Renovating the hedge

It's been in the back of my mind that I'd prefer a hawthorn hedge to the mixed cotoneaster and privet I've got at the moment (though there is one small bit of hawthorn right by the gate). I was leaving the other day and thought, "Maybe I'll just cut back that bit of privet to give the hawthorn a chance to expand into the gap so I get a bit more hawthorn in the hedge."

I began hacking away at it and it turns out that under all the other hedge plants, there were quite a few hawthorns. I kept going and uncovered an 80% hawthorn hedge.

There's one privet plant left at the far right, with no hawthorn to replace it, so I'm on the lookout for a replacement hawthorn for that wee section. When I was done, there was a lot of debris, which just replaced what I'd burnt the other day. Here's half of what I cut away.

Moving herbs

I've dug over the third bed, which took me a while because I kept finding bulbs. This meant that I had to move the bulbs out of this bed and put them into the flower bed. A place for everything and all that. Actually, this bed must have been a wee garden, becasue of the shrubs and bulbs I'm finding. It also has a few planks and boardwalks under the grass, as well as a tiny pond in one corner. I'd like to keep the pond so I've got frogs to eat all the slugs.

I moved the lavender and buried it as I said in my last post. Here's what it looks like.

There is a bit more sticking out elsewhere in the bed because it was so bushy at the top. Fingers crossed. I may even make a lavender hedge.

I also moved some fennel into the middle of the herb bed. There's another one to come when I excavate the next path.

Plants

There are signs of life in some of the beds. For example, some young rhubarb shoots have poked through.

There are plenty of bulb shoots appearing, though I messed up the photo of this one (or maybe the camera did, who knows?). I've got some pots with bulbs coming as well, which I'm going to plonk around the place come spring.

The next bed I'm going to dig over has a small shrubery in it, containing mostly scabby plants that would be better in a garden. There's quite a small euphorbia that I'm going to get rid of and a fuchsia that I'll put in a pot by the gate come summer (assuming it'll survive the transfer). The green blur in the middle of the photo below is the euphorbia.

There's a very leggy lavender that has got very woody. It has some greenery on it, but it's too far gone to renovate because lavender rarely shoots from older wood.

However, I'm going to drop it into the ground and bury it up to the bottom of those shoots with leaves, which should encourage roots to form high up the plant, so I can then detach portions of leaves plus roots and use them as new plants. This is an extreme form of layering called dropping.

You can see the scabiness clearly in this photo.

Adding a roof

I've finished the roof, though it looks a bit bendy close up at the right-hand side. The shed seems to rise at that end. Here's the long view.

You can see the bend when closer in. The storm also smashed the middle pane of glass and a load of windows I was keeping for a cold frame.

I actually took these photos a couple of days after finishing the roof, which was half blown off after I'd put it on. Luckily I had a spare sheet of plastic and odds and ends I could use to reinforce the damaged sections. Here's the bit I'm most proud of.

There's still a bit to be done. For example, the two sections of roof don't quite meet at the top, so I need a cover to go across the ridge.