Macavity & Rudge
In the early days we used to walk the boundaries each morning, accompanied by our two cats, Rudge and Macavity. We would marvel at what we now owned and make plans about the gardens we would create here.
Summer walk with the cats
Our daily walks were not just territory marking, although there was probably an element of that for us and the cats. They were observational field trips, helping us to acquaint ourselves with the land in all its detail. Getting to know what grew here, what thrived here, how the climate varied from one area to another.
As the autumn progressed and the overgrowth began to die down, on one of these walks we made an exciting discovery.
Macavity & Rudge explore our wood
Our land didn’t end at the thick bank of nettles as we had thought, but continued down through a half acre strip of woodland.
This discovery was made even more exciting when the wood burst into flower in the spring, unexpectedly fulfilling our dream of having our own bluebell wood.
Our bluebell wood
Lichen – Evernia prunastri
Every day we discovered something new – a fungus, some lichen, a wild flower, a creature of some sort.
Young fox
Whether by instinct or good fortune we found we had chosen land mostly surrounded by an organic livestock farm, and nestled comfortably into the High Weald, an officially designated Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The potential for gardening organically and attracting wildlife was therefore already pretty high before we started.
Badger
Almost from the beginning our late evenings and early mornings were filled with badgers, foxes, bats and owls. A vast improvement on the late night revellers of town living.
After our daily ‘beating the bounds’ we would return to the field armed with tape measures and bamboo canes and gradually mark out the gardens we were to create.
Virtual gardens
These virtual gardens were a clear vision to us in our minds’ eyes, but to friends and family they were just an incomprehensible forest of sticks, some leaning at jaunty angles, blown over by the wind, which must have looked like a hopeless dream.
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