. 

It’s not much work! I hope it made a difference. I will find out next time I use it. Which will probably be soon. It’s early summer and everything is growing like cabbage, including the grass! 

Blitzing the garden

Before our trip to the Netherlands I was too busy marking to give much attention to the garden. While I was away, it was quite sunny, which is great for photosynthesising plants, so when I got back, the garden had gone from unkempt to veritable jungle. It needed work! And Neil was willing to help. He is a machine. 

I had to cut the grass before he arrived, as there was rain forecast, and I had to get in before that happened. And then we did the rest together. He is so fast! We basically only worked until lunch. But what a difference it made.

As is not unusual with this sort of thing, I did not take ‘before’ pictures. You will have to imagine what it looked like then! But here are some after pictures. I am quite impressed. Let’s hope I can keep things at an acceptable level now…

On the left this raised bed was collapsing; on the right it was overgrown. Sorted now! 

Tidy borders!

Neil attacked the stairs. Tidier than ever now! 

Grass success

In April I spread grass seeds on lawn I had reclaimed from ivy and other encroaching plants. That did precisely nothing. It has been too old! But then I was in a shop that sold grass seed in mid May, and just tried again.

I sometimes had a look at the grass was coming up yet. And generally, the answer was no. But then I left for five days, and that changed things.

When I came back I had a look in the garden and there was grass! It was still a little bit thin, but it was clearly grass. I will spread a bit more of the seed, and water if needed, if we have more dry days. I have faith that these bits of lawn will totally blend into the background in a matter of weeks! That feels good.

Veritable grass! 

Squirrel

When I moved here, I didn’t see many squirrels in the garden. In recent months, this has increased a lot. I see a squirrel in the garden really often. And I see what they leave behind; I don't grow any peanuts, walnuts or hazelnuts, but I find lots of empty shells thereof in my garden. I suspect that is just a squirrel not tidying up after their lunch. And I find lots of little holes. They are too shallow to be mouse or rat burrows, so I figured they were probably places where the squirrel had hidden a hazelnut or something, and dug it up again.

Not my food waste! 

Little holes in the lawn

Most of these holes are in the lawn. But some of them are in flower pots. One of the flowers I had bought for the front of the house is looking miserable. The soil it was in had been very disturbed. The pepper plant had also had a treatment. That is a bit more unfortunate.

Ravished plant

One day I was outside, and I heard a strange noise. I wondered what it was, and my surprise, it was a squirrel running around on the wall of Neuadd Ogwen, shouting at a cat (not mine!) in my garden. It looked like the squirrel wanted to chase it away. It even worked.

That looked very territorial, so that made me believe that it is not that I just see lots of squirrels in my garden; it is probably just one squirrel I see very often.

Notice the squirrel on the gate keep an eye on the cat

 

I have later also spotted a squirrel (the squirrel?) shouting at my cat who was just lounging in the garden. I really think the squirrel is territorial! In the end, the cat got tired of the noise, and indeed went inside, mewing plaintively. 1-0 for the squirrel. 

I think someone is feeding this squirrel somewhere. Where else would you get so many unshelled hazelnuts, walnuts and peanuts from? I struggle to imagine that people are just trying to enjoy these outside, only to have them stolen by an adventurous squirrel. And then this squirrel takes them to my garden, hides some, and eats others. Well, they are welcome! But don't expect me to accept your territorial claim over that of the cat. And I have put protection around some of my plants. Let's see if we can establish an equilibrium here…

Squirrel protection 

Start of 2026 vegetables growing

I've been struggling a bit finding time for all sorts of things. I surprised myself a bit with at some point reserving some time for planting vegetable seeds. Fairly soon, some seedlings started to appear. I had planted beans, beetroot and kale. Quite quickly, small bean plants appeared. And tiny, tiny beetroot seedlings. The kale was largely unresponsive.

The idea is that they will move to the garden. I have a whole vegetable bed ready (well, in theory) for them, and for potatoes. I figured they needed to get a bit bigger and stronger before I could put them there. But they would need something more substantial than the little tray they were in to grow big enough to be able to survive outside.

In the early May bank holiday weekend I found some more time. I took all the bean and beetroot seedlings and gave them individual little flower pots. I hope they will cope with that. And that they will grow big enough to go into the garden. And I hope for nice crop! 

Beans

I have never grown beans before, but I suspect it is not fundamentally different from peas. With those I have had modest success in the past. And I have had a tiny little bit of success with beetroot before. And quite some with potatoes. I don't know how this year will turn out, but so far it is actually going quite well!

Cutting back the willow

I have a sizeable willow in the garden. I have felt the need before to cut it down to size a bit. It gives a lot of shadow in quite a large part of the garden, and the plants in the raised bed underneath that don't like that. I had been thinking about taking some of the trunks out. And one Saturday Neil and I tackled it. 

Starting 

It went super fast! We managed to cut several trunks out without dropping them on our heads. And we barely dropped them on vulnerable plants. We could cut off all the branches in no time as Neil had brought powerful loppers. And we cut the trunks in two if otherwise they wouldn’t fit in the garage. They will be firewood! 

We worked until we got hungry and wanted lunch. We had only started after 11! I suppose we weren’t at it more than an hour. Afterwards we went for a nice walk.  But we really changed the light availability in the garden. And that after the work the neighbour did. It’s a different garden now! I hope the plants that get more light now will thrive. Time will tell! 

Finished

Reclaiming the lawn

My garden is always trying to get wilder, and I have episodic bursts of trying to move it in the opposite direction. This general Easter period was one of those bursts. And one of the first things I did was trim back the hedge. And that triggered another action. 

Most of my garden is lawn, and on several sides, other plants are trying to encroach. Ivy is trying to come from several directions, and one of these is from underneath the hedge. And that had become extra obvious now that the hedge was smaller. I had had a lingering desire to and do that for years, But the hedge work pushed that to the top of the to do list. 

I removed the ivy and whatever other plants had colonised this strip, and then removed the leaf litter. I’ve greatly boosted my compost heap. And then I raked back some top soil, spread grass seed, and raked the top soil back.

I first did that houseward of the raised bed. Then on the riverward side, but only until some lump. I think it’s an old tree trunk. I think I will clear up around the lump too, but I ran out of time. And when I was done, nature watered it. 

I hope the grass seed (a leftover) is still viable. I hope so! Then I can soon enjoy my extended lawn…

Before of the riverward bit

After

Easter garden work

Around all the adventures I also found some time to dedicate to the garden. It was high time! So much needed doing I was getting overwhelmed.

I cut the grass, and weeded, and added more plants to the bed I had emptied the year before. I took some of the oregano running wild out and planted some other herbs in that bed. 

I bought some shade-resistant plants and put them in pots by the front door. Some old plants had died there. 

There is still an awful lot to do! But a start has been made. And it already looks considerably better. 

One of my new plants at the front of the house 

Some tomato plants and suchlike in the garden. The first to grow big gets the big pot (now full of weed) in the back 

Some new herbs keeping my ornamental cabbage company 

Taming the hedge

When the neighbour and I had the top of the hedge chopped off, you suddenly got a rather good view on it from above. I noticed just how asymmetrical it was! My neighbour keeps it rather trim, but I had let it grow out way more. And that is not itself surprising; my neighbour is a lot more meticulous at matters like that than I am. But now it became glaringly obvious!

It irked me, so on the Thursday of the Easter holiday I decided to do something about it. I was aware it was spring, and the beeches would grow leaves soon, and I would be cutting off a lot of buds, but I am sure there will be sufficient left. I have faith it will manage to grow a fine set of leaves. 

In the future I might even cut it back a little bit more. But for now I’m satisfied. And it also means I have gained more access to the raised bed next to it. I am thinking of moving a big shrub out of it. If I do, that would be a lot easier now with the smaller hedge! 

Not sure it is obvious in this pic how far I cut it back

Lots of branches

Hedge halved

There is a beech hedge between my garden and that of the neighbour. It can’t be older than some 40 years, as that is how long these gardens have been associated with these houses. But that hedge is sizeable! Keeping it tidy, which I aim to do every year but clearly don't, it's quite some work. I have to deploy ladders or platforms, and then I still can't reach the top. So that grows out, in a rather disorganised way.

Before: seen from the house

Before: seen from the garden

One day I spoke with the neighbour and he suggested we find someone who is willing to cut it down to approximately half its size. That would still provide privacy, but make maintenance a lot easier. I loved it! So he organised it, and we split the bill.

It happened while I was at work, and when I came back the result was spectacular. I am quite glad we did this! I think I can know trim the whole hedge standing on the ground. That means I really don't have an excuse anymore to not do it every year…

After, seen from the house

After, seen from the garden

Garden cleared of tree

I mentioned the neighbour wanted to get the work on removing a tree done before March. And he got his skates on! I had to leave things as they were for a while; busy with work and running activities, but the next Saturday I was on it again. The neighbour had cut down everything he wanted to cut down, so at least I knew that all the wood in the garden was all I would have to deal with. No additions expected!

Still some tree left

Lots of wood in the garden

It was lovely weather and I enjoyed tackling the pile. I started with a hawthorn or blackthorn he had also taken down. And then I did the main tree.

Most of that was quite straightforward. Get rid of the spindly bits, and put the thicker stuff aside to be moved to the garage. But when I got to the bottom of the pile, I reached the really thick trunks, and that was slightly less comfortable. I figured they were too heavy to carry them to the garage one piece, so I had to cut them in two. That does mean you have to saw through a trunk that is lying on the ground. Your saw gets stuck in the ground, and you have to saw while crouching; not things I like very much. But the wood isn't very hard, and it wasn't really a big deal.

I had other engagements in the late afternoon, but I managed to get all the wood out of the garden by that time. It did mean there was quite some of it in the garage, not yet processed. But that would be a chore for another day! I was quite chuffed that the garden was free again. I wasn't sure I would manage it all in one day…

Spring!

It's meteorological spring! And it has been feeling like spring. I was quite happy running in only my shorts and vest on the first day of March. And you can see it all around as well. Daffodils and snowdrops everywhere! And the plants and the trees are getting leaves. And the days are getting longer.

Spring isn’t actually my favourite season. I quite like bare trees and dramatic skies. But I do enjoy the perks of spring! And I’ll get mentally ready for the gardening season to start again… 

I know we can still get a cold spell, but at the moment, that is difficult to imagine. It feels like winter is over! 

Much tree progress

When the neighbour, who wanted more light in his garden, started cutting down a big tree on the boundary between his garden and mine, I thought I would have a lot of work on. The deal is that he drops all bits of tree in my garden, and that I get the firewood. And he has a chainsaw, so he cuts the big bits 2 size. He tends to leave what doesn't need a chainsaw for cutting.

After that first day I removed all the side branches from the wood I wanted to use as firewood, took the cut bits into the garage and stacked them, threw away what I considered too flimsy, and cut the thinner but still usable branches to size as well. And I expected him to create a new load for me pretty soon after.

It turned out he took a break. There was nothing new coming for a while! Until, at the very end of February, he had the spirit again. 

It turned out that this time, he meant business. I was just working on clearing the first batch when he already showed up to create a second. For a while we were both working on it. He cut two wedges out of trunk that stuck out into my garden, until it sagged with a "crack". I wondered if we should somehow get a rope around it and bring it down, but he had a more pragmatic approach. He went back into his own garden, from which he could kick the trunk. That immediately brought it down! Neatly into my berry shrub.

What I found on the Saturday afternoon 

Work for me to do

Then he brought this one down: more work

I helped him cut that trunk in two, but then I had to go and do other things. And the day after I wasn't going to be there. But when I came back I saw that he had also managed to take down the remaining two trunks. He has done it! An amateur with a battery-powered Aldi- bought mini chainsaw, and he got rid of the entire tree. So his work is now done. Mine sure isn't yet! But at the end of it, I'll have a lovely a load of firewood, and a little think back on these days in a year or two, snug by the fire…

Tree coming down

In summer, I ended up talking with a neighbour. Our gardens border each other. His garden is higher than mine. And there is a tree standing on the edge; the southern edge of his garden. You can imagine that takes away a lot of light. And he said he wanted to remove it. Was I ok with that? It’s his tree, but inevitably the sawn off bits would end up in my garden. I didn’t mind. And then he said he would let me have the firewood. Even better! 

He said the best time to fell trees is winter. You only have to deal with the trunks and branches; not with leaves. 

He has started now! He’s doing it himself, with a battery-operated chainsaw. And it's a tree with very many trunks, and he is just doing one at a time. And he very kindly chopped up the wood into more or less stove-sized bits. It's great!

He has done two days’ worth of work now, and I have so far quite easily been able to remove the cut bits and put them in the garage I have some old garden wood there; by now it has seasoned long enough so that I can burn it, and thus make way for the new wood. I could imagine that at some point I will struggle to keep up, but I'm sure I'll find a way. And I'm curious to see how the garden feels without that tree towering above it!

The tree in question after the work had just started

Spoils below

Sceptical composting

It's great that people are trying to use less plastic. But not all endeavours are without their own challenges. In the past years, I've been getting an increasing number of bags that looks like they are plastic, but that claim they are compostable. 

If they are the potato starch bags from the WholeFoods Co-op, I shred them and put them in the food bin. But I only just about produce enough food waste to accommodate that. And then there the other bags in which you can buy things like vegetables or clothes or coffee. No way these fit in too! So what to do with them? 

They are compostable, but does that mean you can home-compost them? Or do you need an industrial composter for that? And if you do, doesn’t that render the entire concept futile? Nobody has one of those, and no council collects compostable-in-industrial-composters waste. 

Maybe, though, you can actually compost them just like you would compost garden waste. I have a compost heap; I can at least give it a chance. So I shredded a pile of these bags and mixed them into the weeds and grass clippings that make up my heap. 

The bags

They’re in there now! 

I must admit I am sceptical at how successful this will be! I could easily imagine that the next time I turn this thing over, I will come across all these pieces in pretty much the same shape they have now. But I won’t know until I try. 

So what if it doesn’t work? Maybe I’ll have to pull them out again and burn them. Sounds tedious! But I’m not sure what else to do. And as well. If it doesn’t work, then what to do with future bags like that? I suppose there are two options: bin them or burn them. Binning them will have them slowly decompose in landfill: that creates greenhouse gases like methane, but a half-decent landfill will catch those. Burning them would create CO2, which is a weaker GHG, but it will go straight into the atmosphere. Which is worse? Not sure! 

I suppose this is a long term experiment. Compost isn’t made in a day. I should give it years! But then I’ll know. Although, of course, the materials evolve. I might be in it for the long run! 

First holiday tasks

The holidays are for fun and chores. And when I got back from the Netherlands, I wanted to be home for a bit, in order to be with the cat, so I started on my to do list. And it was lovely weather! So I decided an outdoor job would be a good idea. If the weather is nice, maybe the cat comes with me. And the first thing I did was repair some damage to my fence. I don't know if this was storm damage or person damage, but either way; it needed to be fixed. Fortunately, that was quite easy!

That plank belongs in the fence

It’s back!

The next job was pruning my trees. The big job is always the crab apple tree. It's quite a dense tree! I tend to first climb in it with my secateurs, and do what I can that way. The rest I did with my extendable tree pruner. I don't enjoy that; exerting force metres from your centre of gravity is tiring, continuously looking up is tiring, and trying to do something while an entire tree is trying to snag the tools you are using is also tiring. It took a while! And I had forgotten it’s nicer with a ladder. I think next year I’ll remember. 

I largely ignored my plum tree as it didn't have many shoots; I think it’s not very healthy. I did also did the cotoneaster. I left the apple tree for later as it was getting dark. Luckily, it's a dwarf tree, so I can pretty much do all of that with secateurs while standing on the ground.

You can clearly see all the shoots on the crab apple tree

In this light you can’t see they’re gone, but they are! 

There was more on my list, but this was a good start!

Annual knotweed round

Unless something unexpected happens, I have an attack on the knotweed on the river bank every year. And this year I didn’t want to skip. So one Sunday I headed for the river bank for an inspection. And my (and the neighbour’s) efforts are paying off. There wasn’t much there! No big clumps like in the beginning. Just spindly shoots that had managed to grow in spite of our repeated attacks. So fortunately, it wasn’t much work! And it would be lovely if next year there is even less. Or, dare I say it, maybe none? I will have to be vigilant, as of course even if we exterminate it, it can just travel back from upstream. But one tries! Stay tuned! 

Spotted a bit of knotweed! 

Using some holiday on the garden

I always struggle to use my holidays. People who don't work in academia tend to think that you have months off in summer, but even though the students end quite early, you of course first have to mark all their work, sit through all the exam board meetings, sort out the supplementary assessments in summer for students who didn't quite pass the year, fill out all the quality assurance paperwork, actually do the things you promise in your quality assurance paperwork, provide topics for the third and fourth year dissertation modules create timetable requests for the new year, and all these other things. And then you have to prepare all the module websites for the new year. And prepare all your teaching. It's easy to just run from one academic year into the next without stopping!

An additional complication is, of course, the cat. It is always a bit of a headache situation to leave her. If I would have substantial holidays abroad booked, I would basically be forcing myself to take time off. But that often doesn't happen.

This year is no exception. But at least I was taking some days off. I was going on quite a lot of jollies! The Snowdon horseshoe, H floor of Cwmorthin… you can have a great time without leaving North Wales. 

Holiday is not just for jollies, though! It's also for getting all these chores done you otherwise have no time for. And this Spring and summer, my garden has been wild and neglected. But it was nice to be able to sometimes just decide to log a day of annual leave and stay home. And venture into the garden with some gardening implements and get some stuff done.

One of my early targets was the plum tree. It had been looking a bit unhealthy. I had just heard (I may have inadvertently been listening to GQT) that summer is a good time to prune stone fruit trees. Get rid of the dead-looking bits. So I got my saw out. I don’t know if it’s on its last legs. But now it at least looks kind of healthy. 

I did much more, of course, but you can hardly take before-and-after pictures of all weeds you pull. I’m well aware the garden needs bucketloads of more work, but I’m enjoying the progress! 

Before 1

Before 2

After