OCTOBERING ON

 R has cut back the cardoons as they were looking decidedly sad. Sometimes I keep them for their winter shape but the recent rain has messed them up. She has also pulled off the last of the rhubarb stems and leaves.

I have cleared the sweet peas and dug over the bed, then tined some areas of the soggy lawn with a fork. There are still roses down by the pond, what we call Hilary's rose and ripe elderberries.

Also dug over most of the "cutting bed" which revealed potatoes! The rue has been cut back - with care - as the sap can cause nasty blistering of the skin.

The leaves turn - including the cercidiphyllum on the right - but as yet cannot smell the toffee scent the old leaves of that tree emits - need some sun? The Acer Sango-kaku simply glows in the sunshine.

Though autumn progresses there are still flowers to light up the garden like the dahlia above and some roses and black-eyed Susan (rudbeckia).

Then the sunshine is threatened by a black cloud highlighting the last leaves on the grey poplar.

We have also the signs of the end of the year, fungi in the lawn grass and, as I mentioned before, the failing ash.

But there is good news - anyone want a big marrow? Too much for just the two of us. Perhaps someone without a pumpkin for Halloween could turn it into a ... ?

For the first time this year I have been blowing leaves off the paths.

More pears have been picked, wrapped in newspaper and put in the shed and there are still a few damsons left if I get out my father's crook and pull down the branches.

I have trimmed backside of the Rambling Rector rose, a thorny business, and continued to pick the last of the fruit, (see next blog.)

We still have flowers but then I saw this - a camellia on the bush by the mower shed!

We have cosmos and dahlias and a few belated white campanulas. (You said dahlias before - so I did.)

We had a gusty day yesterday and I decided to bring our Aeonium inside for the winter. It is happily ensconced on the living room windowsill for now.

Enough, the sun is out, no excuses so wellies on and off I go .