Monday 31 October 2022

October


 I write this on the day the clocks have gone back by an hour. Light for working in the churchyard will naturally be less with the shorter days but we will gain some light as the trees shed their leaves this Autumn and this will be a major part of our November work sweeping and keeping the paths through the churchyard clear. Despite rainy days this month has been good, work has continued clearing away and planting up, most of the areas between the gravestones in the lower churchyard are choked with grass which leaves little scope for anything to grow. Carefully clearing these areas is a painstaking job carefully saving bulbs and other plants, where there are no flowering plants we will be filling in with varieties that will spread and flower. The first picture is one such area carefully cleared and planted up with several Geum variety Banana Daiquiri. On the far side to the right of the main or West door grass on the bank has been raked to remove accumulated thatch, and expose the soil. Yellow Rattle seeds have been sown which will hopefully germinate and spread providing a source of pollen. Yellow Rattle is parasitic on grass roots so hopefully it will establish. 


Sunday 2 October 2022

Bug Hotel

Earlier this year in line with our objective of creating habitats for wildlife we decided to identify a suitable site and build a bug hotel. Fortunately there is plenty of information out there to help in designing and building a suitable structure. Some features we wanted to incorporate were a structure of reasonable size and also a green roof to be planted with Sedums. We collected pallets that were surplus and destined for recycling all of the same size and old bricks for spacing. Uprights were added to the corners for stability and a tray with lining and drainage to form the roof. Finally it was filled with various materials to create nooks and crannies for insects to crawl into. As a finishing touch one of our team painted and added a panel on the front depicting various insects.