Introduction | Reviews | Mutant Carrots and the Mini Jungle | A Time to Sow, a Time to Hide from Poison-Breathing Deer…

The Forest of a Thousand Eyes

Mutant Carrots and the Mini Jungle

You know those beautifully designed, well-tended gardens with immaculate lawns?

How does anyone manage this?

Well, my garden is the exact opposite.

It’s small, scruffy and feral. My two huge, straggly buddleia (butterfly bushes) want to swallow my house. Hidden brambles sometimes throw out fast-growing spiky tendrils, and the ‘lawn’ is a silly, shaggy, tussocky meadow that I’ve left unmown for the wildlife.

When I got into gardening last year, I had no idea what I was doing, but that was part of the fun! I did my research, of course, but then… I just tried things to see what happened. And soon it became clear that my garden had its own plans.

I grew potatoes! Which was surprising, since I hadn’t planted any.

I scattered lots of wildflower seeds! Later I had dandelions, speedwell, bittercress, clover, buttercups, Herb Robert, wood avens, marsh willowherb, dog violet, cow parsley and creeping yellow wood sorrel! Which was lovely, except… those weren’t the seeds I’d sown.

I planted bulbs! And… the squirrels dug them up, and ran off with them in their furry little mouths. Apparently they then buried them again, but I only worked that out in spring, when my daffodils and bluebells started pushing up in weird and unexpected places.

Even the plants I grew on purpose were surprising. My tiny, ugly carrots tasted much better than they looked, but part of the excitement of pulling them up was seeing what shape the next one would be. Would it be forked, tadpole-shaped or like a tiny, creepy, pointing hand?

I now have a truce with my little monster-garden. I allow most of its weirdnesses, and it puts up with my vegetable plot. The wildlife is happy too, enjoying the mini-jungle, and cheerfully munching the things I try to grow.

My garden is ugly, but it’s full of birds, butterflies and bees. Two different sick foxes have decided it looked like a safe place to hide, allowing me to call Fox Rescue and get them the help they needed. And I got to watch a mummy woodpecker feeding her children just outside my French windows.

My little monster-garden isn’t as large or ferocious as the Forest, but when you start paying attention to plants you realise how fast they grow, and how stealthy, stubborn and strange they are…

…and of course some of them really are predators…