GINA PARKINSON gathers leaves, moves compost with a little help and plants bulbs donated by her mother.

THE mild weather this November has allowed plenty of catching up in our garden. Last weekend saw compost moving, leaf sweeping and bulb planting all tackled and completed.

My mum is a great one for donating bulbs and plants to the cause of filling our garden, and a couple of dozen of tulips from her had been waiting to be put to bed for some time.

After a morning of domestic tasks and an emergency visit to the vet with a poorly cat, I was ready to escape to the garden. Booted and gloved, I went outside to prepare the pots ready for the tulip burial.

The garden is so wet underfoot in November that potting up bulbs in the relative dry of the gravelled area at the back of the house was a pleasure; the tulips were soon safely nestled in their new home.

There are a few of these plants out in the garden that pop up each spring, but I love to have them by the house where we can watch their journey to full bloom.

The misty appearance of the garden last Saturday suggested a chilly time outside, but it was strangely mild. This continued the next day when it was a little brighter and no coats or hats were needed to keep us warm.

The list of jobs was longer and my husband was drafted in to help with turning and moving the compost and raking up leaves from the lawns that wend their way between the flowerbeds.

The composting area is divided into three, giving one section with rotted compost ready for use, one ‘cooking’ under a layer of old carpet and one being filled with kitchen and garden waste.

This is the ideal as preached by Monty Don and co, but in reality things rarely work this way. In our garden one bit was stolen for a leaf bin last autumn, the ‘fresh’ section was piled up to its limit and the ready to use compost was sharing its home with fallen foliage collected over the past few weeks.

It needed to be sorted out.

It’s funny how an apparently simple task generates many more, all of which need to be done before the initial job can be started.

If the compost area was going to be moved around, then why not clear the remains of the runner beans, sweetcorn and blackened dahlias first? They can then be put into the compost mix to give good start to their rotting process.

Then the old carpet covering the cooked compost that was ready to be put on the veg patch could be used to smother the weeds elsewhere in the area. They are growing so much in this mild weather. And really the dahlia tubers need to be dug up before I forget where they are and we get a really cold winter and they all die.

We needed a plan. First to go were the old leaves and three year old compost, both piled on to an emptied vegetable bed. At this time of year it doesn’t need to be dug in. The remains of this year’s harvest were cleared, stems chopped and put into the now emptied leaf bin and the current waste was piled on top.

This movement between bins is a good way of mixing and aerating the stuff although a few nesting frogs were disturbed. They will soon make their way back and have a good place in which to bury themselves.

The leaves being collected this autumn now have a bin to themselves and after raking the lawn and sweeping the front garden it is well on the way to being full. And we have a completely empty area waiting to be used when needed. So the cycle begins again.

 

Lawn and order

THE weather dictates how much can be done on the lawn in late autumn, but it is still possible to give it a cut this month.

Set the mower blades higher than for a summer trim and choose the driest time of day, because dew can be heavy at this time of year.

This cut can be dual purpose as any fallen leaves will also be picked up and the whole mix can be put into the leaf bin.

The only problem is the mower’s grass collector fills in no time and the constant emptying gets irritating. It can be easier to rake the leaves first then give the lawn a quick cut if necessary.

Especially if a beautiful assistant is on hand.

My husband is a demon with the lawn rake and got up quantities of moss alongside the leaves. Not strictly a November job, the best time is early September, but since the lawn is still growing, the side shoots and runners that are stimulated by raking in autumn will hopefully still have a chance to develop before winter sets in.

Garden TV and radio

Tomorrow

6.15am, BBC2, Glorious Gardens from Above.

8am, BBC Radio Humberside, The Great Outdoors. With Blair Jacobs and Doug Stewart.

8.15am, BBC2, Glorious Garden from Above.

9am, Radio York, Steve Bailey. Steve bailey steps in for Julia Lewis to bring gardening news and features from around North Yorkshire.

9am, BBC Radio Leeds, Tim Crowther and Joe Maiden.

2pm, BBC R4, Gardeners’ Question Time. Gardeners from Norwich seek advice from the horticultural experts.

Monday to Friday

3.40pm, BBC1, Glorious Gardens from Above. Christine Walkden takes to the skies in a hot air balloon to visit gardens around the UK. This week she visits Cumbria, Staffordshire, Norfolk, Hampshire and Aberdeenshire.

Friday

3pm, BBC R4, Gardeners’ Question Time. From North Wales with chairman Eric Robson and panellists Bob Flowerdew, Anne Swithinbank and Toby Buckland.