The meadow, wild garden and woods 2017.

 Looking across the small pond and meadow to the beehives, July 5th.

The honeybees (treatment-free / natural bee-keeping) continue to thrive. Here they are swarming on May 7th. They are in clear view from the kitchen window so even if I am indoors it's easy to see when they swarm.

Looking a little closer at the meadow, July 5th.

 Native orchid in the meadow June 16th.

 Ragged Robin in a damp part of the meadow June 16th.

Eucryphia, August 5th. If I named plants I would call this "The heaven for bees tree"!

This summer I realised that a branch on the weeping willow, planted about 17 years ago, had grown enough to hold a swing! August 5th.

Down near the big pond.

The meadow, August 5th.

Alfie collecting branches from summer pruning, August 13th.

Angus and Alfie raking...

...the hay from the meadow.

Alfie.

 September 13th.

Non-native Sika deer. Trouble for trees. Endearing. Brazen...   September 21st.

The view from the house... Sometimes.

Taxodium distichum November 8th.

September 29th. The fairy door we put by the tree, the toadstools grew!

Pond garden spring 2017.

Our regular visitor, he is a non-native sika deer, doesn't do too much damage but he tests my degree of non-attachment and loving kindness! He likes to rub his antlers on the bark of young trees, removing their bark. This stunts the trees severely and sometimes kills them. He also breaks branches when eating leaves, but mostly it is the young shoots in spring that he eats and the trees can recover from this.

Perhaps he thinks he is invisible standing behind the apple tree and although he will run off when we come near, he is surprisingly brazen.

 Magpie pecking at his antlers. He is not just one, Tivon counted 8 Sika Deer in the next field and I expect there are not just 8 either.

Sarcoscypha coccinea, the scarlet elf cup, scores of these carpeted a damp area near the big pond.

Frost on the bank of the big pond... and reflections.

Reflection of oak.

Cornus reflected in the big pond on a frosty morning.

February Reflections in the big pond.
(No the photo isn't upside down!).

Growing near the big pond... Salix chaenomeloides "Mt Aso".

Chimonanthus, wintersweet.

Trillium.

Erythronium.

Fresh new growth of Schefflera brevipedunculata.

  Equisetum arvense, Horsetail was growing in the garden before it even was a garden. Many, if not most, gardeners consider it to be terrible weed but we have been living with it in harmony for almost 20 years, this is a plant that I respect!

 ...Isn't it handsome!

 Darmera peltata.

Magnolia Rostrata.

Native Primrose.

 Tivons turkey and one of the hens on the meadow with primroses.

A hail shower on 25th April.

Woodland edge and ponds 2016.

The big pond, March 26th.

The big pond, April 27th.

The big pond in a dry summer, August 11th.

 The big pond in a dry autumn, October 27th.

Over the last Several weeks we have been coppicing willow branches at the big pond, followed by days of shredding and spreading the chippings on the paths in the vegetable patch. November 29th.

A Sika deer buck has been frequenting the garden, October 9th.

View from the table in the house, The (non-native) deer is eating the seeds from the native yellow flag iris, October 9th.

He likes the garden! November 9th.

Woodland edge May 22nd.

Woodland edge, May 24th.

 

Woodland edge, Rose in foreground, July 12th.

Woodland edge, Mallow in foreground, July 12th.

Alfie now likes to take flower photos too, down at the big pond, August 11th.

Rheum Palmatum at the small pond May 22nd, by July it was looking decidedly dog-eared, but to everything a season.

 Meadow sweet naturalized  in the meadow, July 12th.

Viburnum. Yew, Oak, at the big pond, May 22nd.

 Liquidambar at the big pond. December 12th.

 Over the bridge at the stream are rough steps that go over an earth bank, December 12th. 

The heron is often at the pond but here he/she is perched on the roof of the house! October 6th.

Blackbird feasting on crab apple, Malus Golden Hornet, December 4th.

Crab apple December 12th.