It wouldn’t be May without a bluebell walk.

Even my daughter Rosie, who at 13 seems to have lost the ability to walk anywhere, is still up for this tradition.

Although the weather has been changeable, to say the least, ranging from hail to brilliant sunshine, the bluebells never let us down consistently treating us to carpets of their beautiful nodding, violet-blue flowers.

I have a few in my garden under the nut tree they are naturalising nicely but have not exactly reached a carpet so I would still like more.

I’ll place an order with a reputable supplier, as I know this will guarantee they have not been taken from the wild and are not the Spanish bluebells, which hybridise with our native and take over as the dominant strain.

Identifying the Spanish Bluebell is easy as it has a much thicker stem, broader leaves, and paler blue flowers all around the stem and have no scent.

Bundles of Joy

Ok, I’m not comparing the arrival of a certain princess to asparagus but the local stall did happen to open at the same time … my own little bundles of joy!

If you’d like to grow some of your own they are grown in a similar way to potatoes: you need to dig a trench, add a lot of grit at the base for good drainage, then lay the asparagus crowns which look like spiders legs in the base of the trench, a foot apart, with the eyes uppermost, back fill only an inch or two above the eyes and firm down.

As the spears grow, mound up the earth around them like you do with potatoes. You must not harvest any spears in the first year, as the roots have to get well established and in the second year only crop lightly. A bit of a wait but worth it for your very own bundles of joy.

Too many tadpoles?

My little pond is full of tadpoles, I always think there looks too many, a bit overcrowded but I know that things will even out.

Amphibians lay large numbers of eggs to counter the range of predators that eat spawn and tadpoles including dragonfly larvae and newts.

It’s thought that around one in fifty of the eggs laid in the pond will actually make it out of the pond as a froglet. Then they have to take on grass snakes, blackbirds, foxes and badgers so I won’t panic about overcrowding just yet!