dwarf pines

I acquired two more pines for the garden; a Japanese white pine called Negishi and a mountain pine called Benjamin. Both are dwarves.

Pinus parviflora Negishi

Pinus mugo Benjamin

swallows

A pair of swallows nested in the water pump shed in April, and successfully reared some young.

Family of Swallows.

Also I found this interesting story about swallows; http://photo.net/photodb/photo?photo_id=2315290

perennials in bloom

Here'e a few perennials I like from the glasshouse that might find their way into the garden at some stage....

Echinacea Pow Wow Wild Berry

Erigeron Sea Breeze

Osteospernum Tresco Purple

Leucanthemum 

bumblebees

Working in the glasshouse I was in the company several industrious bumblebees busy doing what they do best...

feeding on some flowering thyme

on a dahlia

approaching a lupin

young trees

I have brought home some more plants, including some Birch taken from my father's driveway as weeds, potted on to 9cm pots for a season and then potted, three to a pot and pinched out, in April. I hope these will make bushy multi-stems

I also have some Hazel which were nuts taken from some bushes, which in turn were grown from nuts themselves several years back. 

A few Castenea sown from Christmas chestnuts last January grew well although the exact variety is unknown to me as they were labelled 'Produced in China'. I'm sceptical as to whether they will thrive with me, but time will tell...
I also have a few basic Japanese Maple varieties.

some new plants including birch and maple

hazel, birch and sweetchestnut

some work done

At last I had a chance to give a couple of days to the garden. My main aim was to install some land drainage pipes and to develop some paths. A 3 ton mini-digger was employed to do the donkey work. After a good days work on Monday, it promptly lost a track on Tuesday at 10am, to be replaced eventaully at 4pm later in the day. Very frustrating to lose such a chunk of time... Anyway, made the best of it and it was good to finally start to define some shapes in the garden. And I began to connect the water feature to the garden and I have a clearer image of how the next phase will look like.

20 tons of 2" crushed stone

I'm using 3" land drainage pipe in 2-3" coarse crushed stone

machines are great when they work

looking across what will be a lawn