Nothing but blue skies……With high pressure over Scandinavia and the jet stream well to the south the northerly air flow has turned the islands into a frigid riviera. Long sunny days and balmy temperatures of 5°C, which in the lightest wind become a chilly 1°C, are perfect for brisk walks along the beach but hopeless […]
Croft Gardener
Wordless Wednesday – Waiting for a Sunbird
From Devil’s Matchsticks to Powderhorns
Year of Natural Scotland – Lichens in Miniature Is it a plant? An animal?No it’s a fungus, well actually it is a lichen, a compound organism comprising a fungus, an alga and sometimes a cyanobacterium. They co-exist in a mutually beneficial partnership: the algae and/or cyanobacteria are protected from the environment by the fungal body, […]
Right plant in the right place
Anyone who gardens on the coast or on a wind swept hillside will understand the shelter belt catch-22 – how can I establish a shelter belt when the plants need a shelter belt to get established? The obvious answer is to protect the plants with a physical wind break, which is feasible if the prevailing […]
International Women’s Day – In Praise of the Cultivators
This posts celebrates all the women who garden, grow food for their families, flowers to delight us and make ours a green and pleasant land. To all the ladies who toil in adversity, never give up and who will never receive accolades for their triumphs other than a smile, I salute you. “God made rainy […]