Winter...

It hasn't been a particularly warm welcome to 2014 from the weather gods.  Our thoughts are with our farming colleagues in Somerset - underwater for weeks now.  At Iford we have had our own challenges to deal with, but not as devastating as theirs.

The river Frome here is very 'flashy' in that it can come up and go back down again in a very short number of hours - this makes it less predictable, but also means that floods tend not to last long - as was the case back in December and again after New Year when we had a couple of fairly deep inundations.  Nothing reached the main house, but the Mill was flooded and of course the pasture which may in time affect our farming (although it might be quite beneficial if the fertility increases. We shall see).

We lost one of the four lime trees in the middle of the garden, weakened (worryingly) by honey fungus, and brought down by gales.

 Here was what was left of the stump.

We lost a Horse Chestnut on the top road to Freshford and this morning we had to bring down a Sycamore and an Ash which had become too weak to support themselves safely.  Recent wind and super-saturation of the soil had meant they were now leaning dangerously on their neighbours. 

Elsewhere the wet weather has meant it has been almost impossible to get any border work done in the garden.  Rob and his gardening team have found plenty of things to do in the greenhouses, repairing paths and such like, but fundamentally we just want to get the plants out in the borders so we have something interesting for April to complement the blossom.

The spring flowers are out in force, and the daffodils even are starting to come out - more on the plants in our next garden report next week.  All we need now is a dry-spell and some sunshine!