Bailey greets our new Education Officer

On Friday I met our new Education Officer, Alison Couch (rhymes with pooch!).
Alison now works 2 days a week at Stone Lane Gardens, thanks to the genorous support of The Ernest Cook Trust. She is responsible for enhancing our Education Programme, as one of our charitable aims is to educate the public about our important work here, both in the sciences and the arts.
We hope to encourage many more schools to visit the Gardens, which I am really looking forward to - as the children all think I'm CUTE !!!

When the going gets tough...

Whew ! It's been hot at the garden this afternoon. Dad and son Rowan have been toiling away digging up weeds from a particularly muddy, boggy bit of the garden. It looked like hard work so I slunk away to this soft, cool mossy bed. Well, honestly, gardens were made to be enjoyed, weren't they !
Keep up the good work , you two. No slacking.

Rare birch !

Well this is really exciting! Beleive it or not, these tiny plants are a very rare birch tree from Georgia in the Caucasus mountains. (Look it up, you heathens!).

Dad was out in Georgia last year looking for them, and he brought back seed to germinate.
Well, now it has germinated and as you can see the little fellahs are just getting going. At this point they can be teased out of the compost and put into individual pots to grow bigger. It is a very delicate operation but Dad has a lot of experience at this.
Because these trees are rare, they will be carefully grown into bigger plants that we will give to other collections and botanic gardens around the UK.
If you want to know more about this important bit of conservation work we are involved with see here.

An 'Arty' day at Stone Lane Gardens

Yesterday was a lovely sunny day at the garden. We were holding an art workshop on how to illustrate a Nature Diary. All the ladies who attended said they had a very enjoyable day. The artist tutor Jennie Hale really got everybody stuck into sketching and watercolours. The photo shows me modelling in the garden.....is this my best side?...would you like me to arch my eyebrows?...

Rabbit proof fence...

Dad's been watching too many Australian movies...
Anyway, here is our new nursery fence. Ta-dah !!

We got fed up with the rabbits getting into the nursery enclosure and eating the trees. They took the tops right off some of the trees. And they definitely had a preference for the birch species that have wintergreen (Methyl salicylate) in the bark. That is why we didnt sell any Betula insignis last year!

Believe it or not the rabbits were able to climb the new 4 foot vertical fence, so we had to include an overhang on the top......although Dad was all for wiring it up to the mains !

So the trees will be much happier this year. I like happy trees !

Grafting

Ok Dad......and roll.....well here I am in our propagation area. Today I am checking the grafting that we did earlier...and here's one we did earlier!
Grafting is a kind of surgery for trees. It means you can grow one tree by ataching it to another tree. In this case we have taken a small twig from a special tree that we want to grow more of. We stick this twig against the bark of another tree.
If we do this right, then the twig grows onto the other tree and the two become one tree. Then we can let it grow into a big tree.
It's a bit more technical than that, but that's the basic idea.
This graft has worked, because the twig is starting to grow a new stem and this is a good sign. This means the twig has joined to the other tree and water and nutrients can travel between the two parts.
Daddy is very clever isn't he. I couldn't do this because my paws aren't able to hold a sharp knife!

Well that's torn it !

As you can see, I am in our poly-tunnel. It's been repaired several times, but this last storm has ripped the cover right open. It was really blowing a gale, you could hardly stand up (even on four legs).
Small dogs were advised not to go out.
Our baby trees will get cold if there is a frost. I need to think of a plan, fast !!!