Weeding? Weeding? Or weeding?
Head Gardener Weeding
Ooooh - It's a gorgeous, gorgeous spring day. So many things to do, so difficult to put them in order... What to do first? Weeding? Weeding? Or weeding? Aagh! No time to lose. I'm off outside, and I'm going to start at the start - with weeding.
Saturday 22nd September, Later...
And it looks like I might do weeding in the middle, and finish with weeding. I've been in the Stumpy (AKA Willow Tree) Garden with Little Mac the black and white gardening cat. And there has been no dithering. I self-engaged with my deepest, most serious mood and asked myself: Should I pull out all the creeping ground-cover which I consider a weed? The answer flashed instantly - yes!
So I scooped it all out, before you could say Jack Robinson. Too silly, that phrase. 'Before you could say Gertrude Jekyll' sounds better...
Annoying Creeping Ground-Cover
That creeping ground cover in question has always annoyed me, and I've planted two roses in the gaps. Though how removing ground-cover can somehow produce gaps for roses is another question...
Glechoma hederacea :- Here's the clean green variety of 'Creeping Charlie'. It grows in the Wattle Woods.
Thank you, Google images search! It's called Creeping Charlie, Glechoma hederacea, also known as ground ivy, and it's a pest!
Mine is the variegated version (slightly more stylish?) - maybe I'll pot some little pieces of it for the herb spiral, to show a little mercy.
Even Later...
I have been so silly. After my break I decided to wander slowly over to the glasshouse, weeding as I went. This would give me a feeling of overall accomplishment. Oh yes? And did I realise how distressing this would be?
Weed this Garden!
The Weeding Myth
I wish to dispel the myth that weeding is therapeutic. Weeding is nit-picky, for the small-minded gardener. It is hard to bask in the afterglow of a day spent weeding.
Shift the Blame?
But wait a minute. Apart from the squillions of gorse and broom seedlings left over from the old hedges (removed over a dozen years ago), all the weeds I've pulled out of the garden have also been visible in the lawns. Hmm...
Shifting the blame to my lawn maintenance man (Non-Gardening Partner) doesn't make me feel any better, because I like NGP at the moment (he is taking me to get bricks tomorrow).
I'm not grumpy and cross, honestly I'm not. Not as grumpy as Rusty the dog, anyway, who is on a serious dog-diet...
Dog Nose
Sunday 23rd September
Sitting in the cottage with my cat Minimus, my early cup of tea, and the pheasant doing his honk-honk-whirl act around the pond path, is THE most peaceful place for a spot of gentle reflection.
You see, inside every gracious, good-hearted gardener (one with the vision to fill ten paddocks with gardens) there lurks a nit-picky, small-minded little gremlin. Aha! You can see where this is leading. I woke up feeling so cross with myself for getting so cross with the weeds yesterday.
Pretty Pink Camellia
I've now got some basic weeding rules, which I will put in place this morning. They address the questions of weeding scale and style, and should stop me complaining. Ha!
Weeding Rules
- Always sit down to weed (or kneel, if knees feel OK).
- Fill a small bucket, not a large wheelbarrow.
- Stay in one area for at least 15 minutes.
- And never, ever fill up a journal page with moaning about weeding again!
It goes without saying that photographs of weeds are not acceptable, either. Hence that beautiful pink Camellia in flower just up there...