Damsons in distress

My damson tree's never been that happy, it always gets attacked by aphids which make the leaves curl. This year for the first time I managed to harvest enough damsons (sour plums) to make Damson and Apple Jam. All the books say damsons make the best jam ever - they are SO right. They give the jam a very sharp taste without it being bitter. I only got enough for 4 jars (or was it five?). I'll sort those aphids out next year, I'm not having damsons in distress nay more, they're just too nice!

Giant rhubarb and summer colours

Rhubarb's from behind the compost bin, lens cap included for scale - it gets no fertisers, or any sort of care whatsoever! The white clematis grows on a trellis by the front door and needs frequent cutting back, else I'd not get in nor out the house! Photo taken looking down the hill towards Danestone and Bridge of Don one sunny morning in May.

Garden Planning Tool

Finally, I bought sufficient soil to fill my new raised bed, so today's job was to plant things in it. So as to remember what went in I did my sketch but thought it too plain and dull to go online. A Google search found a nice wee tool from www.growveg.com/ There's a 30 day free trial then it's £15 per year. There's advice on crop rotation, frost alerts etc. Think I'll buy it, seams nice:

Row 1: Radish,
Row 2: Rocket and salad leaves,
Row 3:Spring onions,
Row 4: Dill,
Row 5: Beetroot,
Row 6: White turnip,
Row 7: Oriental raddish.

Some might say rows are boring, but I wanna see if anything gets eaten by beasties - I hope not, but...

Not my tree, but...

it's a nice one: Acer griseum (Paper-bark Maple), Cruikshank botanical gardens (behind Zoo Building) ...my second home. For years I thought it was a kind of Tibetan Cherry, nope - wrong genus and it's from central China. In Pinyin, should you want to speak to Chinese person about the tree or buy one out there, it's xuè pí. Taken with the Nokia N95 on the way into work on Wednesday morning in bright sunshine (nothing lasts does it?)

Yellow flowers

For some reason in full sun I've got to underexpose yellow flowers and then increase exposure slightly in the photo editor else they look totally washed out!

Dark leaved Celandine don't wanna wake up @ 8am


By 11am they're quite happy!

Foggy March Woodside Sunset

Spring's almost here!

Much nicer than dead sticks and boring stuff about pruning huh? Crocii in the front garden, 10th March, 10.30am, sunny, air temp approx. 10.3C :-)!

Pruning the rasps - done!

Raspberry canes

Notice the side branching on the 'before pruning' shot - the height of the canes had already been reduced by 50% in the autumn. A lot of the thin weedy new stems were removed along with some of the old woody ones. The text book way of pruning gave me a wonderful crop of leaves 2 years ago, I'm pretty sure I've repeated what I did last year, which worked a treat ...we'll see!


No it wasn't dark when I'd finished, it rained. Before putting the camera to bed for the night it stopped ...and I thought 'who knows it might work' - yeah, all you see is the subject surrounded by cool blackness - yeah, discovered a new technique for the blog!!!!

Boyz n toyz!

I was after a max-min thermometer for out in the conservatory, but the more you looked the more you could have... Settled for this in the end cos of its clear display. Could have had a French one where a lady takes off more clothes the warmer it gets ...but doubt she'd have taken her hat and scarf off in Aberdeen! It sits in the kitchen above the sink and tells me the temperature in the kitchen, in the conservatory (sensor no.1 - top figure) and records maximum and minimum for each over a 24 hr period. It also gives humidity (which rises rapidly when steaming rice) and a weather forecast ...looks like more rain again tomorrow! With an additional sensor I'll be able to do outdoor temperature too... Would have been a lot more expensive to have one that sends the data to the computer. It gets the time signal from a satellite, and it agrees with my Casio watch - amazing huh, and all for under £30, boyz n toyz eh :-) ?!?

Red sky in the morning...

Noticed a pink / orange glow in the sky whilst in the bathroom (8.30am, Sat) - a bit earlier and it would have been perfect, ach well something to aim for another time.