Harmlessly staring...

"What is this world if full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare..."

written by William Henry Davies in 1911 and taken from his book 'Songs of Joy and Others' .

With Christmas fast approaching and a time to perhaps think back over the past year,  staring out from the Memory Garden earlier revealed small white flecks on the stems of the Rosemary plants there. They were in flower. These modest little white/mauve flowers  had braved the last few days of cold and gale force winds.

The Memory Garden

 These inconspicuous little flowers are hardly visible until you get up close..

The Rosemary in flower

As you lean in closer  to look at them your clothes brush against the plant and as you walk away you realise that the plant has won. You smell the Rosemary on your coat and your hand! Clever stuff. Nature is like that.

"A poor life this is if full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare"

The poem is called 'Leisure'. Well worth a read in todays computer driven world.

Meanwhile in the pixie encampment things are stirring. They are getting ready for Christmas. They have kept a low profile since the school garden open day back in the Summer but now they are making themselves busy. What mischief awaits!

The pixies have been busy

Done and dusted - or should that be composted!

This morning another 14 bags of horse manure were filled from nearby Martleaves Farm -  for which  we are very grateful - and transported to the school garden. All the class beds have now been treated along with the salad leaf beds in front of the garden HQ and the smaller beds to the right of the HQ.

The salad leaf bed

The garden club small beds

The worm rich manure

Detailed close up of the organic compost

During the afternoon activities a single squirrel was noted on the fence of the WW2 garden. It was probably checking out the edible possibilities of the compost but it will be disappointed!

The fox pays a visit!

Working in the garden over the weekend it became obvious that the fox had made a very recent visit to the garden. He, or she, had  left behind a lot of pheasant feathers by the willow classroom. I have seen and heard pheasants in this part of Weymouth but  the fate of this bird will remain a mystery.  On a more positive note a Red Admiral butterfly was on the wing, a large bumble bee was seen buzzing around and even a very late hoverfly was feeding on one of the bristly-ox-tongue flowers in the WW2 garden.

 There is still no sign of the squirrels. There were some 20 Jackdaws smothering the fatballs this afternoon. It is no wonder that we get through ten to twelve fat balls a day in the bird feeding station,

Some lovely fungi clumps of late in the garden and around the school grounds

Today we started to put some organic compost on the classroom beds. This should be finished within the next day or so. The compost will remain on top of the soil for a week or so to let the weather break it up a little and then it will be dug in.