Amellanchier blossom Spring might finally be coming to the Midlife Garden.  Despite the continuing cold, wet, windy weather, there are signs of new life. The seedlings are bursting out of the storage boxes in the greenhouse so I will have to hold them back in case of frost, and in the borders, the plum trees and Amelanchier are in blossom and the apple is just coming on too. The sound of chiffchaffs and blackcaps has joined the symphony of birdsong.  It is a time of renewal and is a reminder of how the garden literally keeps me grounded and in step with the natural order. Last week M ..read more

Billy’s Beetle, by Mick Inkpen, was a favourite bedtime book for our kids when they were young, or perhaps I mean it was a favourite of mine, as reading it out loud was so much fun.  Whether the little ones enjoyed it as much as I did is debatable, but I often think of it still, particularly the character of the “sniffy dog” which its owner claimed would be able to help find the eponymous errant insect. In the Midlife Garden we have our own sniffy dog, in the shape of Badger, the dachshund.  Known formally as Mr Long, he displays the classic dachshund profile of long dog, long nose ..read more

February has been so mild; it feels like spring.  Which it almost is, isn’t it?  But we are not fooled in the Midlife Garden, despite the daffodils coming up weeks ago, wallflowers currently adding splashes of gold in the front border and even the Viburnum Mariessii about to come into flower.  It is still not spring.  OK?  But we are keen to get our annual flowers established in plenty of time for July and the Big Fat Somerset Wedding.  Over the years of the MLG, the trend is for me to be getting flowers to bloom earlier and earlier.  Whether this is due to ..read more

I love my cycle commute to school.  It provides a light workout as well as giving me time to de-tox from the rigours of taming teenagers.  And I have more time to observe the world around me. As I cycled through Lower Hadspen last week, I saw two large birds rising from the road in front of me.  I immediately recognised one as a buzzard and was pleased to see the other was a red kite.  These angular birds of prey are still relatively new to Somerset, having spread their territory down from Wales and the Midlands. I remember the first time I saw one in the county; it was ci ..read more

It has been a week in which reports of the C-bomb have been liberally sprinkled across the news, although the “C” that has affected us most in the Midlife Garden has been C for Ciarán as wind and rain have come on stronger than a Dominic Cummings WhatsApp message.  With flooded roads and schools sending kids home early we expected the weather to create the kind of damage not seen since a Downing Street Lockdown Party; but nature has proved to be a lot more resilient than any SPAD or tousle-haired PM.  The garden survived.  To quote Bill Murray in Ghostbusters “the flowers ..read more

Part of the job of the Midlifegardener is to be a “teacher of future generations”, and this week in English Literature we are taking a look at dystopian fiction. We have a sneak preview of a future (dystopian) edition of Grand Designs, a TV programme which looks at bold, innovative building projects and the people behind them.  In this episode, our brave and intrepid host “Kevin” finds out that while all animals are equal, some (buffalo in particular) are more equal than others as the owner of a large estate aims to create his own Brave New Farming World. Establishing shot:  Kevin wa ..read more

Like Post-Brexit Britain, the Midlife Garden tries to be a tolerant, outward-facing place to which we welcome all-comers. Robins, wrens and blackbirds have nested in various parts of the garden this summer and any number of moths and butterflies, dragonflies and other insects have made their home in our “bee-friendly” environment. We have even seen hares on the lane outside. But, just like the modern UK, there are limits to our hospitality. Upon returing from our brief summer break we discovered major problems with border control. In our absence, a plethora (possibly a tidal wave) of invertebr ..read more

A few weeks ago Mrs B and I were lucky enough to be able to go to Chelsea flower show. A generous birthday present forom friends, this was my first visit to the highlight of the horticultural shows. Our tickets were for Saturday so we had scoured the TV coverage from Monty and friends as they roamed the avenues and spoke in glowing terms about the planting of this or the stonework in that, with the occasional oblique cristicism of water features or colour schemes. So we felt like we knew the gardens already. And yet the reality of them was often in contrast to what even 4K TV conveys, and our ..read more

March, and life is starting to rev up.  January was hard and February not a lot better.  Not because of the weather, although at times it seemed either too wet or too cold, or both.  There just did not seem to be enough light. But now, the evenings are longer, the mornings are bright and the garden is beginning to wake up.  Garden is in its Yellow phase: of daffodils and forsythia, of Cloth of Gold wallflowers and the pale yellowy-green fringing on the trees as they start to test the temperature. The birds seem to have doubled their decibel levels since Sunday’s hour chang ..read more

This week we have managed to get our hands on an advance copy of “Bark” the latest instalment detailing the life of Mr Long: Badger, to his peers, or the Duke of Midlife, to his vassals and many humble fans.  The Duke has been busy these past few months putting together memories of his first years in the Midlife Garden, or the Firm, as he likes to call it. Badger has been reminiscing on the events of the last couple of years, how he has brought joy and love to people’s hearts and been the one true star of the Midlife Garden Family.  But it has not all be plain sailing for the rugged ..read more