More bird news

The last four baby swallows ventured out of the nest yesterday, and flew today.



Meanwhile, a baby blue tit took a shower... and was having a great time until a big boy came along, and pushed him out. Is the usurper looking around to see if Mum is going to tell him off?

Swallow Central Update

This is the latest nest, and the five eggs have produced four chicks- at least I can only see four. (You can only see three in these pics) However, the nest is so small that another one might be underneath! Mum and Dad have to sleep on the floor so to speak, or in this case on the end of the ladder which hangs right by their hastily thrown together homestead. As far as I can tell, the whole family crowds into the nest at night, sitting on each other's heads. At least, that is what family no 1 do. It looks like this lot will be ready to fly in a week or so. Watch this space!

The Constance Gardener- and the Michael

We are a three garden family. Other families have several cars, some even have second homes, but us, we have three gardens! We have a big stake in our daughters' gardens: there are many plants in theirs that originated from ours, and we frequently bomb off south to do a bit of a makeover. Having worked recently on the Southern Garden, and the Mid West Garden (in Swindon) we came back to the Northern Garden to find lots of weeds, but also many flowers. Our Garden Goddess, Avril, has done sterling work recently, and we are delighted with our replanted central bed with a mad mix of orange pink and red flowers. It shouldn't work, but it does!

The Southern Garden

The London garden. After a week of solid work, and a lot of luck with the weather, this was the result. A new bed created and one turfed over, a large number of new plants added to give summer colour as well as a tidy up of the existing beds. I am delighted with the result. More photos @ www.flickr.com/photos/amberimages/