Cutting grass?
Week 22 “I cut the grass,” commented a colleague, “I no longer cut the lawn.” My colleague is not only pleasant but appears to be a...
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Green Fingers
May 20, 20238 min read
Think before you deadhead
Week 21 There is little doubting the beauty of daffodils, at least when they are flowering. Yet now, as the flower shrivels and fades, my...
Green Fingers
May 13, 20236 min read
Look after insects
Week 20 “Do you have any orange-tip butterflies?” he asked, as I was showing him around my land. “Not seen any,” I replied, trying to...
Green Fingers
May 6, 20238 min read
Horsetail and slugs in the May dew
Week 19 The war has begun, as a few days ago I saw my first horsetail[i]. I know I will be battling it until September and then it will...
Green Fingers
Apr 29, 20238 min read
Battle of the Bluebells
Week 18 What is it about dandelions[i]? So many hate them and see the dandelion as a weed. They rip them out, regard them as a sign of...
Green Fingers
Apr 22, 202310 min read
Pets can be a problem
Week 17 “What are you looking at?” I asked, as the two birds studied me. A problem of being a renaturer in Lakeland is that you soon...
Green Fingers
Apr 15, 20237 min read
Nature is my boss
Week 16 A delight of my renaturing is that I have no real clue what is happening. Nor I suspect does anyone else, however they may...
Green Fingers
Apr 8, 20237 min read
Moss should be encouraged
Week 15 If I wish to find anyone who is working or visiting my land, and there are plenty of nooks and hiding places, I go to one spot -...
Green Fingers
Apr 1, 20236 min read
Birdsong, frogs, and vertical gardening
Week 14 I am hopeless at many things in life, but a huge failure has been my inability to interpret birdsong. I can recognise most birds,...
Green Fingers
Mar 26, 20238 min read
Biostimulation - my land needs it
Week 13 They call it biostimulation, which is what I am trying to achieve with my land. There is a subtle difference between...
Green Fingers
Mar 19, 20237 min read
Renature and rewild properly
Week 12 After seemingly taking forever, the daffodils are now springing to life, although there are two clumps of tiny daffodils that are...
Green Fingers
Mar 12, 20237 min read
Badgers and disappearing hedgehogs
Week 11 I know that blackbirds[i] are messy creatures and never tidy up after themselves. However, right now my land is looking more than...
Green Fingers
Mar 5, 20237 min read
Ground elder and me
Week 10 “It’s ground elder,” he said. “Aegopodium podagraria[i]. It’s a weed and needs to go. It grows by rhizomes, too.” There were two...
Green Fingers
Feb 26, 20237 min read
Coming alive
Week 9 I am glad I am not a pheasant[i], as the males are hugely territorial. The pheasant breeding season is just around the corner and...
Green Fingers
Feb 19, 20235 min read
Dead hedging is the way forward
Week 8 Tragedy! My song thrush[i] is still missing, for reasons I cannot work out. It may be because a neighbour is hard at work felling...
Green Fingers
Feb 12, 20237 min read
Excited by pigeons
Week 7 I have an idea - a school for messy blackbirds[i]. I am sure it would be oversubscribed, as if there was an award for scruffiness...
Green Fingers
Feb 5, 20237 min read
Trees do have feelings
Week 6 At last the year has truly begun as there are snowdrops[i] everywhere. The wild snowdrop is something of a rarity these days,...
Green Fingers
Jan 29, 20238 min read
Leave the leaves alone
Week 5 I despair. What is it that goes through someone’s mind when they fell a tree? I understand a tree may be diseased, but there is a...
Green Fingers
Jan 22, 20237 min read
An owl has a meaning
Week 4 I am unsure how to react to an owl - whether to be fascinated, excited, or even frightened. Yet I have one somewhere in the trees...
Green Fingers
Jan 15, 20236 min read
First shoots appearing
Week 3 I am very excited, as the first shoots of several plants are beginning to appear. These days I am quite good at recognising...
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