Cutting and strimming

In my last entry I reminded you about the delights of the Autumn meadow cut. Well this year our garden meadow received a different treatment with the use of a strimmer to control the grass. I thought it would be easy, but I was a little surprised by the fallout. Let me explain. Normally I would use a hover mower without a grass collection box to cut the foliage. This device has a metal blade and acts very much like a scythe, which would be a far better device to use if I had time. Using a hover mower has the advantage of speed and efficiency, but the disadvantage of really putting a strain on the motor. So this year I took pity on the lawn mower and decided to try strimming the area instead. As you can see in the picture, thee are windfall apples in the grass from our Bramley apple tree. There are two reasons they are there. The first is that the tree is very large and the second is that the meadow area is down the slope of the garden, so the apples roll and bounce their way into the long grass. With the hover mower these are not a problem, the blade slices through them. Using the strimmer I ended up with bits of apple in various states of decay all over me, flicked about by the whirring nylon thread.

Once the cut had been completed I had a look in detain at ground level just to check for damage to any of our orchids and I was surprised by what I found.

Tucked away down at ground level was this, which I can identify from its position as a Pyramidal Orchid, Anacamptis pyramidalis. These are the new leaves which will sit over the winter until the Spring. It seems to be a little bit early but these winter green species put out leaves whenever they want to. It certainly looks like we will have some lovely flowers next year if that is a taste of what is going on at ground level in the garden, mostly unseen and unknown until they burst forth in Spring.