In Bed With 'Flu

Although I'm full of 'flu, and Liz is still fatigued from her bout at the start of the week, we were back in the fruit garden cutting beds for the gooseberries and blueberries. Neither is complete (we're probably about 35% of the way there), but both are at least started. My turf-cutting technique is improving (just as well, given the number of new beds we're going to wind up creating---there were only three when we arrived, in half an acre), but it's still hard work. We wanted to make the most of a dry day: the weather's expected to breakdown considerably over tonight, and we don't know how many more we'll have before the plants arrive.

Some of our spring bulbs have arrived, too: Scilla siberica (quite like bluebells), Allium sphaerocephalon (purple globe alliums), mixed crocuses and hyacinths. Together with a big bag of mixed narcissi, they'll be going first under the main copse (in the bottom left, or south-east corner). When we have time to plant them, that is. I think it'd be better to do them all at once: if we do them in phases, we risk damaging the earlier ones in planting subsequent sets.

On the topic of bulbs, the gladioli need sorting out before very much longer. Most didn't flower, on account of late planting and moving up the country: I think we'll need to cut those that did, and cut off the immature flower stems of the others, to provoke their leaves into ripening so we can lift them for the winter. It's going to get colder this week, so we probably ought to do that soon.