PECKING ORDER. As with humans you need to pitch your food offer right to attract particular avian custom. Putting sunflower seeds on the menu alongside peanuts and fat balls has attracted goldfinch, siskin and greenfinch to join our café regulars of tits, robin, dunnock and blackbird. Greenfinch is something of a threatened species due to their susceptibility to trichomonosis, a parasite induced disease that prevents them feeding properly. Our birds hog the food and brook no fellow diners. The stout beak and dark band across the eyes add to their suitably fearless appearance. Away from the feeding area I watch our resident clan of blue tits pairing off to go about their courtship displays, alternately leaping up and down in the air from a branch followed by an exuberant chase, repeated many times. Truly the joys of Spring.
FLUSH WITH SUCCESS. Every five years or so our septic tank at the bottom of the garden needs to be emptied. Jim, our contractor’s gentle giant of a tanker driver, uncurls the suction pipes, links the sections, shifts the concrete slabs that cover the deep lined pit and drops the end in. Engine on and within minutes the load is extracted and will be driven off to the nearest sewage treatment works. We need to replace some of our concrete cover slabs as a few have cracked. Until I’d cleared it for the operation five years of creeping vegetation in the copse had effectively hid the subterranean tank from view.
FIRST AID. Re-staking a young apple tree I inadvertently scarred the trunk with the post banger I was using. To avoid infection I gathered moss from the lawn, sealed and secured in a plastic shower cap, then duck taped round the trunk. Hopefully the damp and mildly antiseptic cleanser will help the tree heal naturally over the year to come.
CUT AND COVER. This month we’ve been clipping with sheers the overwintering dried stalks of perenniels like broad-leaved bellflower. The pieces provide a crude mulch for the bank as they fall. Some long stalks I retain to cut, trim and bind in bunches. The hollow stems will make for ideal ‘bee hotels’ when placed in nooks and crannies round the garden.
DISTANT DRUMS. Loud noises off in our rural neighbourhood might be caused by firings at one of the area’s quarries or activity on the military’s vast training grounds to the north, on the moors. Soft repetitive thuds or echoing retorts have been superceded by louder and more resonant booms in recent weeks. In conversation with folk I hear that Ukrainian armed forces are being trained to use heavy artillery up there. In scattered communities even closer to the firing grounds vibrations and noise levels are severely impacting householders but given the war context they duly bear with the disruption.
ATTIC CAPERS. Our builder Gordon is back to replace the decaying coroline roof of the workshop/garage with a new galvanised green metal one. That means we need to sort the accumulated circus of stuff stored in the outbuilding’s mezzanine loft. In the process we discover that big oil paintings of landscapes have been cannibalised by mice to make their nests. Lots of mouldy old frames, glass and mounts detached and broken up, ready for a trip to the tip, alongside carpet remnants, pin boards, dead electrical equipment, assorted plastics etc. Best quality prints or drawings that can be reframed are retained but most, sadly, we just have to let go.
POND PREP. Spring’s the best time to create a new pond. I’ve surface cleared a level patch some 2 x 3 metres, close to the existing pond at the bottom of the garden. Fun and games assessing how much butyl like liner needed. (Measure length, breadth, depth and add extra for edging). My earlier order got lost at the manufacturers. A helpful phone call got things sorted and now the big heavy roll of EPDM liner lies on the deck outside in front of me as I write, prompting action! Below the topsoil there’s serious clay so it won’t be an easy dig and I await a spell of good weather to begin my labours.
CRIME TIME. I was invited by a local WI branch to reprise a reading given last year in the village’s Town hall of an entertaining crime story, My Oleander, by Kate Ellis. The welcoming members were an appreciative listening audience in the intimate setting of the small village hall where they hold their meetings. They treated us afterwards to a delicious home made Jacobs Join of a supper, with lots of great conversation. Interactions like this that make my heart sing and remind me why I wanted to be an entertainer in the first place and why this is such a good place to live. Great to have Kim with me too, as she caught up with some of the women known from her own farming days here in the valley.
ON THE WING. As the days lengthen and the earth comes slowly back to life the emergence of different life forms continues to surprise. Like drifts of snowdrops, which are always a joy to witness spreading to new locations year on year. When shifting logs in the store I inadvertently disturbed a butterfly that has been overwintering there. A brief open wing moment revealed it to be a peacock. It soon closed up its wings though and hopefully will settle back in its shelter until the true time comes to emerge and fly.
VALENTINE PRINT. Every year the Rheged Visitor Centre off the A66 outside Penrith hosts a print exhibition where some sixty artists work is on display in their extensive gallery space. Part of the Tebay Services family, Rheged has a cinema, shops, café and an adjacent service station. It’s recently had a make over and emerges an even more attractive and welcome visitor facility at the gateway to the north lakes. It’s rare for Kim and I to agree which print in an exhibition is our favourite so when we do (and it’s in the wake of Valentine’s day) then we dive in and buy it. Here’s a detail of ‘Bluebells in a Wood’ by Kent based print maker Sue Scullard. (Print size: 4’ x 5.5’)
STEPHEN TOMLIN 