Fiona Veitch Smith

A Gardener’s Gospel – Week 9

I’m feeling much better this week after a dose of penicillin. If I’d known that dodgy loaf in the bread bin could have helped my middle ear infection, I would have eaten it weeks ago. Although I’m feeling better, I still haven’t had a chance to get into the garden. Yesterday I took my daughter away for a day trip and today it’s raining. We’re also going to church in an hour, but if it’s clear when I come back I may plant out some pansies. I’ll let you know how it goes.

A bird’s eye view

I’m still in bed with the laptop, looking out of my not-so-clean bedroom window. I can see the top half of my Whitebeam tree and the one opposite. I’ve mentioned before that I love these trees, not least because they attract so much bird life. Just this morning, without leaving my own cosy nest, I have seen a crow, a pair of blackbirds, a robin, a pair of grey tits, a scraggly pigeon and a gang of sea-gulls perched on my neighbours’ roof.

Meet the Blackbirds

So let me introduce you to the other residents of this North East English suburban garden. In the boxwood hedge in the corner, we have Mr and Mrs Blackbird. He’s a better looking bird than she is, always dapper in his black suit, but he loves her. She’s a little brown and dowdy and who can blame her raising a new batch of kids year after year. We’ve been here five years now and they’ve never failed to produce a new brood despite me occasionally terrorising them by taking the electric hedge trimmer to their house. But like the residents of San Fransisco after an earthquake, they keep coming back.

Double Income No Kids

Two bushes along in the Laurel are the Grey Tits. If this well-matched pair have produced any offspring, I haven’t seen them. But care-free DINKS or over-protective parents, they seem well-settled in the neighbourhood.

I’m not sure where his nest is (or his lady friend for that matter), but we have a cocky little robin who comes back year after year. This ballsy bachelor has claimed the entire Whitebeam tree as his own and will take on anyone who thinks otherwise.

The neighbourhood yobs

Apart from these tenants we have regular visits from a gang of juvenile finches who sweep in en masse when the bird feeder is overflowing. They come and go like football fans moving through Newcastle city centre to and from St James’ Park. Speaking of the Magpies, we’ve got a pair of them too. They don’t live in our garden, but they can’t be far off as they regularly perch in the Whitebeam or along the fence, much to the chagrin of the robin. These thuggish birds only move on when a crow decides to flex his muscles or, to my delight, the mysterious stranger who occasionally stops by for a rest: the Kestrel.

The out-of-towners

I don’t know where he comes from, but we’re only two miles from the edge of the city and the great expanse of Northumberland with its wildlife is only a short flight away to the north-west. In the other direction, it’s only four miles to the coast from where we get raucous visits from the day-tripping seagulls.

Fairtrade rules

My garden is a microcosm of God’s creation and a cross-section of society. My garden is not my garden. I am one of many and I need to be careful to remember that. When I’m raking up leaves I should leave enough under the bushes for my neighbours. The Whitebeam berries that sometimes stain my washing are a staple food for the blackbirds and should be left for their consumption. And if you think I’m only talking about the birds you’re mistaken.

The Creator said: I give you every seed-bearing plant on the face of the whole earth and every tree that has fruit with seed in it. They will be yours for food. And to all the beasts of the earth and all the birds of the air and all the creatures that move on the ground … I give every green plant for food.
Genesis 1:29-30

Jesus said: If a man has two tunics he should share with him who has none; and the one who has food should do the same.
Luke 3:7

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