Gardener's diary

With some help all the roses have been dug over, moats created and filled with a handful of fertilizer, potting soil and my own homegrown compost.  I could not resist having another ‘go’ at the bushes with my cutting shears – taking off more errant shoots and old wood.

My compost heap is a source of great pride. I devote kitchen organic waste to it, veggie and fruit peels mainly, and all the garden cuttings. I occasionally add a bag or two of bone meal and keep it damp. When we extracted compost from the heap last week, it was alive with earthworms. Understandably the Heuglin's robins were the first to visit the rosebeds followed by the orange thrushes.

Bags of leaves waiting for the current compost to be harvested and the new one to be begun.