Domenico came to visit again on Wednesday 7 July. He lent us his electric chainsaw and hedge trimmers (so kind) and we toured the garden recording what he knew of the trees and shrubs in it. I now have a little hand drawn and annotated map of the garden which I need to find a way to record better. As far as fruit trees go, we have apricot, kaki (persimmon), olive, pear, fig (may be dying), cherry and nocciola (hazel nut). Hopefully we will get some ripe fruit before we leave.
Domenico reiterated the issue with the hedge and our neighbour, so next day I attempted to tackle the situation using his chain saw. Nightmare. I didn’t feel particularly safe or in control wielding a chain saw above my head in order to reduce the hedge to 2m. Not only that, but the chain soon came off the saw. Time to retreat and make a better plan.
The next day I started on the hedge with secateurs and a pair of loppers that we had brought from the UK. This was harder work physically, but I felt more in control. Had a chat with Lino the neighbour who was delighted that I was making a start. It soon became apparent that I couldn’t reach all the branches with the loppers we had brought and it wasn’t long before we headed off to the brico to buy long loppers along with other household and garden tools. We also priced up petrol strimmers and mowers.
Once I had the long loppers I set to on the hedge again. When I say hedge, it had been so long since it was trimmed that it stood about 4 or 5 meters tall in places and the thickest branches were more than an inch in diameter.
The hedge in question – laurel
Then disaster struck. On the evening of 12 July while removing larger branches with my long loppers I realised I had disturbed a birds nest with chicks in. I found it surprising that birds were still nesting in July – shows how much I know. I backed off, determined to leave the hedge for now and desperately hoped the parents would return and the chicks survive. I fear that was not the case.
While I was doing battle with the laurel hedge, Fenella tackled the area outside the back door. She removed a rather unimpressive hedge growing along the wall outside the kitchen, pruned two camellias and removed an ugly wire fence. A big improvement, but we’ll have to do something about the wall which is not at all attractive – all in good time.
Also on 12 July we headed down to the agricultural suppliers looking for a strimmer and a mower. They only had one option and it was a battery operated system with the various tools sharing the same battery. My experience at the allotment had been that battery power tools were underpowered and that the battery ran out quickly. The size of the battery (a whopping 82V) and the shop owners assurance that recharging was only 20 minutes reassured me somewhat. Wanting to spend money locally we took a punt and bought the highest power battery on offer, a charger, a strimmer and a mower. I have to say, they are really good and of course we have access to power for recharging (unlike at my allotment). May well go back for a hedge trimmer, but I think it will be a while before I risk a chainsaw again.
On Wednesday 14 July we met with Andrea who is the gardener and family friend of Domenico. He brought along his daughter Alessia to act as interpreter. She’s a bright cookie and her English is pretty good. We talked about the garden and how Andrea might help us get it under control and keep it that way. He was happy we had bought the house and told us the locals were also pleased. He had helped Domenico’s parents look after the garden when they were alive and said it had been beautiful. He’d been frustrated that after their death he’d only been allowed to visit twice a year for minimal maintenance. We told him we wanted to get the garden looking good again and wanted him to visit and care for it in the periods we were away from the house with which he seemed pleased. We booked him for three days in early August to tackle some specific things: remove the magnolia from the front of the house, get the laurel hedge bordering Lino’s house and garden back under control, remove the hedge from around the pool. We’ll see how that goes, but we warmed to them both and are hopeful he will work out in the longer term.
In this period, we also visited a garden centre and bought plants to fill some of the pots in front of the house. Makes it look cared for and creates an opportunity to chat with the neighbours during evening watering. Using the water supply to the house for watering the garden is a real no no, but there is a standpipe outside our neighbour’s house that is fed from the gora (stream) that runs across the back of our garden. In the early evening, there is a steady stream of people filling bottles and watering cans from the standpipe. Watering our pots presents an opportunity to meet and chat with the people who live close by.
One of the garden delights is looking up from the house in the early evening at the sun streaming down the path.
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