Up and down the brae

Step out of the front door, go down four steps onto the grassy terrace, on which grow daisies, ribwort plantains, Vinca major periwinkles, primroses and Hypochoeris radicata (Common Cat's-ear – very common at the Boggy Brae), among other things, and take three small steps so you can look over the dry stone wall and down the brae:

Then wander round the house and up the brae to stand under the oldest flowering currant bush that stretches up into the crowns of the wild cherry and holly trees that surround it, and look up:

On your way up you might notice the peony shoots in among some dried grass that I am leaving there to protect and cushion the young growth:

You might notice my penultimate pile of small cut eucalyptus logs from the tree that came down in a December gale. I've stacked them neatly. Just one more pile of branches to deal with.

Turning round and coming back down the hill you'll see the daffodils clumping themselves around the bases of wild cherries and the roe deer skid mark near them showing that even sure footed deer slip on boggy braes sometimes!

Then wander down to the eastern corner – you'll need good boots; it's one of the boggiest bits – where I've been bramble yanking this morning so that I can get at an old wood pile, and you'll see that the deer have been here too chomping the young, spring monbretia leaves. It's amazing how well monbretia does here given the cropping it gets every spring!

They've chomped my Triteleia leaves too, the blighters!