I am sure that I don't need to remind anyone that May has been rather wet and windy. I welcomed the change when it came, that period of dry weather in early spring played havoc with my new plantings. The lushness of the past weeks has also made gardening a bit of a challenge. All newly planted areas are prone to weed growth and I have spent a good deal of time on my knees weeding by hand. I can't use a herbicide amongst close planting even if I wanted to and I can see the prospect of a summer with me communing with nature in a horizontal position looming ahead.

This damp warm weather has made perfect conditions for repairing and improving lawns. Areas I seeded and had turfed last year had several quite poor sections, which were verging on baldness. A raking, an aerating with a fork, a dressing with John Innes No 3, a seeding and a light brushing in with a beesom broom did the trick and everything looks good. On these same lawns I did something, which I had never done before which was to apply fertiliser and weed killer. I bought one of those things on wheels and after a while quite enjoyed staggering up and down spreading good cheer. Halfway through I looked closely at the markings on the contraption and discovered that I had not been aligning the tiny arrows with the wheel marks on the grass. I thought I would get away with it but no, a week or so later I could see wide strips of green grass with small strips of yellow stunted grass in between, it looked like a giant flattened marrow. I went over the yellow strips recently and so now will probably have bottle green stripes with apple green stripes as a contrast. I always seem to go at anything new like a bull in a china shop is this a sign of youth or weary middle age?

Daisy, the jack russell has been off her food for about a week. Turns her nose up at chicken, cheese and bacon. I was told by our resident builders that she has been seen with a furry creature (not a bunny) in her mouth so perhaps she has found a branch of Nature's Takeaway somewhere nearby. One minute she is as fat as a barrel and the following week she is all skin and bone, I do hope she has not contacted one of those teenage eating disorders. Whatever it is I shall maintain my policy of benign indifference and hope she sorts herself out.

The greenhouses are full to bursting and when I return from my usual week away at the Suffolk coast I shall start planting out. I have not even thought about planting schemes as everything depends on what has survived and is looking good on the day. When I have time off the plants are left to their own devices and I have to beg and plead that someone from the farm or shoot will spare the time to water, it's touch and go, some areas are drowning when I return and others are in the middle of a drought. I say nothing and am grateful, if I was asked to hatch eggs or plough in return there would be tears before bedtime.

Last weekend I had the tree surgeons in to cut down a mature ash tree, which had been severely damaged last winter, I had asked them to come in January but a four months wait is not bad in these parts. They did a great job and so I turned round to view the scene and saw that a huge and important elm had failed to come into leaf and so had finally succumbed to elm disease. Why did I not see this last week............I need a holiday!