Sunlight, bees and fun size trees

I've been gardening again. I have to say, my house is suffering a little - the stairs haven't been hoovered in, er, a while. But there's so much to do outside, and when the sun is shining, outdoor chores seem so much more inviting.

Before I show off today's work, though, I saw these two links on my Twitter feed and thought I might share.
This one is about attracting bees to your garden: http://www.bbc.co.uk/nature/17073830 bees are still in big trouble (and so are we, without them), so have a look and find out how to pamper your bees.

This one: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/gardening/howtogrow/9131409/Dont-downsize-your-trees-upsize-a-shrub.html  is about training your shrubs into fun size trees if you have a small garden without room for traditional small trees. I have 18 - oops, 17 now - grown trees in my garden, and I want to try it, anyway. I love the idea of a fuschia tree and a buddleia tree...Plus, butterflies will love you for it.

So today I finished wrestling the last of the rose bushes into burnable piles of twigs. There may have been a lot of very quiet swearing (so as not to upset the people in the sheltered housing behind us - they watch, like Celebrity Squares) and a lot of twisting myself around trying to de-thorn myself (I'm sure my audience appreciated the comedy.)
I'm going to enjoy burning the prickly, evil stuff into oblivion. It's going to be a big fire:


Apologies for the dark photos - I suddenly remembered after tea that I hadn't taken photos, and ran out with my camera into the dark...





I then did for that rhododendron whose life I've been threatening ever since we moved in. I'm going to take the bigger rocks and move them down to make a rockery next to the garage. I'm thinking this new space might be perfect for a living willow dome.

Sunday I brashed this tree, and now it's just waiting for Mark to chainsaw off the larger branches, and then we'll use the trunk to retain the soil  under the fence, and this particular part of the odyssey will be DONE!

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