Paths

The wet weather of late has put the kibosh on digging and ground preparation this week. Instead, Dirty Nails has turned his attention to paths in the vegetable garden. Wooden planks are all very well for temporary access to crops, but where regular routes are walked Dirty Nails suggests something more solid.

He likes to construct his paths with old bricks and gathers them wherever he can from skips and dumps. Only unbroken ones will do. Lay them side-by-side across, and set them out as the path will go. Then simply use a spade to dig out two-thirds the depth of the brick, and break up the bottom of the trench. Move the bricks to one side as you do this, and place them back in as you progress with a half-inch (1¼ cm) or so between them. They will settle comfortably in the trench with a stamp of a foot. The spade can be employed to scatter some of the excavated soil onto the bricks, and a piece of wood used to scrape this into the cracks. Then ram it down with a thin edge. Finally, sweep clean.

The structure these paths give to the garden is very pleasing, and they instantly blend in with a look of natural permanence. Walk and wheel-barrow as much as you like, as this all helps the bricks to nestle in. A path constructed thus can be left for years, or shifted with a minimum of fuss and disruption as the garden evolves.

Natural History In The Garden: Wild Arum

Lush, deep green whorls of leaves are popping up in the wild garden edges. They belong to the wild arum, which is also known as cuckoo pint, or lords and ladies. This is a fascinating wild flower with a very unusual way of reproducing. From the centre it sends up a smelly brown spike which attracts insects. These are captured by the plant and held hostage overnight by one-way, hair-like triggers. When pollination via the insects has occurred the triggers wither, and the captives are released unharmed. All this excitement happens in April and May. For now, the fresh bundles of growth are just a promise of the natural magic to come.

Vegetable Snippets: Living With Travelling Badgers

Paths should be constructed so as to allow comfortable wheelbarrow access. Making them too narrow will result in awkward manoeuvring of this essential piece of kit. When crops are in the ground, especially once well into the growing season, they can flop over a narrow path. This not only causes damp trouser bottoms in wet weather, but also potentially damages the crop itself through bruising as the gardener brushes past. A nice, wide path is a pleasure, one that is tight a pain.

Creating regularly used and well-worn routes is not a condition restricted just to humans. Badgers and deer are creatures of habit, and if they are resident in the area of the veg plot evidence of their nighttime wanderings will be conspicuous. Badgers are apt to use the same paths from homes to foraging sites over generations. A patch or scrape of bare soil under a fence is telltale, and the discovery of coarse white-tipped black and white hairs caught on thorns or barbed wire hereabouts is even stronger evidence of them passing to and fro. It is very difficult to dissuade badgers from using their favourite paths, and blocking their way can prove both frustrating (to the gardener) and damaging (to the fence).

Dirty Nails recommends that a sturdy two-way gate be installed in this situation. It works along the lines of a small dog-sized cat flap. Alternatively, a gap can be left which will allow these handsome nocturnal beasts free passage as they like.