The clocks have gone forward, and we're past the equinox - it must be properly spring now

And so the seasons cycle by. And here we are, properly back at spring and the garden is coming back to life after what was really rather a mild, but very dry winter.

The flower garden needs some attention - but not a lot. It needs weeding and tidying up after the winter but that won't take long. And I've got some flower seeds to make new plants where they are needed. I might also go to one of the herb nurseries in a couple of months and buy some culinary and some medicinal herbs to plug gaps.

The fruit trees are beginning to come to life. There is loads of blossom on the peach tree. It's an amazing tree that one. It was about a meter high when we planted it, and quite a weedy plant. And now it's taller than The Under Gardener and looks quite robust and is obviously very healthy. I don't know if we'll ever get any peaches from it. It flowers very early and the flowers tend to get blown off in the April gales. But you never know - we would only need a warm and calm spring and we might get some peaches.  And it's a white peach tree, rather than a yellow one. I absolutely love white peaches and they're hard to get in your bog standard shop in the UK.  We've had to trim the grapevine back - it was proving impossible to get past it without being impaled! But we still have plans to extend its trellis so that it acts as a "green gazebo". One day - when there's time and money!!

The Under Gardener has made a start on preparing the beds in the kitchen garden and on the allotment for the coming season and has planted up a second bed of white onions in the garden. I have planted a box of rainbow carrots (not that each individual carrot is a rainbow colour, but the pack contains yellow, white and orange carrot seeds) in the green house and a tray of cascading cherry tomato, black cherry tomato and alicante tomato seeds, also in the greenhouse. a bit early, but the tomato plants won't go outside at all, apart from the tumbling cherry tomatoes which will go in baskets in the driveway - but not for a few months yet. And The Under Gardener has planted two rows of broad beans and peas up on the allotment.

We're under way!

The garden as at March 26th

The allotment as at March 26th

Spring flowers in the garden. Click on the photo to view the garden at the weekend