Monty revisits one of his classic books, Gardening at Longmeadow, in an occasional series.
Throughout my whole life I’ve kept chickens, and apart from the wonderful flavour of the steady supply of fresh eggs, I value the birds highly as a useful and pretty addition to the garden. They spend their day scratching around the orchard, eating larvae and grubs and keeping my fruit trees largely pest-free.
I even kept a couple of hens that roosted in the outside loo when I was a student, and certainly a small hutch for a couple of hens can be moved around a lawn without causing any damage to the garden. But you do not have to keep hens to enjoy birds in your back yard, and as I get older I enjoy all birdlife in my garden more and more.
Every patch has some birds in it but some have more than others, and as time goes on I’m increasingly aware that the number of birds in your garden is a good measure of its health. If a garden can attract and support lots of birdlife it must also be rich in the insects and seeds they need to sustain themselves, which in turn implies a rich and varied ecology.
Winter bird sound is much harsher, a series of warnings rather than wooings. Pictured, a robin
In other words, birds are a barometer of everything we do right in our gardens. If that is the case, we’re doing some things very right at Longmeadow because it fairly teems with birdlife, and watching them at work is a great bonus of the winter garden.
The relationship between the garden and birds changes as soon as the leaves start to drop. For a start they become more visible. They crowd the branches as a series of shapes rather than sounds.
The outline of a small tree will suddenly break as a flurry of birds leaves, scared away from grabbing berries while they can. It makes you aware of how present the soft mid-summer sound of unseen birdsong is.
Winter bird sound is much harsher, a series of warnings rather than wooings.
Occasionally a robin will astonish with a burst of song, but a November afternoon in this garden tends to shuffle with staccato sound, like overhearing an argument in another room.
Winter here is heralded by the arrival of the fieldfares and redwings, as surely as summer is certified by the first swallow.
Monty also revealed that he has kept chickens (stock image) throughout his life
But whereas the swallows, supple as mercury, arrive with a kind of soaring familiarity, the fieldfares are a curious mixture of awkward truculence and shyness, rising in a clucking, chattering cloud if you so much as appear within their sight, and yet always pushing aggressively forward as soon as they think your back is turned.
Everything about them is harsh and jerky, yet I like them. They are of the season. They like the apples left in the orchard best and will fiercely defend a tree with windfalls from other birds. They also do a lot of good, eating snails, leatherjackets and caterpillars.
The other type of winter thrush, the redwing, is smaller, daintier and altogether less intrusive. Whereas the fieldfare has an instantly recognisable grey/mauve head, the redwing is only distinguishable from a song thrush in flight when the red flash under the wing is visible – although its tendency to flock, like the fieldfare, is a giveaway.
Birds belong to the garden as much as the plants. A healthy bird population is an important link in a healthy garden, not to say a healthier, happier garden.
Your kitchen garden: Lamb’s lettuce
Lamb’s lettuce, also known as corn salad, Valerianella locusta (pictured) comes into its own now as a delicious component of a winter salad
Also known as corn salad, Valerianella locusta comes into its own now as a delicious component of a winter salad. It is a native plant which is hardy but at its best in winter months, if protected by cloches or an unheated greenhouse.
It can be grown at any time of year but has a tendency to run to seed in warm weather so is best kept as a cool-weather crop.
The small oval leaves are very tender, with a distinctly nutty flavour. The plants that I harvest from November through to February are sown in August, and although they germinate fast, they grow very slowly throughout the autumn, putting most of their energy into developing a fibrous root system before producing a good crop of edible leaves.
Then in January I sow another batch that will be harvested between the end of March and June.
The best way to harvest them is to cut the whole plant with its mass of leaves at ground level, and you should get another fresh crop in about four weeks. My favourite varieties are ‘Verte de Cambrai’ and ‘Verte d’Etampes’ which tend to be a little hardier than others.
How to enjoy winter pots
■ Big containers planted like a vibrant bunch of flowers are a good thing, but they are difficult to do, so I’m now using identical pots, identically planted, rather than one display.
■ At this time of year, you can create an instant effect with topiary shapes from box or holly, or grasses like Festuca glauca, Briza media, or the brown Carex comans.
At this time of year, you can create an instant effect with topiary shapes from box or holly, or grasses (pictured)
■ Evergreen ferns in pots, such as Hart’s tongue (Asplenium scolopendrium) and the Japanese shield fern (Dryopteris erythrosora), are lovely and will thrive in the cool shade.
■ If you’re prepared to splash out, a pair of citrus plants in pots makes a superb display flanking a door or entrance. They need protection from all but the lightest frosts, but this can be done by draping fleece over them and removing it as the temperature rises.
If you’re prepared to splash out, a pair of citrus plants in pots (pictured) makes a superb display