Wrong Impression?

I think my last post has given completely the wrong impression and shown nowhere near the extent of my problem.

You see, the first three or four days we were here it was cold, wet and windy - no good for fairweather gardeners. The next week Kate and her three young children stayed with us and spending time with them was the priority. And now...time has passed, the weeds have grown incredibly and it isn't just a few borders....

It's bigger than I led you to believe - the whole area is three acres plus.

Here are a few pictures.


We mow a large part of this wooded area with a ride on mower so that's not too bad although time consuming but there are still lots of wild thickety parts like this




Then there's this section at the top that I thought would make a nice wild flower patch so for three years running I've scattered packets of seeds, and also planted little pots of established wild flowers with no success.


And only grass and a few big daisies grow here but we can't dig it yet because it's where the orchids will appear in a few weeks.

Then the lawn in my last post...I agree, the celandines are lovely and under the fig tree it doesn't matter because that will be deep shade in two months time. But beneath the celandines are (were) hundreds of tiny cyclamen and I *really* love (loved)these but will they live alongside the celandines? I don't know but I can't weed kill them. And there's this other large patch of cyclamen where massive cow parsley/wild carrot plants are competing.


I've tried several years running to hand weed the unwanted plants but they regrow with renewed vigour and worse, are spreading everywhere. The next time we come they are likely to be waist high.

This is where the Canterbury Bells grow.


And the nettle patch. These tiny nettles that I think you can just see will be enormous in a few weeks time and covered in black caterpillars that feed and feed and then turn into beautiful Peacock butterflies.


And of course the butterflies love the buddleias that survive despite the weeds.


We're going home in a few days so I don't have much time left and the roofer and plasterer are both coming later today so I need to brush up on a few words before I can continue in the garden.