Mike Dilger - My Garden and Other Animals

Passing through the crude, asbestos-covered outhouse adjoining the kitchen at the back of the property and out of the back door, the functional concrete patio funnelled down to a nondescript path, bisecting a lawn which had definitely seen better days. Dotted randomly around the lawn were a couple of long-neglected rose-standards, a sickly collection of random shrubs which had been planted in all the wrong places (and in the wrong soil type), two different-sized birch trees, two rowan trees positioned far too close together for either to flourish, and a majestic if slightly lop-sided beech tree. The centre of the garden featured a huge and monumentally ugly wooden pergola that had been built in the form of an archway and which quite possibly could have been the only other man-made structure, apart from the Great Wall of China, viewable from outer space.

As I took in the view from the patio, our patio, the left-hand boundary was split between next door’s mature garden, with the further half running adjacent to a council playing field consisting of a goal post and a small playground for infants. Following down the right-hand side, the small creaky and rusting garden gate, which gave access to the drive at the side of the house, was attached to a short breeze-block wall, which in turn was adjoined to a great, hulking garage, shared with our neighbours. Finally, at the rear of the garage a panelled fence delineated the boundary between our property and that of next door’s, giving our garden privacy if nothing else.

Pacing down the garden, the lawn ran in a fairly regimented fashion for some 25 yards in a northwesterly direction, increasing in width from the patio (or hips) down to a tree-covered shady bank (or the ankles), revealing at its base the aforementioned water feature poking out of the bottom of the flares like a pair of grubby feet. From our very first visit, I had envisaged the water course, with the remarkably unprepossessing name of Strode Brook, as the ace in our deck of wildlife cards. Our section of the brook happened to join our property at the head of a large meander, meaning that the water met the garden at an angle before caressing the bank for a 10-yard stretch and retreating away again at a tangent. Inside the bend on the opposite bank was an area that looked like it was attached to a much larger and formal garden, but apart from a carefully mown strip that had been cut to allow access down to the brook, the rest of the land had obviously been left to glorious abandonment – making it great for nature.

In addition to the more formal part of the garden, the bank on our side was in desperate need of attention. Being on the outer bend of the meander, the constant water flow had acted like a huge corrosive brillo pad, and had seriously undercut the bank to such an extent that the small, steep section closest to the playing field looked decidedly unstable. Additionally, the adjacent and much shallower middle section had previously been used as a dumping ground for garden waste, giving the bank more the look of a rubbish dump than a wooded glade.

Dominating the air space above the bank were a sickly-looking and ivy-festooned oak, whose exposed roots crudely protruded out of the steep bank in the precipitous northwesterly corner, and a 60-foot-tall flagpole-straight ash in the centre. Both of these trees were surrounded by overgrown rank hazels and hawthorns, which hadn’t been touched for decades, and as a result had run amok in the understory, making an already dark north-facing slope look a Tolkienesque mini-Mirkwood. To put it bluntly, it was hard to see the wood for the trees!

The wooded bank and brook were partitioned off from the rest of the garden by a 3-foot-high wooden fence, covered in chicken wire, meaning any entry to the wood could only be achieved via a straddle at the height which tends to be awkward for males. Apparently the reason for this fence lay in the fact that the house had belonged to a very senior gentleman by the name of Mr Gregory, who had lived and raised a family here for the best part of 50 years until he was removed against his will, but for his own safety, into an old folks’ home nearby. Once an extremely keen gardener, in his latter years he suffered dementia but was still prone to impromptu walkabouts. During one of his mini-excursions down to the river, Mr Gregory had apparently accidentally uncovered a wasps’ nest, resulting in him being stung numerous times before tumbling down the bank and into the brook. Unable to haul himself out, apparently Mr Gregory had lain dazed and confused in the water for several hours until his faint cries for help were heard by neighbours.

As I wandered around the garden, with my chest puffed out and a heady mixture of excitement and trepidation welling up, little seemed to have changed since our last viewing, but in other ways everything had changed – the garden was now our responsibility! Contemplating the gravitas of what we had just taken on, my mood was instantly lightened as I spotted the first basal rosettes of primroses, pushing their way up exactly where I had planned the meadow to be! In little more than a month, their flowers would be providing the first boost of nectar for any emerging queen bumblebees that had successfully navigated the perils of hibernation.

As I got to my feet, one of those unforgettable red-letter moments suddenly occurred as a bird began to sing – my first thrush song in 2011. To make the moment even more special, it was not only being sung by my favourite songbird, but the individual in question had decided to belt out its mellifluous, strident and instantly recognisable song from the top of the oak tree, our oak tree, making it our song thrush!

When comparing birdsong, many say the nightingale is the finest songster in Britain, but I reckon in full swing the song thrush gives it a damn good run for its money. It’s difficult to explain with mere words the astonishing complexity, beauty and power of the song thrush’s song. Consisting of over a 100 exquisite, different musical phrases, each is repeated three or four times before the thrush draws breath in prelude to belting out another. It’s as though the gaps in between each phrase have evolved to give the song thrush a second to retrospectively admire his artistry. If so, he wasn’t the only one. As I stood there, listening to the virtuoso performance, it sounded like the bird was actually serenading me with a welcome song. The song thrush’s timing was impeccable, birdsong had never sounded sweeter and, more importantly, it made me feel that everything would be all right.

Landing back on Planet Earth with a bump and suddenly painfully aware as to how much had to be done, I wandered back in to find Bill, the Bristolian born and bred removals gaffer, espousing his philosophy to Christina on everything from Formula 1 to the finer points of interior decoration. Despite his West Country chatter constantly reverberating around the bare walls of the house, giving the impression that there was rather more tea drinking going on than what we were actually paying them to do, both Bill and his two henchmen, Derek and, yes, Derek, made light work of unloading the van. Having distributed all the boxes, they paused only briefly to have one more round of tea and biscuits and receive their all-important tip for a job well done before hands were shaken and they were off, leaving us and our boxes to a new life in the country.