I’m just going to gloss over the fact that I haven’t managed to write a post in well over a month. On the flip-side everyone has been commenting on how organised for Christmas I was. All the decorations were up early, the Christmas cards were written out, ready to post, fairy lights were up about the house, the annual newsletter was penned and printed, the Christmas cake was cooked to perfection and the “tasting sample” was a hit. Suffice to say that in order to get all of this done, I took my eye off the blog for a short while.
Not that there was much I could have done in the garden anyway. We recently came out of a period of several weeks of sub-zero temperatures, certainly at night and usually during the day too. We had a short spell of light snow too.
It’s very unusual for us to get frosts this side of winter. They normally come in from late January. To have a sustained period of frosts with daytime temperatures struggling to reach above zero is exceptional.
Cold weather is needed to deal with a build up of pests and to send fruit trees into dormancy. With this recently-passed frosty period, I’m expecting a bumper crop of fruit as well as reduced problems from problem pests – having said that – one of first things I did when I went to check the greenhouse was to squash a mosquito that fancied my blood for a hot snack.
The cold frost put an end to what was left of the annuals but we still have continued flowering with the winter honeysuckle and cyclamen. Christmas Box and Wintersweet will be out very shortly too. The snowdrops will come after those and so the cycle continues.
While the frost is very damaging, it is also very pretty so I put on several layers one day to brave the cold, and stepped outside to take some wintry photos of the garden in what is probably its quietest time of year.
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