You find me on my way home to Edinburgh I'm currently on train bound for York as with the West Coast Main Line is closed between Preston and Carlisle due to a train derailment at Shap, in the early hours of this morning I'm heading for the East Coast Line.
I was in Manchester to join the group for a workday at Biddulph Grange Gardens. I was joined by 8 others on a chilly but sunny Sunday morning, for our annual task for taking out the Daliahs. This task involves cutting down the Daliahs, taking out the stakes which we had put in earlier in the year, making sure to keep a hold of the labels so that they can be tied on to the tubular and then put in a crate with other plants of the same name. There were names such as Boom Boom Yellow, Edinburgh, Purple Gem and Golden Sceptre. Some of the Dahlias were still looking good but it was time for all of them to come out.
Before we started we were asked if anyone wanted to cut a bunch of Daliahs for the cafe so I offered…you can see my arrangement below.
We had our coffee break at outside tables that belonged to the cafe and although it was in the shade and a little chilly it was great to be able to enjoy being outside with nature, Robin Redbreast joined us in the hope of getting some crumbs leftover from our Mr Kipling cakes Sue had provided.
Work carried on and some of the daliah beds were in sunshine which was actually quite warm and others were in the shade and coats were needed. But we worked away at our different tasks wherever we were. Lunch was eaten near to the worksite some of us in the sunshine others not. It did make me smile that out side the gardens was a sign that said no picnics and there we were eating our picnics. Whilst working we had been passed by many visitors asking for advice about Daliahs also saying how much they had enjoyed seeing them on previous visits. We even got asked about the group, hopefully they will join us on future workdays.
Many of the visitors to the gardens were families on the look out for Halloween related objects, we found this chap working hard near the truck and trailer where we were putting the cut off dahlias, he was dead pleased to see us as his heart was no longer in it. His name badge told us he was called Albert Spinestein....
We finished our day at about 3.15pm we didn't quite manage to take out all the Daliahs but Gardeners Holly and Jack were delighted with what we had got done.
Sue and I also followed a sign I had seen on the way in, it was an arrow with Kitchen Garden painted on so we went exploring....
Thanks to everyone who joined Me we had a great day...and yes I made it back to Edinburgh
