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In the garden 2022

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The Dead Horse Arum, Helicodiceros muscivorus, native to Corsica and Sardinia but rare in the wild now. It's the first time it's flowered for me after waiting 5 years.
This is one of the worlds most curious flowers, it mimics the hairy anus of a dead animal and attracts flies to pollinate it. Flies get trapped deep inside the flower and can't escape for about 24 hrs, you can hear them buzzing inside.
The flower actually produces heat and a very strong smell of rotting meat. I made a 2 minute video: https://youtu.be/-Y-5Fs-zEhEdead Horse.jpg
 
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he Dead Horse Arum, Helicodiceros muscivorus, native to Corsica and Sardinia but rare in the wild now. It's the first time it's flowered for me after waiting 5 years.
This is one of the worlds most curious flowers, it mimics the hairy anus of a dead animal and attracts flies to pollinate it. Flies get trapped deep inside the flower and can't escape for about 24 hrs, you can here them buzzing inside.
The flower actually produces heat and a very strong smell of rotting meat. I made a 2 minute video: https://youtu.be/-Y-5Fs-zEhE
Well I played the video twice but couldn't smell a thing :laughing:
 
Nico It’s a blue-tit, would love to get robins. If you look at page 11, 214 it has markings on her head.
Beautiful pictures Jackie. Though we lost our garage baby robins to the cat the other pair have at least 2 at the front. The cats are after them too. I was edging the lawn today and the robins were taking the worms and feeding the babies quite close. Their home is in the rhodo. But they don't come as close at the garage robins got. I don't know where they went but one of the rhodo pair sings in 'their' tree. So whether this pair have extended their territory. I saw them chasing one off it was the rhodo pair who got chased before. I keep whistling anyway as I can't tell one from another but they know me.
We noticed some white fur and hair strewn about we hope it is not from the tit box. Still not sure if it is occupied but when I was working head down by it I saw a flash of blue. The robins perch on the top of it whether that would happen if it had great tits in I don't know. Had to dispose of a dead chick, very small with a blue tinge.
 
Pigeons throw themselves at my window , no casualalities yet thank goodness.

A mystery I thought others could solve for me.
A few weeks ago I was tidying up a large terracotta pot with a shrub in it but the soil had been moved.I found a large beefhide dog chew buried in it, my husband put the camera out and we were visited by a very large Fox who had come looking for it.
Today I was moving a tiny pot of crocus that had finished flowering, everything was intact no disturbance until I saw a spot of brown and uncovered a hens egg. I broke it and it was addled it must have been there before the crocus began to grow as they were covering it.
I am wondering , as the egg wasn't even cracked, if a Fox would be capable of carrying an egg over a 6ft fence, burying it and not break it.
My other thought was a Rat but it would be far too big for one to carry.
The camera will go out again tonight.
 
Pigeons throw themselves at my window , no casualalities yet thank goodness.

A mystery I thought others could solve for me.
A few weeks ago I was tidying up a large terracotta pot with a shrub in it but the soil had been moved.I found a large beefhide dog chew buried in it, my husband put the camera out and we were visited by a very large Fox who had come looking for it.
Today I was moving a tiny pot of crocus that had finished flowering, everything was intact no disturbance until I saw a spot of brown and uncovered a hens egg. I broke it and it was addled it must have been there before the crocus began to grow as they were covering it.
I am wondering , as the egg wasn't even cracked, if a Fox would be capable of carrying an egg over a 6ft fence, burying it and not break it.
My other thought was a Rat but it would be far too big for one to carry.
The camera will go out again tonight.
I keep finding bits of lamb shank bones and cake and bun wrappers licked clean, a buried dead squirrel with the tail sticking out. Polystyrene trays licked clean I saw a fox carrying one once. We have many fast food outlets close by,
I found a pound of cheese in a wooly hat once and various cans and bottles of half drunk alcohol. A smart denim jacket, the same cat's collar three times, (Stanley) a pair of frilly knickers, hubcaps, a briefcase full of papers, little cylinders that make you high and unmentionables .All in the privet hedge.
 
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This year I set up my own business (sole trader) offering garden maintenance - weeding, mowing, clearing borders, seasonal pruning - the usual. I have a small van and some starter pieces of kit (petrol tools but lower end as finances dictated).

In the summer I was busy - I priced "big jobs" as £125 per day (worked approx 6 hours and removed waste for customers). Didn't give hourly rate, just priced each job by how many days work it would be. Seemed fair and customers were happy. Felt like I was making ok money especially as a new business.

here's my problem - most of these customers wanted regular fortnightly or monthly maintenance. I offered £35 for two hours work (fortnightly or monthly) but made it clear if they went monthly and had a larger garden I wasn't going to get around all the jobs. So far all customers see happy. But I do 1 or 2 jobs a day for £70 max whereas before I was earning £125. I rarely work more than 2 in a day as the hassle and time of travelling between seems to affect things (all my jobs are within 3 mile radius so far). It also seems more tiring weirdly doing 2 maintenance in one day vs one big tidy up but that could be psychological. And what's more between all the regular customers I don't have time to leaflet drop etc for the big one off jobs, nor do I seem to have much diary space (I work 4 days or want to be working 4 days per week going forward).

Any tips on how many hours and rough pricing for regular maintenance would be really appreciated. And do you do a maintenance schedule specifying exactly what you're doing for each client too so they know what to expect?
If your 125 pound days are steady and repeatable then do that. The off set of the repeat business is that it is always there. based upon what you state above I would increase your 35 pounds (don't have a pound sign on my computer) to 40 and again in the fall to 45. You might have underpriced yourself and just have to get to where you are comfortable without upsetting too many people.

I hope that helps..........
 
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