Where did August go, not to mention September? Quite a lot to catch up on. Rather a mixed August, weather-wise: not
particularly cold, not particularly hot, occasionally wet, overall a bit
mixed. September started well, with a
pleasantly warm and sunny week, but has turned autumnal: chilly nights, some
lovely sun with intermittent showers and getting windy. It’s the early mornings that remind you that
the year is drawing on, with condensation on the outside of windows at
breakfast-time from late August and a bit of a nip in the air. Amid the showery weather recently there have
been a couple of lovely days (like yesterday), with some quite warm sun, but
more October-sun than September-sun.
I’m feeling rather foolish about one of my plants. It was given to me years ago by a colleague
who was a keen, if not specially knowledgeable, gardener, and I’m sure she told
me it was a pink-flowered pulmonaria.
Not being particularly familiar with pulmonarias I never thought to
question this, although the leaves were plain green and rather coarse – I took
this to be the price one had to pay for pink flowers (although frankly I would
have preferred a blue one, but this was a present and I couldn’t say no). It’s attractive enough and has flourished, to
the point of being a bit invasive. Then
a few weeks ago I got an email from a gardening website which I’ve used in the
past, offering end-of-season bargains – and there was a picture of my
pulmonaria. Unmistakeably the same
plant. Except it’s a comfrey. Symphytum ‘Hidcote Pink’ to be precise. Ooops.
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| Not a pulmonaria |
In my defence, I should say that it's on the compact side for a comfrey - only 9ins or so high. Actually, comfrey was on my wishlist when I first planned the garden, and I can’t think of a better place for it in the garden, so at least some of it will stay. It’s effective ground-cover and the flowers are pleasant. I will make room for a proper pulmonaria, though!
There have been a few more flowers in the garden this
August. Partly this is because the phlox
and Lilium henryii flowered so late and partly because of new plantings such as
the echinacea and clematis. The
chrysanthemums and Michaelmas daisies haven’t done anything yet; maybe they
need more sun? There are still a couple
of late foxgloves and, remarkably, one of the posh aquilegias had a couple of
flowers into September. And now the
nerines are coming out; they’ve been a bit shy in recent years, but the extra
feeding seems to have done the trick as there are over a dozen flower spikes
this year.
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| Cheerful but unfashionable |
The chilly nights have done for the planting in the
window-box. For the second summer
running I had put in Livingstone daisies (Mesembryanthemum); cheerful,
colourful and undemanding, if rather unfashionable. I like them. Cold autumn weather finishes them off, though,
so today they went in the compost bin and pansies, with ‘Tete-a-tete’ narcissi
underneath and a couple of undersized seedling bronze sedges, went in instead.
I’ve also finally pulled up most of the self-seeded oregano
in the vegetable patch to flower (I hope I got it out before it seeds further);
there has been concern about bees not having enough to feed on, and they’ve
been enjoying the oregano hugely, so I left it in as long as I dared. For a while the vegetable patch looked very
attractive in a wild, cottage-garden way, with oregano, foxgloves, linaria and
deschampsia. The buddleia has done well,
and attracted a lot of butterflies; apparently they hatch in the second week in
August and, bang on time, along came lots of peacocks and red admirals, with a
couple of tortoiseshells and a painted lady as well. Other buglife has been affected by the
weather, though – hardly any ladybirds this year and virtually no wasps.
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| Peacock butterfly on the buddleia |
Birdlife, though, has continued to be good. The house martins seem to have gone a couple
of weeks ago, and the swallows too (although I saw a lot of them on the phone
lines in a neighbouring village today).
We had also had visits from a warbler, though he has probably gone too
now. Lots of sparrows (they were still
feeding at least one youngster at the start of the month), a good number of
blackbirds, at least a couple or robins and the same for dunnocks. Blue and great tits are about, and
occasionally a family of long-tailed tits; a pair of marsh tits have also been
on the seed container, as has a nuthatch. We’ve had a solitary partridge hanging around,
although small groups of them are now appearing from time to time. And a green woodpecker has been hoovering up
ants from the lawn. Other wildlife has
been around too: a grass snake in the pond and a fieldmouse on the patio, both
last weekend. The mouse - perhaps the one that appeared at hay-cutting time? - was stealing the crumbs put out
for the birds. As long as he leaves my
bulbs alone ...
