Spring update

Working with Nature's energy

Working in the warm Spring sunshine, feeling the energy of everything growing and being surrounded by bulbs poking through, crocus, snowdrops, not quite open daffodils, birdsong- you can feel yourself absorbing the energy and awakening from the dark and slowness of winter. We both really enjoyed being outside doing this work. We have been focusing on pacing ourselves and our workload, but the longer days and warmer dry weather meant we couldn’t help but overdoing it a bit.

The last few weeks we’ve been dead hedging, tree pruning, woodland archway, and making some upgrades to the cabins. I think dead hedging is one of my favourite tasks, its a very ‘Permaculture’ thing because you’re using a resource which is just laying around (old dead branches, tree prunings, brash etc) and making something useful- a fence, a windbreak, shelter and habitat for animals and insects, and it also satisfies a creative and aesthetic urge to make things look good. we finished a big dead hedge in the west wood and a small lower one by the red shed with some woven willow included. The west wood dead hedge has some hazel saplings laid into it which will grow up through it eventually, and in front is blackthorn, laburnum, sea buckthorn, berberis and dog rose.

Working outside making these hedges means you can observe the blossom emerging, crocuses in flower and also our first bee checking out the crocus flowers. There is a really nice post from Kate Warner about Bees and Crocuses…

Pics Of Bumblebees And A Honeybee, 27 February 2026

March can swing wildly from warm Spring weather to snow, sleet and driving wind, which is exactly what we had the last few days. But we enjoyed plenty of sunny days prior to that, working in the garden and taking some time out to relax on some local walks …

Almost three months in , and my new job as Transition Black Isle Comms Officer seems to be going well, last week was the TBI Black Isle Potato day where over 600 people flocked from all around the Highlands to buy seed potatoes. We’re chitting our tatties week in egg boxes in the sunroom, and then planting into tubs in rough compost later in spring. The tubs can stay protected in the polytunnel until last frost has passed, then grown on outside.

Every year we say we already have enough seeds, but still end up collecting some at the Tattie day seed swap and buying some from the brilliant Seeds of Scotland. We also have our first seeds started and sharing the space with the tatties. Sweet Peas, Cosmos, Nasturtiums, various salads and greens …

We have also been doing some garden planning so we can work out exactly where all these seedlings wil be going. Our Permaculture design for the site doesn’t go into full planting detail, and we have drilled down into the zones to break them down into smaller colour coded and numbered areas for each space. This was then put into a list and a cross for each plant that would go in that area. Hopefully this will make planting out easier!

We were also really excited to find frog spawn in our woodland pond. Spring is definately coming!