This Week in the Garden in Photographs.

It has been a beautiful week, a week of marvellous weather and long days outdoors spent in the gardening. I was going to write "working" in the garden but it is more a pastime, a gentle time of light jobs, of bits and pieces, of this and that but no major projects and plenty of …

Prodigiously Prolific.

Lionel and Helen (Meg) Richardson were breeders of daffodils, based at Prospect House, Kilcohan, in Waterford City. The house still stands, now surrounded by modern housing estates which also cover what was previously the Richardson’s farmland – they kept Jersey cows for milk and also grew tomatoes commercially – and the family name is given …

Photographic Review

This is no more than a set of photographs taken in the garden during this last week, selected because they appeal to me either for the subject matter or that I just like the photograph. As I particularly enjoy photographing flowers I have in mind to make this a regular blog post. We'll see!

The End of Days.

There will be a break, a rest, a time of indoor confinement tomorrow and over the coming weekend if the weather forecasters are accurate. This past while has been beautiful, dry days with sunshine and warm temperatures and hours and hours in the garden. Even from something which gives such pleasure, we need a change …

100% Increase in Movement Membership!

Yes, I've been moving slowly along and have had a 100% increase in the membership of the movement, The Slow Gardening Movement, which is soon certain to become an international grouping of like-minded gardeners. The future is ours, the unhurried, the leisurely, the sedate, the slow-going, relaxed and gentle gardeners;  the past is for the …

The End of the Bare Days

These last few days have brought a change in the garden, a change that clearly marks the move from one season to the next. Buds have been bursting and leaves opening on the trees. There has been a noticeable greening of the up-to-now bare trees since the weekend. Clearly the seasons are moving along, from …

Asparagus, Confetti and Then it Rained and…

The rain was expected earlier today, this morning, but it was early afternoon before a light rain arrived and, as I write, it does not look like it will last for very long nor be of any consequence. This is a pity as rain would have been welcome to keep the garden and plants fresh. …

Not Much, Really!

What did I do today? Not much, really! At first saying, it might sound as though I had a dull day, an unexciting day and, to a certain extent, I suppose that was the case but dull and and unexciting are perfectly fine with me. A day when nothing extraordinary happens is a good day. …

A Poem for this Spring … Mark Roper.

MORE THAN EVER Now more than ever, swallow, is the time to come, up the river and over the field. Now, rook, the time to know your ramshackle basket of twig holds its fragile trove. Blackcap, this moment more than ever we need your hidden delivery, sudden mad burst of song. Gorse, your rich and …

Food Insecurity

Of course, not in the sense this term is generally used – “the disruption of food intake or eating patterns because of lack of money and other resources” – but a certain sense of insecurity regarding our food supply has come about during this time of isolation due to the Coronavirus Covid-19 outbreak. The monthly …