Thanks - yes we are pretty exposed but we love the views. We asked a local gardener with experience in windbreak planting. He suggested birch and rowan with underplanting of wild roses, amelanchier and a few other things. Parts of it were planted eighteen months ago and seem to be coping with the wind fine so far. They are in tubes to protect them from rabbits, and some of the trees are taller than I am (not hard).

The space: well it was a bit overwhelming at the beginning. The last place we lived was on the 67th floor of a tower block in Hong Kong. I'm starting to get more of a handle on which areas to leave to get on with it, and which areas to try to control. For example, I spent a lot of time in the first year reducing the number of nettles in the woody bit - this year I haven't had to work on this at all. I left a large area still nettly for the butterflies, but reduced the rest so that the children could ramble through. We also planted new fruit trees in the first year, only to have the whole apple crop neatly eaten by deer. Oh well - we live in the country and deer are to be expected. One day the trees will be too tall for the deer to reach the fruit.

Off to plant some herbs in pots and weed my newly planted bed in front of the house.

Thanks again,

Laura