I think it’s fair to say that it rains a fair amount in Glasgow. The weather coming in from the Atlantic doesn’t have much to absorb it, whereas Edinburgh on the east coast, for example, has 50 miles of landscape to at least take a bit of the brunt.
So what with this delightful spring weather we’ve been having, last weekend we decided we’d start trying to tackle the garden, specifically the rampant moss problem we have. Whilst Frances used to be of the opinion that “it’s green so it’s ok“, I managed to persuade her that it was a problem. It’s positively bouncy, clearly all over the place, and is starting to look scraggy and ugly: Indeed, some parts of the lawn needed no mowing at all for most of last year, and what did need mowing was a lot more difficult than it needed to be.
So off to Homebase we trotted, and returned with a tub of green grass and weed and moss killer stuff that required the brief suppression of my overly eco-friendly sensibilities (Moss is just plain rude and requires lashings of chemicals. It’s my lawn, and that’s got a free-pass). I proceed to spread it with eagerness (although not too eager and wind up Overdosing the grass on nitrogen fertiliser stuff), and actually started to look forward to raking up the dead moss in a week or two….
Alas, here the ‘bloody typical’ issue arrives with a cheeky grin and a winning smile, and fully deserving of a punch in those shiny teeth it no doubt has. You need rain to get the tiny pellets of moss-death absorbing into the, er, moss.
And we’ve not had any. For a week. I was so chuffed, and looking forward to getting out in the garden, and running in the park, I’d forgotten that rain can be useful at times.
Solution of course was that we dig out the hose-pipe I unearthed last weekend when clearing out the shed (which had half the carpet from last year stashed in it). But there’s got to be some irony of us Glasgow residents having to water the garden. In Glasgow. In April.
Bah!
Bloody British weather.
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April 5th, 2007 at 9:22 am
This brought a smile to my face as we have exactly the same problem, although I suspect that where we live is, marginally (but only marginally) less prone to downpours. In its previous reincarnation, our garden was prime agricultural land, which makes it perfect for growing moss. No matter how hard the local gardening firm tries to eradicate it and make the lawn look a healthier shade of green the efforts prove futile (though lucrative for the gardeners!).