A triffid

August is continuing to be more autumn than summer.  We’ve now had two separate gales and some heavy rain and persistent showers; we’ve moved on from saying that it’s ‘good for the garden’, that stoically British approach to wet weather, and are wishing that it would stay dry for longer between the showers.   It's on the chilly side too, and the central heating has gone back on.  The rain is certainly encouraging plant growth, though plants are moving into that late-summer stage of flopping about untidily, partly because I haven’t staked them well enough.

One of the most rampant growers in the garden at the moment is the winter squash plant.  Only one of the seeds I sowed germinated, but the survivor seems to be trying to make up for the failed seeds by sending stems out in all directions.  I’ve never successfully grown a winter squash before and, although I knew it had the potential to be large, I hadn’t quite anticipated how much ground it would cover.  Comparing that particular bed when newly planted up with how it looks now, I can see that I was much too ambitious; besides the squash, I put in the three courgette and twelve radicchio plants and sowed three types of French bean (fortunately not all of these came up).  The two ‘Defender’ courgettes were supposed to be tied to the tall stakes and grown upwards, but one of them is growing away in the opposite direction and I haven’t managed to corral the other one into its intended position.  The radicchio have done quite well, but twelve is far too many – and they’re being buried under the squash leaves, so some of them have rotted away.  It remains to be seen whether I will actually get any squash to eat; there are flowers on the plant, but I'm not sure how many have set fruit.

The young plants newly planted - the squash is in front of the left-hand courgette

The bed as it is now - the squash romping away towards the camera

This particular bed was one of the ‘no-dig’ ones that was mulched last summer to get rid of the weeds, and this has been quite successful, with only a few stray strands of couch grass creeping in from the edges (these have been trowelled out), and there’s no doubting the soil fertility! 

One of the neighbouring beds (at the back in the photo) is the Hill, which hasn’t been the success I was hoping for.  The top soil layer is too thin – in both senses – and dry to grow much in, and the slope over the top has made it impracticable to pile good soil or compost on top.  It has been mostly empty this year.  There are obviously still gaps between the branches underneath, as holes occasionally appear and it looks as though some wildlife is living down there.  I’ve been walking over the top in the hope of compacting it, but the mid-layer of twigs, brushwood and old grass clippings is still holding up quite strongly and makes it strangely springy underfoot.  However treading it down seems to be working as the Hill is gradually subsiding and is now no more than a low mound, and I should be able to mulch it heavily this winter with little risk of the topping all sliding off. 

The dahlias have stood up well to the wind and rain, and the ‘Café au Lait’ ones in particular have come into their own in the past week.  With their pinkish-white colour they’re not an obvious pairing with the orangey-red ‘Bishop’s Children’, but together they’ve made a striking little vaseful for the table.

Dahlias - 'Cafe au Lait' and 'Bishop's Children'