Monday 30 July 2012

the mystery of the deceased hedge

There were only two of us working in the plant centre today.  We were very organised about the watering, setting the irrigation on the trees to run before we did anything else, which gave us 24 minutes to go round the other beds standing up any pots that had blown over in the night so that they wouldn't miss out when their turn came with the automatic irrigation.  The boss has finally got all of it mended, so that there are no beds not working, or that have to be turned on and off by hand while getting watered yourself in the process, and it makes life easier, first thing in the morning.  The hand watering took a while with just two, and I had a difference of opinion with the person who works behind the scenes, potting plants on and keeping them tidy, as she opened the gates and wanted to put the notice board out at nine, on the grounds that we couldn't afford to turn away any potential trade in this economic climate.  We don't officially open until ten, specifically in order to allow time for watering first, and I thought that with just the two of us we could do with being allowed to finish it in peace, without having to worry about stray customers getting wet, or falling over the hoses, or taking up the time we needed to finish the watering by asking questions.  Neither of us converted the other to our point of view.  The watering did get finished by ten.

Somebody wanted advice on why his beech hedge, not supplied by us, had died, and why the replacement hedge provided by his original contractor was also dying.  From his description of where it was growing the site sounded suitable, not too wet, which was one of my first thoughts after the summer we've had.  He said that the top part of the hedge had developed webbing, which is a classic sign of advanced red spider mite, and seems an odd thing to get in a bad way outdoors in a monsoon summer, given that the mite favours dry conditions and one of your defences against it in a conservatory is to raise the humidity level.  The dead plant he brought in didn't have much of a root system, since most of it had been chopped through and was no more than 15cm long, so perhaps what was left was simply not up to the job of supporting the plant until it could grow some more roots.  The manager is on holiday for a fortnight, and the boss was busy, so we never managed to find out the answer, though I hung on to the dead sample, putting it by the house at a safe distance from the plant centre in case it had anything infectious. I'm curious now to know the answer.  It was a bare root hedge, so maybe the plants were killed by leaving their roots out of the ground in the wind for too long, and they were dead before they were even planted.  Maybe it has a terrible disease.  People keep planting beech as hedging, because it is so pretty with those nice glossy leaves, but I've read enough accounts of beech hedges unaccountably dying for no discernible reason that I wouldn't use the stuff myself.  Hornbeam is safer.  Not as shiny, but less likely to die.

My colleague has decided she enjoys operating the tea room, and she knows how to work the cappucino machine, which I don't, so that went off quite smoothly.  With only two of you on duty the person working outside doesn't get all that much done, since the call keeps coming over the radio to go back into the shop to help with the till, but by the end of the day I'd made some progress tidying up the Hemerocallis.  Their common name of day lily puts some cat owners off growing them, since lily pollen is highly toxic to cats, but day lilies aren't real lilies, or even closely related to them.

We had a brief encounter with the puppies first thing, as all four came tumbling out of the office door.  They were very, very cute, and illustrated how 'puppy fat' is an expression firmly rooted in reality, though nowadays used to describe something else.  Many phrases are.  I never realised how literally true it is that chickens come home to roost until I got some chickens.  One of the puppies was due to go to its new home today, and another tomorrow.  The owners are keeping one.  They are not yet vaccinated so have to be kept away from other dogs.  Once the resident puppy has had its jabs I suppose we'll see more of it in the plant centre.  Let's hope it has not inherited its mother's absconding tendencies.  Though she is a very sweet-natured dog, so if the puppy inherits her temperament that will have its plus-side.

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