A few weeks ago Sue pruned back our extremely thorny blackberry bush. It’s not a task I enjoy and I'm happy for her to do it. I don’t tend to have enough patience for all the careful pruning required. Sue just asked where to put all the wickedly prickly stems. Just leave them on the ground by the blackberry I’ll see to them later I said.
Next it was our buddleias that Sue cut back. Where to put the prunings was all I got asked and the answer was put them with the blackberry remnants. Next it was the rose and the heap of prunings got bigger.
So this was the state of the prunings today. After some mild days and no rain I reckoned that they should have dried out well and be ready for burning to tidy up the plot. With rain forecast for the weekend it seemed a shame to risk them getting a soaking.
They certainly burnt well. I was kept busy piling more debris on the fire as the dried stalks burnt so quickly. I didn't have time to stop feeding stems onto the fire and by the time I took this photo most of the burning had taken place.
By this time all the debris had been burnt and the bed next to the blackberry looked much tidier. It had only taken just over 30 minutes to burn the whole lot.
I made sure all the ‘unburned’ bits around the edges of the fire were picked up and placed on the hot ashes to burn away and that the fire had died down before I left the plot.
Before visiting the plot again I’ll have to decide which is the most appropriate bed to spread the wood ash on. With all the rubbish burnt I’m not planning any more large bonfires before autumn or even next spring.
So now I’ve fulfilled my contribution to all the pruning work!
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Our plot is bordered by gardens so we tend not to have fires so as not to antagonise the neighbours. It makes sense having a fire though, all that rubbish gone in the matter of half an hour.
ReplyDeleteI like to compost as much as I can but there is too much chopping into small pieces involved with all the prunings.
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