Moving out

[Palustris]

Anyone want to buy a nice garden with a rubbish house?
We are thinking seriously about selling up and moving to a house with no garden at all.
There is a slight drawback. A family of badgers have discovered the 1,000's of tulip at the top end of the garden and have totally destroyed that section digging them out.  Cannot find where they are getting in either.  We have had enough. Taken all the pleasure from gardening here. Just don't feel like doing anything out there. It is too disheartening.

[Eric Hardy]

We occasionally get a badger, Eric, but apart from the odd little hole in the lawn, they haven't created havoc. Far more prevalent are the muntjac deer which we find impossible to keep out. They nibble away at numerous plants but luckily they don't like daffodils and primroses.

Well, at least you will have time to visit other gardens if you haven't one of your own. I have just added Great Dixter as a place to visit, why not try that and upload some photos for me 

Eric H

[Palustris]

Sadly G.D is just a bit further than I am capable of driving these days.

[ideasguy]

I hope you can muster up the energy to tackle the setbacks you have had the past few years Eric.
It was moles last year, I seem to recall. Did you manage to get rid of them?

I'm sure you will give it a lot of thought before taking such drastic action.
Good luck!

[Palustris]

This is what has been upsetting me to the extent of not feeling like doing anything in the garden at all.





You cannot see from these pictures the huge holes the badgers have dug, under the roots of the shrubs, the number of  Tulip bulbs eaten, the Brodaeia dug out and all the herbaceous plants destroyed. There should be about 500 tulips in that section.

[Palustris]

Badgers got in again last night, so today we have cut away part of the front hedge (shrubby honeysuckle which seeds everywhere so needs chopping when the flowers are over.) Big holes in the wire fence, so, as a temporary measure, we have put green shade netting over it. Will buy some proper netting tomorrow.

[Eric Hardy]

What a mess, Eric  . No wonder you want to move. THat sort of thing must be most discouraging.

Eric H

[nikoroma]

all my simpathy and a little encouragement too, I understand (from a 5th floor terrace at the most I can fear ants or some unwelcomed insect or my worst enemy a blackbird coming to look for worms in the seedlings area)) although I sincerely hope you'll succceed by stopping those animals and recover the "wound"in your garden.
I really hope ,after all the "love" you've spread and invested in your garden in all those years that an accident ( yes, very upsetting)is not enough to make you take such a decision.
Sincerely
Nicola
ps ( I live too far to be interested in your alpine house )

[Palustris]

No damage last night so perhaps(with a bow to Hubris) we managed to block off where they are getting in. We will put the wire netting up when my wife is fit enough to help.

[Palustris]

They are back.
Just had another look and the damage is even more extensive than we had first thought. They are now digging up the Brodiaea, Scilla sibirica, Schyzostylis blubs. In doing so they are destroying herbaceous stuff and shrubs too. We are going to have to seriously look at spending a humongous amount of money and putting up  secure fencing all the way round the garden. Not sure I am capable of doing it myself these days either so there could be the price of paying someone on top of the materials.

[Palustris]

Despite fencing much of the perimeter, they are still getting in. They seem to have lifted the old, existing fencing up in an obscure part of the garden, typically behind some very prickly bushes, Holly, Mahonia, Berberis, so it is going to be hard to get new fencing in down there. Cost us a fortune.

[ideasguy]

I can understand your concerns there Eric
I removed Holly and all but one Berberis in my garden. Weeding under a Holly bush is dangerous. The fallen leaves just don't seem to decompose and are dangerous
Good luck!

[Palustris]

Well, that is another length of fencing installed. Cost only a sliced to the bone finger, a badly bruised forehead where I leant into a branch. We had to cut down a Cotoneaster tree which was leaning over the fence, hundreds of yards of my bete noir, Roses, (I utterly detest roses, cannot for the life of me see why anyone would ever willingly plant them) and thousands of feet of Ivy. My hands are scratched to death and if the !"£!""£ come back in I will seriously consider a gun and an all night watch, even if it is illegal. We have trampled down heaven knows what plants in the border in trying to reach the fence and both of us are utterly exhausted

That was yesterday. No signs of incursion last night.