Garden photos

I finally, after more than a year, actually brought my camera to the Bio-Garten with me yesterday and took some photos.  I'm going to try and do this at least once a month for the whole year.  So here are some photos of what it looks like in the dead of winter, when not a whole lot is growing.  There is still some curly kale in the ground (have some on the cooker as I type) and a couple of beds of brussels sprouts (which, literally translated from the German, is rose cabbage - that won't make them taste any better but it's a much nicer name I think).  Unfortunately the pigeons have been at the sprouts and the one bed of kale that wasn't covered so there won't be much more coming from a lot of those plants. 

The view to the right from near the pavillion entrance - tool shed in the distance, large pond to the right with wild meadow area to the right and far left of the path

View to the left form the step of the pavillion - some of the beds in the main cultivated area of the garden

View to the left side of the main cultivated area with more beds and the greenhouse.  In the distance you can just make out the bee hives - someone comes in to look after these but there is talk about him coming in to give a seminar or possibly a course on bee-keeping, which would be really interesting.

The tomato bed and cage - a plastic roof is pulled over this in the spring to keep any rain, i.e. the worst of the damp, off the tomatoes in at attempt to stave off blight as long as possible.  It's similar to a polytunnel but the plastic only just comes down over the side and then the 'walls' are left free and open for cucumbers to grow up the sides.

The small pond, which is just beyond the tomato cage

The final section of cultivated space (meadow area just in view in the far right

The large pond and meadow area.  Behind the pond on the left, is what was supposed to be an alpine rock garden.   But apparently when the garden was first being built up (about 25 years ago) there were conflicting ideas on how this should be done/people weren't entirely sure how to do it.  So instead of replicating the arid conditions necessary for the kind of alpine plants the wanted to grow to actually grow there, they shipped in a load of ordinary earth and piled rocks on top of it in a very orderly fashion.  At a later stage, someone realised that this was not at all 'near to nature', which was what they were aiming for and so set about toppling over some of the well placed rocks and bricks and just let them fall where they would.  However, placing a rock garden beside the large pond, i.e. the dampest bit of the whole garden, was possibly also not the brightest idea.  So they've never really had the alpine area they wanted but it's lovely nonetheless and they do accept it's impossible to recreate every type of habitat in a relatively small space.