Excerpts From A (recently discovered) Garden Diary (7)

Ah well, at least you didn't eat it!! Lol! :~))
J looks really cute there!

No chance, Marie, it was well labelled!! We all had a good laugh when I showed this pic, but J would probably be very embarassed if he saw it here. :-))

Well some people DO eat the placenta! Strange, but true! In some cultures it's fed back to the mother to build her up after childbirth!

Yum...possible food shortage there:-( Dogs often eat the placenta, I used to let my bitches eat theirs if they wanted, some didn't. Lovely pics David, although I skipped quickly over the placenta burial /tree planting one:-) Loved especially your summer planting one by the decking, gorgeous, and of course James, even more so:-)

I know they do! A homeopath friend at the time suggested that a unique formula could be made from it for treatment of ailments for J, but wouldn't go that far.

Hi Bornagain. I did debate, actually, whether to include that pic, but decided to do so as it is part of the diary. interesting to read about your animals. :-))

Very interesting, David, I knew about the placenta being eaten before but not the planting bit!

You look a bit different there, David - but James! Wasn't he a bonny baby. :-))

interesting blog david but feel a bit queezy now lol james looks cute on this pic

You mean that I've aged 10 years, Spritz? (feels like 20 at times, lol!). :-))

Sorry about that, San :-( James has "aged" too, of course, haha!) :-))

lol hope so david :o))

In all my years of gardening I'd never heard of anybody burying a placenta in their garden!!! Were you hoping to get some "bloody" pears??? LOL! Interesting things you recorded in your diary!

No, Balcony, was hoping to grow tomatoes for "Blood Marys", lol!!

Welcome Back from sunny Spain (or was it?). Hope you all had a fantastic Festive break!!.

I had, in my line of work, heard opf, and met some folks, who did this with placentae (trying to sound erudite, lol). More common, of course, to mark the birth of children by planting trees, etc., as have seen elsewhere on GOY.

Yes, that diary was, in retrospect, a nice piece of family history, and some interesting astronomical events, too. :-))

Thanks for the welcome back, David. Happy New Year to you - even though we are 10 days into it!

We did have an enjoyable time in Spain but it was far from sunny!!! In fact I don´t think we had more than 2 days of sunshine plus 2 half days! We had more rain in two weeks than I think we've had here in the whole year! When we arrived in Cuenca & got off the train it was raining heavily & continued all night & part of the following morning - Christmas Eve.

It was warmer there than when we left the UK - we left behind snow & ice & -4ºC! Spain was unseasonably warm & we found most of the two weeks that the temps were around 8º-10ºC when we would have expected them to be around 0ºC!

There were floods in SW Spain as the winds were coming from the SW bringing warm air full of moisture which fell as heavy rain across all Spain. Although Cuenca is almost in the centre of the peninsula we also got an awful lot. One day we were up in my mother-in-law's flat we had very heavy rain for a few hours. We later heard that a reservoir further up river had overflowed because of the heavy rain & that they had had to open the sluice gates to avoid it bursting.

A couple of days later I got some photos of the two rivers that join up in Cuenca but by then they had started to go down considerably. I know because we crossed the bridge in a bus only a day or two after the incident I described above & it was much, much higher. We also heard that a small portion of the city had had slight flooding where the river burst its banks.

Tonight they expect the temps in Cuenca to fall to about -12ºC! Although they don´t have snow there at present the weather is much, much colder than here in the UK!

I'm not that great on geography, and have always thought that Cuenca is located much higher in altitude than a lot of the country, Is it in La Mancha? Never been, but would like to see this area. -12 does sound a bit low, however. No wonder they won't get snow! A surprising number of work colleagues were going off to spend Xmas and/or New Year in Spain this time round. They were all complaining about the feedback from friends already there about the rain b4 they set off. Would love it to be mild enough here to rain, and wash away the snowdrifts and underlying packed ice!

One new "Resolutiion" for myself, Thanks to you! Am going to be getting out and about our town, on foot, and capture the many, amazing municipal plant displays!!! :-))

Glad I inspired you to get out & take some photos of the Municipal displays. My photo "safaris" are on hold until about March as there is practically no change in winter/spring bedding once they have established themselves. In March some Primulas/Polyanthus should start their display. Daffs will also be making an appearance.

Same here, Balcony. Roll on Spring! :-))