I’ve just been turning the compost heap, it’s pretty much the darkest day of the year. I’ve been joined by three bickering robins and a scurrying blackbird. Compost heap turning is a feast for them with all the bugs and worms who themselves are eating the soft plant material in the heap. The Garden is full of wildlife and at this time of year as the bees and butterflies disappear and many birds migrate, we notice the residents that stay around.
This weekend we begin our winter opening hours; this means the Garden will be closed at weekends until the beginning of February 2019. We’ll still be open during week days but on a Saturday and Sunday the gates will be closed. This is a reflective time for us as the plants shut down with the Garden and we look back through the summer when the now leafless trees were all life and energy.
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| By Matt Philpott, Botanic Garden trainee |
| By Nicola ‘Froggie’ Rathbone |
I studied Latin at Secondary school. Not because I wanted to but because I had to at the time. Bam bas bat bamus batis bant. For some reason this has stuck in my head, as has ego sum (I am ) and salve magistra (greetings teacher). I never thought it would be of use to me until I became a gardener. It has been of great help in learning and more about plants and I am going to try and explain why and how you too can discover more about plants. (more…)
