It’s February, and a perfect time to get the hedges neat and tidy. The weather is somewhat mild and you’ll find some sunny days too.  In Ireland, it is illegal to cut hedges  between March 1st and August 31st as it’s contrary to the Wildlife act.  So this gives us a window of about a month to get all along the property line trimmed.   I have beech hedges (Fagus Sylvatica) which are slow growing.  I like them as the leaves turn brown in the fall, yet stay on the branches until the new leaves appear.  This gives some color (albeit brown!) all through the winter.   I am cutting them down fairly low to get them to spread out sideways.  I’m keeping them below the top of the fence until they are really full.  This is my second year cutting them – they are about 4 years planted (the owners before us planted them, but only lived here for about 2 years).  The 2nd picture is a shot of  what I still have to do.  It’s a work in progress!

We had a glorious day of sunshine today, with temperatures around 9 degrees Celsius.  This was perfect for spreading some horse manure my neighbor had given me just yesterday.  I wouldn’t be an expert on manure, but it was somewhat “aged” and full of wonderful worms for the soil.    We have been working on this one (new) garden for about a year.  It started as all grass, like the rest of the yard.  So I first  put down a load of newspapers to kill the grass. Then I added seaweed on top.  To keep it from blowing away, I added some heavy compost.  In the meantime, boxwood plants went on sale so we bought a bunch of them and planted them around the border.  I am hoping the horse manure will be the final stage before planting.  We did plant some tulip bulbs in here this past fall, but the main intention for this garden is for roses.  I’m hoping to get them this summer.  One step at a time.

It’s February, and in Ireland we thankfully have mild enough weather to get out into the garden (yay!). We moved into our home almost two years ago and we see the garden as a lifetime project. We live in the country with fields all around us, and pretty much love it! Every season is a new adventure as we learn about planting a vegetable garden, starting a compost area, growing fruit trees & plants, and simply creating our garden! I hope you enjoy seeing how things progress!