Daily Archives: May 21, 2023

Dada gardening

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Tired of slugs and snails decimating tender stuff in the garden we thought of a daft idea, we wired a pot of Basil atop the weird hand-made hat stand we found in the street a few years ago and going to see how it work. We even stuck an old jam jar over it to give it a bit more warmth in the night. We’re not sure if it will deter slugs or snails and also even if it’s a good idea or not but you have to try sometimes. That’s the hat stand that already has a couple of seed potatoes in some old shopping bags on it. We may even run some climbing beans up it too. A bit unconventional but why not? It’ll make good use of space.

Also the Lemon Verbena in a pot that we thought was a goner is starting to sprout. It was a good thing we didn’t give up on it and threw it in the bin like we were going to. It’s an interesting plant and we got the idea off another Dub Gardener Haji Mike in Cypus a few years ago here after he mentioned it on a Facebook post. It makes a wonderful refreshing tea and there’s lots of recipes online on how you can use it too. Here’s a great tune from Mike from a few years ago.

The time has flew by this year, it’s nearly June and things are starting to crack on in the garden. Can we have more sunshine please?

Take a walk on the wild side

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It’s all gone a bit Johnny Morris over here in SE23 again. We’ve got a Magpie’s nest high up in the Pyrochantha with mum Magpie sitting on the eggs all day and dad on the ponce for food wandering about the garden and coming right up to the back window without a care in the world. We know it’s waiting for the right moment when the back door is left open so it can nick the cat’s food (we haven’t got a case of Hitchcockian bird paranoia as it’s happened before). They ain’t scared of the cats or us humans for that matter and may even be slowly sussing out where we keep the spare door keys as they are that smart here. In this picture below you can just make out the tail feathers of the Magpie in that large nest, it’s crazy stuff.

We had two tweeting Robins yesterday (one of them features in the main picture above) trying to tell us something as they perched very close to us on the fence. We were thinning out some plants in the pond (and leaving them on the side for a bit for any wildlife travellers to hop back in the water). The Robin chat went on for ages and started to get more urgent as afternoon changed into evening. Even though we aren’t that versed in Robinspeak we reckon they were telling us to make sure we put the netting back over the pond when we were finished as they had some information through the bird grapevine something bad was going to happen in the morning.

At 7am today while making a cup of tea the enemy of the garden pond and the Lewisham pet shop goldfish contained therein, the Lewisham Heron was spotted by the pond all still and lifeless. It’s a right old git but you can’t help looking at in wonder as it stands frozen on the spot. The first time we ever spotted it we thought someone had stuck a plastic bird in the garden as a joke. With its size, cockiness and cunning you know it’s got to be the King or Queen in the Lewisham bird world and left alone by the south London Magpies, Pigeons and Parakeets which are all up there in the “You wouldn’t want to be messing with us” birds league table. We once saw it in action “fishing” in the Quaggy in Ladywell Fields, well still yet very skilful when it caught his dinner!

One thing that makes us think every time we see the Heron flap off into the distance of Lewisham Town Centre, is it related to the Pterodactyl from times gone by when the caveman roamed around here?