Spring Spawning.

Today work commenced in the garden, it had started out  mild and sunny, the perfect opportunity to prepare the ground for the first plantings of potatoes, however by one o'clock it clouded over and the rain started, so we decided we would go to a garden center that we had been told were selling bare rooted hedging plants at a reasonable price.
We particularly wanted Ribes sanguineum, the  flowering currant, bees love the flowers of this plant and it blooms very early, however the garden center had sold out . We ended up buying ten Silver Birch which is a lovely tree. Bare-rooted but a good four feet high they should establish well.
On our way home we popped into friends to deliver a pot of Lemon Curd as a thank you for all the veg seeds they had given us on our last visit. We always enjoy seeing these people, both are very knowledgeable on gardening and many other things, including world matters so we always end up having a good old chin wag and lots of laughter! It's lovely to see how their garden is progressing, they have only been in their cottage just over a year but already the garden is taking on real form and not the over grown wilderness it was just a year back.
They also inherited a pond from the previous owners, again this was very overgrown but  they did a good clear out of over grown pond weeds, many of which we have cuttings of for our pond. With the clearance it has given the wild life a real chance.

Two happy Newts.

I have never seen so many Newts! The pond is teaming with them.

What a cutie, will he turn into a prince?

                             Also frogs,

who have very stupidly decided to spawn there, the Newts must think they have their own takeaway.

Takeaway for Newts.

Some of the frog spawn might survive, but most will end up as ready meals for the Newts.
Once again we came away laden with plant cuttings and rooted bushes, there are still places that are over grown, plus this time a jar of frog spawn for our pond. Hopefully this spawn will develop and not get eaten by any predictors. Although our pond is well established now, so far no frogs  have taken up residence.
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The Pork Gammon piece that we cured for Gammon steaks turned out well, they look as they should but we have still to try them. Hopefully they will taste as good as they look.