Country diary: We live in hope of rain - a normal amount of rain | Anita Roy

Wellington, Somerset: Our fragile forest garden just needs some help from above, anything that won't bake it to dust or wash away the topsoilIt's another beautiful day. This sentence doesn't usually elicit a collective groan of despair, but after three arid weeks, the gardeners of south-west England are entitled to sigh a bit. In my local Fox's Field, volunteers from Wellington's Transition Town group are hauling water from the stream up the slope to carefully rehydrate the herbs in their newly planted forest garden.The ground is covered with a layer of woodchip, hay and municipal soil improver. It has been so toasted by the sun that you can crumble it in your fingers like granola. At intervals, tufts of green poke up through the mulch: oregano and lemon balm, bergamot and sweet cicely, chamomile and clary sage. Over the past month, 273 plants have been planted, with 198 still to go, representing hundreds of volunteer hours, and costing about ?1,800 in grant money. There's a lot at stake. Continue reading...