Lush

I’ve had a few days free to get out into the garden (between showers) and not before time – a hot dry few weeks in June, followed by a few more weeks of warm and wet weather has meant an explosion of growth, both wanted and unwanted. It’s terrifying how quickly the new plants which I had put in at the beginning of May into what looked like a fairly well-cleared patch of ground have been overwhelmed by the dense jungle of hedgerow plants that our garden keeps trying to revert to whenever my back is turned. I can only apologise to the poor little alpines and other delicate plant souls who have been left to fend for themselves among the school bullies of Crocosmia, foxgloves, Welsh poppies and periwinkle that dominate (not to mention the willow herb, brambles, nettles, sticky willie, buttercups and dandelions that snake in from the untended edges).

My main goal this week was ‘find the back of the fruitcage’ (and ideally, get out alive). I’m not going to lie, I was somewhat putting off this task as the raspberry canes in there grew larger and larger, encroaching into most of the space and threatening to go on the rampage elsewhere (top tip to newbie gardeners: do not put commercial raspberries in a patch of ground where wild raspberries had long been established as you will never work out which are weeds and which are not and besides they may well just gang up on you and your wimpish blueberry bushes and take over the entire top end of the garden).

Also there was plenty of other weeding to be done, and I suspect always will be, so it took me a little while to get to the fruit cage itself, but when I did, I was at least rewarded by some actual raspberries, as well as just the start of an epic crop of redcurrants from a bush that doesn’t seem to mind being all but overwhelmed by the thugs around it, unlike the blueberries which did not like the dry spell At All and have gone into a bit of a sulk about it.

The rest of the garden is similarly swings and roundabouts. Some bits work, from some angles, at some points of the year, and some are just, well, wildlife habitats, and I think we can agree that’s a good thing. But I’m realising that gardening, at least the way I do it, is a bit like knitting and amateur choirs – the value of any end result is far outweighed by the enjoyment of the doer in the process of getting there. As long as I choose the angle of view carefully and squint a bit I can enjoy whichever bits are currently looking garden-like, and for the rest of the time I can enjoy the fact that there will always be gardening to do should I ever find myself at a loose end.