B is for Butterflies and Bees...and Bunnies!!

When I started work on my bee garden (which also attracts butterflies) I didn't think it would attract other creatures also beginning with 'b'.

But we have a new house guest in the Much Malarkey Manor bee garden - a bunny!

A few days ago, we had the feeling we were being watched. You know, when you can feel eyes boring into you, but you can't quite tell why or where from. (My previous experience of this has been waking at 3 o'clock in the morning with one of the cats sitting on my chest, staring at me from a distance of two inches. This can make you jump and your heart pound for upwards of half an hour after it happens.)

We'd go out the front door and feel that SOMETHING WAS THERE, LURKING IN THE HEDGE. Or we'd open the curtains in the morning, only to catch a glimpse of SOMETHING DISAPPEARING INTO THE HEDGE.

And then, when Heather came home last Thursday, she said upon her arrival, 'Did you know there is a rabbit in the front garden.

Of course, when I looked, it had gone. Thoughts of Jimmy Stewart and Harvey flitted through my mind. I thought, poor Heather, all that intense university education for the last three years has clearly affected her brain.

But then I saw it too! It was sitting in the middle of the lawn and then it turned and ran into the hedge.

The hedge stands on the border between us and our semi-detached neighbour. At first we thought it was the neighbour's hedge as he was always out the front trimming it back with his large and loud electric hedge trimmer. Of course, he could never quite reach over the top far enough so there would be an edge on our side that remained tatty looking after the careful topiary ministrations on his side. So I would sigh and troll outside with our wholly inadequate-because-they-are-rusty-and-blunt garden shears and hack away at the remaining tufty bits until all was level again. And because I am not as tall as the man next door, and couldn't be bothered to shuffle my way along the hedge with my rusty shears atop a step ladder, the hedge, over the years has taken on a slightly slanted appearance.

Then I realised the hedge was actually OUR hedge. It was on our side of the border.

This put a whole new slant on the whole hedge trimming malarkey i.e whilst the neighbour continues to trim the side that abuts his property, I have let our side grow wild and free! His side is about 4 and a half foot tall; our side is almost 7 foot in places. I am happy to let him keep hedge cutting his side of our hedge. I am relieved I can let our side of our hedge grow rampant. I sing tra-la-la-la-la-la-la in my head when my mum comments on 'the state of the hedge, I'll bring my shears along and give it a trim for you, shall I?'

And I think this rampantness and wild verdure is what has attracted the bunny.

For the last two days, the bunny has been getting bold. It has been sitting in the middle of the bee garden eating grass and dandelions. This is good because it saves Andy having to struggle across the grass with our wholly inadequate -because-it-was-never-any-good-and-the-blades-keep-disappearing strimmer.

And sometimes the bunny just sunbathes. Like it was this morning.

I don't know why the bunny has suddenly arrived. I don't know how long it will stay. But bunny watching in the evening, with our own Much Malarkey Bunny, is very entertaining. (I just hope the next step of 'b'animals in the bee garden won't be a bear! Or a bison...)

Cat's away, the mouse might play...or garden...

Yesterday, to save my Mum having to keep raising her eyebrows and 'tutting' about the huge pile of garden debris that is STILL on the front drive after umpteen weeks, I spent the afternoon cutting up said garden debris and shoving it into the sacks the bark chippings came in, ready to transport to the tip. I sustained many scratches, five splinters and a large blister on the middle finger of my right hand. I managed to get all of the splinters out bar one which, this morning, was red and producing bubbles of pus. I hope this won't result in my hand eventually turning green and dropping off, for that would be very inconvenient indeed.

And whilst I was out in the front garden I scrabbled about on my hands and knees on the driveway with a trowel clearing weeds and moss from the spaces between the paving bricks, and then I thought, 'I don't like that rhodedendron' over there so I set about it with the secateurs and created another pile of garden debris for Mum to 'tut' over. However, the death of the rhodedendron left a nice space in the corner of the front garden. What can I put there, I thought. It looks about the right size for a...

...BEE-HIVE!

I stood back and looked at the front garden with new eyes. My enthusiasm for bee-keeping has waned recently, mostly I think because I keep e-mailing the Bee-Keepers Association asking for information about courses and meetings and impressing on them how keen I am to have a go at keeping bees, but they have so far ignored my interest. However, I have discovered the existence of a bee-farm on the Isle of Sheppey and, if the web-site is anything to go by, it will be well worth a visit and chat. And my interest might well be re-invigorated.

So, I was thinking, cordon off that area for bee hive using willow trellis (I am very keen on willow trellis at the moment), make circular beds across the lawn between the new willow and the magnolia. Fill circular beds with bee flowers (of which there are many in the greenhouse). Put new gravel in space under window and cover with large containers filled with more flowers, tall ones, that will disguise the presence of a bee-hive.

A picture of a re-vamped front garden materialised in my mind.

And Andy is going to be away from home for 4 days to attend the BSAVA Conference in Birmingham. Leaving me with the car. Alone. With bee garden fever.

Now I don't want to alarm Andy. And come tomorrow, it might be snowing and I'll have gone off the idea of playing at being Charlie Dimmock and hide indoors for 4 days writing novel number three and eating chocolate chip shortbread and liver. (Not together I hasten to add - but Andy won't eat liver and I love it, and there's a bag of it in the freezer just waiting for the opportunity when the only person I have to feed is myself.) In fact, the most that might happen could be a few strategically placed canes and bits of string to mark out my ideas and a trip to the Isle of Sheppey.

All I'm saying, Andy, is you should brace yourself for your return on Sunday. Just in case.