Have loppers will slaughter

Well I never thought I had it in me: I’m hunting plants. With a vicious determination and a huge pair of loppers.   Verbascums. My dread plant.   I was strimming up on the top terrace this morning and innocently lopped the head off one that had flowered.

What followed was the most unladylike coughing and spluttering and hacking and swearing. I do so loathe being allergic to some plants.

So now that I’ve done my strimming (olive garden underneath the plums, first terrace above the gite, bits of paths and other scruffy areas), I’m off to hunt the plants on the lower terraces.

And I have the thistles in my sights as well. Bumper crop this year. Way too many. The insects love them of course, but now that they have reached invasion proportions I have to exercise some sort of control.

Hours later I feel I’m ‘done’ for the terraces. Five terraces mown (mowed?) in just under three hours. Lovely.   They look like nothing in the pictures, but every flat surface is now devoid of thistles, nettles, brambles, vinca, inappropriate wild flowers and overgrown grass.   The bottom terrace is now a dream to mow as the chestnut trees have been lopped.

I was pleased to see that I have fruit on the two surviving apples trees.  Â  (The ancient variety Court Pendu Plat turned up its toes in the first year.) They survive on neglect, and luckily have put their roots down deep enough to keep going. I am ashamed to say I didn’t even water them during the drought.

The middle terraces are always playful as you have to haul the heavy mower up a steep slope to access them.   Naturally I need to strim the verticals, but that can wait. I ache.

And while all this was being done on the lower terraces, Nicolas was hard at work turning the pile of stones outside the living room door into a wall.   These were the stones that came out of the fireplace that we have just transformed.   So what do you do with stones around here?  Why you build a wall.

The object of repair was the wall above the water troughs. I have just had a rummage in the archive and have found a picture of the wall in 2007.   Lots missing.   And in fact Nicolas thinks that the very stones that were taken away here probably went into the fireplace over 25 years ago.   They are of similar sharp edges.   I have to take his word for it.   He’s the poor one who has to spend his days building these things.

So it doesn’t look like much but the whole right hand side has been built back up.   And then we had to decide what to do wih the rest of the stones.   The whole area is a bit too unstable to be building a dry stone wall all the way up the steps.

So instead, he built up the wall behind it, and made a rock platform. A perfect place to perch a dramatic pot with plants.   That’s a way off.   But it is a great idea.   One day I can see that these steps will have a descending row of pots with interesting plants all summer; mainly to disguise the terribly wonky shape of the steps.   We aren’t going to rebuild them, as we now use the indoor staircase.   So when in doubt, hide all sins with plants.

Right now I’m just going to admire the weed free and beautifully neat stones.

Other achievements in the gloaming after the heavy toil? I potted on the two little gooseberry bushes that Teo propagated.   I’ve never grown this fruit before and I think I know why. Ouch.   The thorns, even on this teensy plant can hurt.   I’ll have to think hard about where I plant them when they grow up.   Right now they need a season in a few different sized pots.