RAPTORS AND MARROWS

Yesterday we had buzzard and a pair of kites over the garden. Today we had a sparrow hawk sitting in the shrub by the bird feeders outside my window. The hawk looked at me and I am almost sure it smiled. Here I am providing a meal on a plate for it. Not a good time to be a small bird though the buzzards and kites are mainly scavengers.

The Mammal Society estimate, however, that 55 million birds are year are killed in the UK by CATS! We have two prowlers, a black cat (called Megatron) and a shaggy thing - do not know its name.

Let me talk damsons - yesterday morning R and I picked 28 pounds. Now most are in the freezer (actually for jam making freezing seems to soften the fruit speeding up the process) even this one that I posted on Facebook - could not resist it. There is definitely something anthropomorphic about it. (I have wanted to use that word in a blog for a while.)

I continue to do the Big Butterfly Count - 

 Speckled Wood

 

Painted Lady

Small Tortoiseshell 

The latter have suddenly sprung from the odd one to over a dozen.

We went to Holker Hall gardens the other day, partly as we can get in on our RHS membership cards and partly for coffee.

The herbaceous borders were still good and the use of white cosmos in the formal area was great. In the lower garden the pruning of the hedging bushes has left a line of dancing trunks. It gives the effect of a barrier yet one can see through unlike a normal hedge.

We have been to the Lowick and District Agricultural Show - the Li''le Royal. It has been going for about 160 years. Met friends and walked the tents. On the first Saturday in September. Congratulations to PB on his prize runner beans.

Back home the garden is struggling somewhat for colour. However the bed full of odds and so on - poppies, zinnias, cosmos - is still doing well - until the builder comes and digs it up.

Down in the cutting bed the black-eyed Susan, Rudbeckia fulgia "Goldstrum", is bright and colourful but they do not cut well and droop almost immediately which is a shame. I looked up advice re this and got -

Rudbeckia- Harvest when just beginning to open or unfold. Flowers will continue opening when placed in floral preservative and water. Make your cut at the base of the stem or plant above a set of leaves.
Our flowers still droop.

One other thing that has givens a blast against the backdrop of sycamore is the Acer palmate "Sango-kaku" my sister gave me when we moved in.

If we are struggling with flowers it is good to have strong foliage hues.

Then there are courgettes and marrows - the freezer is filling with a courgette bake - defrost, put in a shallow dish, sprinkle with cheese and bung in the oven till hot - and now R is looking for a courgette chutney recipe.

Autumn looks like it might be early, the euonymus is turning red, the hamamelis yellow.

Apart from that the world is much the same, needs brightening up - I suggest at the party conferences Labour and Conservative do a swap - Boris for Jeremy and vice versa. We should have a new referendum on whether to have another referendum, Scotland and Northern Ireland to become anew country and the Isle of Man join Eire - OH! yes and Putin and Trump to have a week together on Necker Island and leave the rest of the world alone.

That's the world sorted, all I need now is a gardener who answers his telephone.