SHOULD I HAVE MOWN THE GRASS?

So, it is still growing a bit but I have decided to leave it till the spring now. I wonder if this is the right decision though that choice has been made for me by the rain and wet ground.

As I ramble on I have posted three flower pictures - those that continue to bloom as the garden goes to sleep.

I have pruned the pear tree to remove crossing and damaged branches and to open up the centre to let light and air in. Whilst so doing I found a pear I had missed - with only minor wasp damage.

The flowers are, in order, Astrantia, one of the geraniums and Rose 'Rhapsody in Blue'.

I think that I got the geranium from Elizabeth MacGregor's wonderful nursery in Kirkcudbright - web site at the bottom of this page. I have just received their latest catalogue by email.

R has been clearing the remains of the meadow sweet that grows by the ditch, drain, stream - take your pick (open the box). I moved the yellow tree peony from a flower bed to the banking as a continuation of the great shrub transfer.

Had to chase the squirrel from the feeders again this morning - (:-(}=

We are now in a rush to get the garden as far as we can before I get a new left knee at the end of November or thereabouts - Oh! The joys of old age.

So, what else, must get the last of the beetroot up, the pumpkin has gone to Grandchildren in Manchester in time for halloween, the marrow is now marrow and mint soup and in the freezer with a load of mint leaves. The latter are freezing so I can crush them and bottle (or jar) them with vinegar for mint sauce.

My earlobes get longer, my ears and nose bigger and here is that website - www.elizabethmacgregornursery.co.uk/

The plants come individually wrapped with love. The violas are very special.

TOO LATE FOR TEA IN THE GARDEN

Not so much late in the year

as the weather cools but regarding the ex leader of Libya.

I invited Gadaffi, via this blog, to tea in the garden so I could chat to him about his troubles in a relaxed atmosphere. Unfortunately he was too busy to come so I was thwarted from changing his mind.

Anyway - to gardens - the cotoneaster is loaded with berries, best it has been.

Now berries makes me think of a strange thing - we usually have half a dozen blackbirds rooting in the garden but I have not seen one for a while. I expect they will come back but . . . ?

Still we have second flush

flowering as here with the Ceratostigma wilmottianum - what a mouthful. It nearly died last winter in the intense cold but has recovered somewhat to flower a second time.

R has been clearing out the marrow/pumpkin bed yesterday and I have dug two big holes for two Amelanchiers due to arrive next month. I also transferred a Guelder Rose and a Hydrangea paniculata to the banking in front of the house.

As the shrubs in the herbaceous borders get bigger I am moving them to permanent sites.

More to go yet.

This frees up room elsewhere.

I have also planted an Aruncus dioicus (Goat's Beard) down in the boggy bit where, I hope, it will thrive.

We bought it at Eggleston Hall Gardens on wednesday.

So what is this you may ask?

It is actually the heart of a flower of the orchid in the kitchen - an extraordinary mechanism (aren't we all).

The orchid family have such a varied complicated reproductive organisation.

Though, in the end, as with everything, A + B = C (or sometimes Z), or in the case of a clone A = A .

This makes on wonder, looking around, how many of us are Zs.

Time for a mug of chocolate and a few Zzzzzzzs.

ps - it is raining this morning.

THE AUTUMN BLUES

So, here we are again, autumn with a vengeance, only one ash tree left with leaves and Moi full of 'Can't be bothered.'

It is just that wrong end of the year mood as one watches the plants disappear into the ground again.

The rhubarb is on its last legs. The sweet peas have all but stopped flowering. The need is now to tidy, tidy, move things like shrubs, wonder of the lawns need another mow - and then be grateful for rain so they have to stay as they are.

Suddenly the sun is out.

Suddenly the skies are black and a squall drives rain into the window glass.

The figs never ripened.

We are quite far north but with the awful weather since July they never had a hope.

The larger ones will have to removed, next years fruitlets will be left to the vagaries of next summer.

There are bulbs to go in. You plant them and then cover them - they disappear.

Of course they will give a boost to the emotions in six month's time or so - SIX MONTHS!

For the last two years we have had a vicious month or so of cold weather and things in sheds and cold frames that are the slightest bit tender have died.

You would think this picture of veg (fruit really) would cheer me but no one in the family likes Marrow other than myself, no one likes the yellow courgettes much (they are small and weedy anyway) and the pumpkin is struggling to ripen. The pumpkin is much smaller than last year because of the weather - which I am under?

So, off to something exciting like leaf gathering, twig collecting (the gales have brought down another load - it is amazing how much dead wood there is on an ash tree and we have several).

Just read 'The Finkler Question' by Howard Jacobson, listened to a blues CD of Big Bill Broonzy and weighed myself - all very depressing.

My knees ache, the builder's insurance will not pay for the bathroom floor tiles which are coming up, the parsnip and carrot crisps I made are chewy, I cannot play the piano and it is raining again - good! I can stay in with a mug of hot chocolate and be old.

What to do?

I know - 2 days in a nice hotel with roaring fires and good food.

Son will have to manage on his own for a couple of days.

Off to Romaldkirk.

RAIIIIINNNNN!!

I was seriously getting worried that, if I went into the garden, my feet might dissolve.

It has RAINED!

All we hear on the radio and television is that farmers and gardeners in the South East (you know - where London is) (I have to explain for those of us who live North of Luton who think of London as something thought up just so Eastenders can exist) (imagine living north of Manchester! No we are not in Scotland) and East Anglia are worried because of drought. We have lots of the wet stuff - surely we, in the north, could sell it to them?

So the first picture is of our teeny stream with water in it - a lot - and the second picture shows where I had dug it out so that it did not overflow everywhere.

Back to rain - have to keep off most of the garden. We had floods (for those in the south that is water running down roads and in pools all over the place).

I did, of course attack the

willow tunnel and here you can see it undressed to five feet in height.

So, have cleared the old growth from the bed between the shed and the cattle grid, dug up beetroot and made borscht for the freezer, planted bulbs in pots and topped them with yellow pansies and planted a bought Dianthus Mrs Sinkins - white and heavily clove scented.

It is so autumnal - hardly a breath of wind -most of the leaves are off the oldest ash tree, it is not sunny but not cold - and quiet but for an occasional buzzard call.

I wish the buzzard would have a go at the squirrel though - it (they maybe) destroyed another feeder, and the barmy blackbird is back flying into its own reflection in the porch window.

This, of course, is not quite the wildlife of Soho, but look for a while at the countryside and there it is - greed, sex, murder - which reminds me I have not seen the rabbits for a while.

The year is definitely winding down.

Why do we not go into hibernation?

It might be a good idea but then we would wake to a jungly garden.

We need the winter to get ready for next year, more rain - and drought in the sunny South East - poor things.

MIZZLE AND QUIZ

What is there to do when waves of mizzle sweep across the garden?

You say - what is mizzle?

Mizzle is misty drizzle and the most wetting form of rain I know (short of a tropical downpour). It is a feature of the western part of the British Isles. The rain comes in fine droplets and soaks everything.

Back to the blog.

What is there to do?

Well, how about write the blog?

So to cheer you up before the quiz here is a picture of marigolds - they have been splendid this year,

flowering and flowering.

As has the cardoon - it started a bit later but, not only will it go on flowering for a while yet, its statuesque shape will last through the winter and keep interest in the flower beds along with the teasels and grasses.

New bulbs come every day - have planted the orange 'Prinses Irene' in a pot and the 'Rococo' are waiting for their tub. Rococo are an early parrot tulip, deep deep red.

I have, of course, forgotten what I have ordered now, except for the two tall amelanchiers from Weasdale Nurseries.

So - surprises to come!

To the quiz -

Here are two egg-shaped, black things, each about three inches long.

But what are they?

Answer below.

My son has just come in from mountain cycling in the rain - got lost, chain broke, soaked and fell off.

Sounds like such fun!

As soon as the rain stops will go in search of the disappearing stream and try to block up the hole in the stream bed.

All right - here is the answer -

The one on the left is a fungus known as King Alfred's Cakes which grows on ash wood.

The one on the right is a carbonised potato left for two days in the Aga range.

I do not fancy eating either.

Now that is something you can do when outside is nothing but mizzle - eat, guzzle!

Off to the kitchen.

TIME MOVES ON

Here I sit at my Apple Mac and learn Steve Jobs has died. Then I learn that Bert Jansch has died - memories of magical guitar playing - Jansch and John Renbourn in the 1960s when I was at University in Liverpool. (Which makes me 27 years old!)

All this has nothing at all to do with gardens but makes me realise I am getting older. So does mowing the lawn - blades up and box off, (the mover not me) - mower set on mulch. The grass is growing more slowly as winter approaches.

Small cyclamen are flowering under the cherry tree and sending out their seeds on spiral stems.

Weeding goes on, lilies are removed from their brown ceramic sink and put into the flower bed where the helianthemums were - they are now around the back in the bed by the front door - which is at the back.

The small hole drilled in the sink as a drain is unblocked and covered with stones. Then the sink is filled with compost and R plants rancunculus for next year, their little clawed roots downwards.

A large pot has new lilies planted in it for next year.

Then there is the "cloud" tree in

the woodland edge - a hawthorn that has been mutilated. It now needs trimming, despite the berries, to keep the shape I want. It is in a position that makes it very hard to photograph so this one which shows it in silhouette will have to do.

Jobs remain unfinished - chipping willow sticks, completing the power washing of the paving - I have moved the table into shelter from the paving and put the summer chairs away in the shed. From heat and humidity we have moved to gales and rain and 12C and rain.

I have started to collect leaves to be bagged so that we have some leaf mould next year.

Picking flowers for the house continues but choice is becoming more limited.

The nasturtiums will go on until the frost but many other things are getting tired (like me.)

The stream in the lower part of the garden has suddenly decided to disappear. It runs down its bed until about ten feet from the top pond and then vanishes into the shingle bottom. This is not good news for the ponds. There is a stony layer about three feet down under the turf and the water must have found an alternative route through this.

What a garden - streams disappear when you do not want them to, springs appear when you do not want them to - so dry ponds and soggy lawn.

Now Bert Jansch was in the group Pentangle - this gives me an idea - if I draw a pentagram on the paving and dance around nude can I cast a spell on the garden and solve all my problems?

I think the sight of a fat aged nude warlock (wizard) (whatever) would bewitch nothing, just give watchers a good laugh.

So I think I will have a cup of tea.

Just checked and have used the cloud tree photo a week or two ago - apologies to all cloud tree enthusiasts.

IN THE COOL OF THE DAY

I am sitting in my room at the computer looking out of my window at the rainwave. Not the heatwave - that left us yesterday after a short two day visit.

I feel so sorry for all the people in the south east sweating and labouring in the heat, 29.9C in Gravesend - perhaps that is why it got it's name?

I was going to mow the lawn but now watch wet leaves fall from the ash trees and carpet the grass.

So, on this grey day I give you three pictures of bright cheerful colour - Guelder Rose berries, red nasturtiums and a peacock butterfly.

I have, though, been in the garden and pruned the willow tunnel, removing all the lower branches up to about shoulder height from the ground. This has opened up that part of the garden as you can now get glimpses of the lawn beyond.

There is a large heap of willow

outside my window on the paving either waiting for the chipper to make path surface material for the wood or, if I can be bothered, make wattle fencing.

Some plants never give up - some of the oriental poppies are in flower again and, at last, the magnolia grandiflora (no it has not yet flowered), which looks moth eaten in May, has healthy, shiny foliage.

R took one of the big marrows to church this morning for Harvest Festival but what they will do with it after I do not know. Often the produce goes to an old people's home or something - I am sure the kitchen staff will be delighted with a large marrow!

How sad to be lying in a bikini on Primrose Hill when you could enjoy the cool, soft, October rain up north.

Calm down - I did not mean me in a bikini - it would frighten the caterpillars off the broccoli!

Now there is an idea!

VANDELLA TIME

It is here, a heatwave - well not by the standards of the rest of the world but for here 23C in late September is hot!

What's up ex-doc?

I have turned the compost which exhausted me but it looks promising.

I will have to build something much bigger in the winter to take all the compost - but not now.

Shrubs have been moved to the bankings including a Eucryphia lucida Gilt Edge - a fragrant evergreen variegated shrub which has white flowers in summer and can grow to 10ft.

I moved a rather miserable red-leaved maple growing in the dry concrete-like soil in front of the house as well but managed to snap the stem in the effort to uproot it! So it is now a six inch stump projecting from the fresh soil where I have replanted it. We will see if it survives.

It is at this time of year that faithfuls like nasturtiums and calendulas come into their own.

Other dependable plants are the Cosmos - only grow the white - and verbena bonariensis - which survives some winters and sometimes not.

The anthemis are in full second flush after dead heading but we know autumn is here. The ash tree leaves - last to come, first to go - are falling and the fig leaves are yellowing. (You thought I was going to boast and say that they were not big enough - Ha!)

Look B - twice a week is often enough for my bloggings - your demands are unreasonable - every time you ring R you ask - Where is the blog? Well, it is in my head somewhere, I suppose, but I need a good big KitKat bar to get me going and hiding chocolate from R, (she thinks I am too fat), is not easy!

There is so much to do and not enough of me to do it (despite being overweight) -ditches to dig and manure to spread, grass to cut and sticks to collect - so I am going to sit in this sun, which we will not see again like this for nine months probably, and do a Sudoku (or sleep).

Oh! Yes - why Vandella time - 'Heatwave' - sing-a-long-a Martha.

SUNBATHING RABBITS AND STUNNED CHAFFINCHES

Before the fauna here is a produce update -

our five pears, ten beans and first damsons.

The beans were delicious and the damsons needed sugar.

At least something escaped the rabbits - well, the damsons and pears were up a tree and out of reach of our DEAR! bunnies.

Having said that I have seen one go over a four foot stone wall!

Now to the chaffinch which

has just flown into out kitchen/patio doors. It was lying on the paving stunned. I picked it up and placed it under the garden bench in a safer position. After five minutes resting on its head it recovered and flew away.

At least we have not had another fatality.

Then we come to our DARLING! wabbits.

This bold as brass Peter was reclining near the top of the banking enjoying the sun after a feast.

I managed to get a closer picture - see next.

R says she is thinking of a man with a gun but I am a bit softer - after all someone

did once ask if they could name a rabbit sanctuary after me.

So what has been going on in the garden - a bit of mowing and weeding but especially, as it has been so wet, planning.

Shrubs to move to the bankings - this will improve the bankings and free up areas of flowerbed for all those plants I cannot resist buying - let alone new bulbs and cuttings and so on.

The woodland paths, usually covered in wood chippings, have turned into mud - so either more wood chippings - out with the shredder - or buy stone chippings?

Now to preparing lunch - rabbit ragout?

5 PEARS AND 2 WASPS

This is the garden in the rain and the garden

in the sun from the window of my room.

I have picked the 5 pears on our tree - conference pears so they are in the house with a banana to ripen though, with two, I had to evict wasps who were dining out.

We also have parsnips, leeks and beetroot - and, despite the rabbits, a handful of french beans from our one remaining plant.

The marrows are getting rather big and there is hope for the late-coming pumpkin.

Best of all, we have our first damsons - enough for a pud.

Done a bit of deadheading - especially the white cosmos - and stick collecting. In fact, last weekend, before the malaise, I took my grandson aged 5 into the garden to collect sticks. This did not last more than 5 sticks at which point he announced he was returning to the house to make something from the heap of Lego he had decanted from a large box onto the bedroom floor as picking up sticks was boring.

The buddleia planted around the septic tank to conceal it is covered in Red Admiral butterflies. I have yet to complete the encirclement with self sown plants dug from elsewhere in the garden and cuttings now rooted.

So to the second image - my attempt at a cloud tree using a young hawthorn on the fringe of the wood. It is in a position where the poor light makes it very difficult to photograph (and it needs a trim).

I used to have an old pair of sheep shears what I found in my mothers garage years ago but they seem to have gone missing. They would have been ideal for trimming the clouds.

You may remember the log circle with a hearth in the centre so we could sit round on warm summer evenings and bake potatoes in the embers.

A dud! Not used and no decent weather will mean a rethink.

C is with us from London and setting up his own business - courage - but he has brains - more than I have (see note above re log circle). In fact all our children are clever, each in their own way, which is probably why they shake their heads when they see me!

Time to pick up a spade to dig holes for the transfer of shrubs to the banking - then a cup of tea to rest my brain cells. In fact I will have a cup of redbush now, all this blogging is exhausting (mentally).

LEAF FALL AND MAN 'FLU'

The leaves are yellowing and falling from the ash trees, autumn colours are coming early and I have been berated for not producing another blog sooner.

Time for excuses (not for the leaves, that is slightly out of my control) - I have a cold, otherwise known as Man 'flu', and we have just returned from three nights in Scotland.

Of course, whilst there, we visited places - Girvan which was very depressing and then I took R to Castle Kennedy Gardens near Stranraer, a place I had not been to for 50, yes 50!, years.

It became clear that we should have been there in May for the rhododendrons and azaleas, especially around the huge pond (is that a lake?) must be amazing.

The herbaceous borders were splendid and as usual, under orders, I took photographs of the things R would like in our garden. This does not include willows as she has now decided that my willow tunnel should go - I foresee stubbornness arising within me.

The last three images here are of plants which have caught R's fancy. I know what they are, approximately, so now out with the books and do a definite identification - fennel and the salvia are ok, I think the other is a nepeta but not sure which one.

So we are home and I watch the rain making all walking on the grass very inadvisable - so cannot mow and so on.

I am limited by my "terrible" cold and have to just water the houseplants. In fact, I was very much looking forward to lunch today with old friends but have had to say sorry -

they would not want this spluttering, coughing, croaking creature near them - fine present for guests.

No frost yet - some years we can get to November before the nasturtiums go soggy -

but I feel this year the cold may arrive early - it is only mid September and autumn is definitely here.

Looking out of my window I see the sun is out, the grey squirrel is lolloping up the grass bank and the leaves on the cercidiphyllum are turning.

I hope the cold clears soon so I can smell the caramel odour that the fallen leaves give off. There are three "toffee" trees in the garden. They were given to me as unused scions by the owner of a garden centre at Next Ness just before he closed.

Duty done, time for a pill and feet up.

I wonder what woman "flu" is like?

JUST A LITTLE LEPRECHAUN

My hair is full of poppy seed!

Three days away and when we come back the grass is long enough to hide the Wherearewe tribe and wet so cannot be mowed. I am dead-heading and weeding.

The photographs today are to demonstrate that there are people in our garden

occasionally.

The figure in red, B, (in the rain of course), has a touch of the leprechaun on her mother's side, the other with the purple trug - to match something - is R, the main weeder and expert garden manager with an eye for colour and design yours truly does not possess.

For me - bung it in, if it goes great, if it does not also great as I cannot be bothered to move the thing - until along comes R, slow talkin', slow walkin' R (no prizes for the source of the quote) (but something to do with Yaketty-yak!).

She will request that that section is pinks and another yellows rather than the super-clash I have concocted.

Ah! Sweet mystery of life! (Another quote, now that I've found it.)

The sun is out today so a great day for gardening which is why I am off to the golf course.

I wonder, if I do not wash my hair for seven months will I have opium poppies sprouting from my thatch?

Opium - mmm!

BIRDS, BUNNIES AND BEARS

Before you ask how the weather is - it has poured until 2pm and then stopped. I went out to weed the banking bed, did it but slipped on the lawn and so was clarty with mud down one side.

The bed I have done is the one just in front of this rabbit spied from my room this morning. At least it was eating the broad-leaved willowherb - a pesky weed.

This is not the only cuddly bunny in the garden - I have yet to find their burrow but indications are that it is at the top under the ash tree with the Rambling Rector.

So to bears - woolly bears

- caterpillars that can give one a rash - crawling across the paving looking for a place to pupate.

So what is the moth this caterpillar will turn into? I have to admit that I am not good on caterpillars unless they are obvious. This could be a yellow tail tussock or a common footman, a white ermine or a tiger moth - help needed - anyone with more wisdom than I out there?

And then to birds, birds, birds.

I seem to be feeding every tit, finch and heaven knows what in the north of England.

3 feeding stations and this morning I counted 38 birds at one sitting!

Try and work out the pecking order for that lot!

Must nip to West Cumberland Farmers for some more peanuts.

STONES

The wife of my late partner has a habit which I share.

Wherever we go in the world we bring back stones - be it local or New Zealand.

A selection of small egg sized pebbles sit on the windowsill of my room, the rest are heaped in the garden.

STONES

On digging new ground for potatoes I found four tide smooth stones.

“Tom brought them here,” his daughter said, “To edge beds.”

Our stones fill corners, sit on logs, fill old bowls -

slate slabs from Luing inset with cubes of shining pyrites,

rock crystal from Corfu, 1969. still exotic,

gathered from a quarry on our honeymoon,

pebbles from Menorca when the octopus grabbed my ankle

on the snorkelling beach and I yelped with alarm,

white quartz from a crag near Goats Water carried down

the old track to Little Arrow through Bannishead,

heavy haematite looking like half an enormous brain

lugged from Newgale in a backpack, now a doorstop,

small stone eggs harvested from the shore at Roanhead

whilst Jethro and Willow excavated mountains of sand,

pink Ionan granite from the beach opposite Eilean Annraidh

where we stood and stared north at Western Mull and Staffa,

slag from the bloomery by the lake near Napping Tree

where we would swim and cook causages on a wood fire.

When my father died I took a dark brown stone from Bardsea Beach

and rolled it in my pocket like a Rosary Bead, a comfort.

All these places, memories and events are now collected in our garden,

waiting in the shadows to be seen and surprise me.

Which brings me to plums - they have stones!

But most of them have been removed from the jam.

ps. It is raining again so I have Karchered most of the paving to remove the slippery green stuff.

And the week ahead - gales, heavy showers and cool - autumn is with us, winter is not too far away!

WORKING BETWEEN THE RAINFALL

There are many pests one might expect to meet in an English garden. This is not one of them!

Nor would I want this as an ornament in the garden - it would frighten R.

This is a story of rabbits and squirrels,

docks and nettles and creeping thistles,

stakes that sprout and floods and drought,

springs that spring - none one of my favourite things.

There are ditches that clog, turn grass into bog,

snails and slugs, 'pillars and bugs -

This is not what gardening's for,

this is a story of unending war,

with that which eats the fruit and veg,

it sometimes pushes me near to the edge -

until I discover a scented sweet pea, eat a plum ripe from the tree,

dump a pumpkin into the barrow, an enormous courgette (a monster marrow),

savour asparagus cut in May, just spend a day

sitting in birdsong after the mowing,

listening to water tumbling and flowing

down to the pond. I am losing the war

but, you know, here in the sun I don't care anymore.

This last image of the banking and the Wendy House by the pond shows the wonderful work done by M the strimmer.

Unfortunately the stronger wild grasses have grown a foot in the two weeks or so since this was done and I will have to nip out now with the mower (still have not got my hover mower) and try to not let it get out of hand again. (Of course it will.)

FOR B ON HER BIRTHDAY

B is coming today on her birthday to see the garden (and us?).

It is raining tigers and wolves.

So here, for her, are pictures of some of the flowers in the garden yesterday that she will not see (unless she gets very wet).

Now most of the strimming in the wood has been done and it looks wonderful. I did not sit on my backside, much, whilst it was being done - I did clear the overgrown sides of the stream, help R make lots of plum jam - yummy - mow the lawns, plant three veronicastrum by the pond (where R had weeded). The carex pendula (weeping sedge) sows itself everywhere and is a nuisance.

I have also succumbed to some yellow pansies to put near the back door.

Pansies are not my thing - I prefer violas.

Autumn plans are astirring in my head - to move shrubs in the flowerbeds to the banking and replace with cuttings of herbaceous perennials from the shed. Two roses are struggling for lack of good soil (planted over a drain) and will need shifting and feeding.

I have ordered bulbs and stuff from Parker's (good value), Sarah Raven (top quality but not cheap) and Weasdale - two Amelanchiers after seeing Sir Roy Strong on Gardener's World had almost topiarised - is this a word - it is now - his.

And I need to buy a hover mower.

And I need to rent a scarifier.

And I need to have another drinking chocolate on this dank drear day.

Happy Birthday B.

BACK TO THE FUTURE

It always intrigues me that here we have our patch of land from which we are making a garden and all the time it is desperately trying to revert, first to grass and brambles, then to tangled shrubbery and finally to high forest.

All right I have skipped a few steps but you get the concept.

We struggle to weed, mow, prune and shape this plot against its will.

Even the "Wild Garden" is controlled, not really wild.

And it is b***** hard work.

We lost a month in the spring and have never caught up.

Also, as age and general deterioration

catch up we cannot do as much.

I can see the day when we come home, fight our way to the front door and slam it on the jungle that once was our garden.

Yet, you know, even in that jungle flowering plants will push through like the acanthus here, managing to compete with the vigour of the wild, old fruit trees will bear, fruit and daffodils and bluebells will bloom.

Just as now, when one walks up the wood and stumbles on the delight of a self sown flower the same would happen in a reverted garden.

Life of all kinds is remarkably tenacious.

The instinct is to reproduce, to survive.

Talking of newts - R saw one by the pond - I continue to excavate the stream and drag out weed, I made ten jars of marrow and apple chutney (not sure it is edible) and five pots of cauliflower soup. R likes cumin in it. I potted on some winter sprouting broccoli seedlings and potted up some Tete a Tete daffs for Christmas so they will probably flower in January as usual with Christmas bulbs.

Wet grass = cannot mow.

But the rain can produce some wonderful sights. I just wish it would not do it so often.