Watch out for Hogweed!

I keep meaning to add a posting about Hogweed or Cowparsley to my blog site, following the rather unpleasant after effects that I had after strimming in a client's garden where this was growing.

I thought I'd covered up quite well and with the use of a face guard too I'd not bargained for the horrible blisters that you can get when any of the plant or it's juices from the stem touch your skin... so if you've got this in your garden and are wanting to strim - do take extreme care!

In summer it produces large white umbrelliferous flowers!

In between the April showers...

The weather today has gone from one extreme to another - very stormy and wet with hail stones, thunder and in brief patches, beautiful warm sunshine... so at least I've been able to catch up with some jobs needing to be done in the garden as well as update my blog!

We have an area of mature woodland which includes a number of hazels which come in very handy for making supports in various forms in the garden - equally good for plants as for supporting climbers in the vegetable patch!

We inherited many beautiful plants when we moved here - I'm still discovering new ones as they find the space to emerge as we continue clearing away brambles, couch grass, and ivy in the main. I've got a small area of Peonies which were planted very near to a Lilac and as a result the Peonies are always straining for the light (the lilac considerably bigger now than when it was planted!) and with wet & windy weather once flowering begins, the beautiful flowers very quickly go over, so this year I've constructed one square and one triangular support to prevent them from flopping over! Time will only tell if this does the trick! I've also used the Hazel for supporting the Runner Beans that are currently being brought on in the greenhouse - they won't be ready to plant out for another few weeks yet.

On a last visit to the vegetable garden this afternoon, I spotted a slow worm basking in the sun - they're great for the garden and should not be confused with any form of poisonous snakes!

Glimpses of a Brittany Garden!

Sorry there haven't been many recent postings - the time of year with too much to do outside and no time for anything else! A wet Monday morning here in Brittany finally allows the time to add something to my blog...

This last weekend has been glorious and the warmer weather has certainly brought many plants into flower, with the first of my Oriental Poppies and Cranesbills out now, not forgetting some of the Aqualegias too. We have had swallows around now for the past 2 weeks and I even heard the first cuckoo three days ago! I don't know if anyone else has had this experience today but discovered that a wren has started to rebuild one of the swallow's nests in the barn - despite having two wren's nests to choose from in the same building - not sure what the swallows will think about that when they return to nest build!

The colours of spring are raphidly changing with most trees other than the Walnut now in leaf and many birds starting to build nests too. I did happen to noticed a number of juvenile thrushes in our woodland whilst out for a walk over the weekend so Mr & Mrs Thrush must have started early - do hope they'll hang around as they're great to have in the garden to keep the snail and slug populations down.