WET WET WET

 I feel it in my fingers, I feel it in my toes - well wearing wellies, so much rain it runs from the back field across the garden in sheets and streams.

It is wetter than I can remember and the heap of twigs I call a bonfire is never going to light for November 5th even with loads of fuel and paper. 

I have cut back the shrubs hanging over the path to the upper garden and trimmed the dying paeonies. It seems pointless blowing leaves off paths etc when the forecast includes gales - just blow the leaves back let alone those to come off the trees. 

It is becoming quite clear looking at the weather forecast for the next two weeks that staying off much of the garden is the only option. Today is Friday and gales and rain sweep in.

On Saturday I manage to rake out the stream and the spring in the field. Also I fork over the compost heaps - not really breaking down as I would want. R does a great job clearing back plants that are past it.

The groove in the far grass designed to help dry the way to the far end is full of water but the turf below it is still waterlogged.

I have pulled the last rhubarb stems - inedible now - and they will go on the compost.

The tangle over the old well is now impenetrable especially as the Rambling Rector rose is so vicious.

So time for a breather. Sunday and sunny, walk at Kirkby and a coffee at Pam's wonderful cafe.

Here are some sunny autumn pictures (at last) mainly of the euonymus elata and the acer sango-kaku my sister gave us when we moved in.

They are both tucked near out notable sycamore (Woodland Trust) but the latter is producing so much seed it carpets the tarmac.

I suppose I ought to mention produce but the Bramleys in the kitchen are fed up waiting to be cooked. We still have some wrapped up elsewhere form later in the season.

So here is to A sunny day - though it seems to be clouding over again.

WHEN IS A

 Garden not a garden, when it is a quagmire. 

Big decisions made. We can no longer manage all this two acre garden so - not really rewilding areas but just letting it go (unless, when it is done, we change our minds.)

And we are not the only thing that is getting older, the shrubs threaten to be trees, and perennials insist on spreading, need dividing etc, bulbs get congested - snowdrops on the surface.

I must cut back the buddleia outside the kitchen window early again to let in more of the weak wintry light.

There are cries of too hot for October in the south east, it is 40C in Spain and here it is warm too but only 16C and RAINING. I have suggestion for the government - a sun tax for the south and a rain rebate on tax for the rainy areas - sort of levelling up?

Dug up some potatoes I had forgotten. They had sprouted in the kitchen cupboard and been shoved in an empty corner of the veg beds. 

Sunday brings a drier morning and a huge wedge of geese flying north, so evocative. I cut back the buddleia and light floods into the kitchen. Wasps are about but not as many as ladybirds. The latter are seeking somewhere to overwinter.

There are also butterflies on the fruit, here a comma and a red admiral.

And suddenly it is Saturday again and colder, only 10C, but sunny (when it is not pouring down).

We still have flowers in the garden, the michaelmas daisies falling over the paving.

Then there are marigolds, okay, calendulas outside the kitchen.

R has been away at a school reunion (Glad Hearts Adventuring) so I have been doing odds and so on. Potted up the Sarah Raven tulips and alliums, bought some yellow crocus which have been put near the kitchen window and replaced the battery in the oil tank sensor.

Suddenly there is sun and went up to the wood despairing at the long wet grass. The contrast between the leaves on the magnolia and the old ash was great and branches of that ash hang down over the woodland path. Pray the dieback stays away.

The beans are done, the sweet peas dead, but lichen can light up a dull corner. 

Then I come upon this and smile.

GETTING TRENCH FOOT

In fact storm Agnes which will amuse my sister as it is her first name though she never uses it. In fact she is Mrs Agnes Brown and I am sure she wishes she had got copyright on her name before someone in Ireland had the idea of pinching it.

So sodden everywhere, no mowing, gardener scraped moss and liverwort off the hoggin path today, last damsons picked and the badger has been back.

From the trail camera by the bird feeders. It showed the usual rabbits and pheasants and other birds (and a r*t actually trying to climb the cherry.) Do not tell R. She hates them.

The storm came and missed us, going up over Scotland, just a lot (more) rain.

My cousin H came today with her friend M and taking them around our neglected patch made we see it through other eyes. Never mind, just call it a wild garden. Too much for me now I have to admit. And R has plans afoot perhaps to reduce workload?

That was yesterday so a dry day today and out with the mower only to find it is so wet I cannot get the machine back up to the house from the lower garden. In the end manage a long way around. Much of the garden unmowable. 

The council are rebuilding the road in the village so getting out and in is a long way around too.

And now it is tomorrow and raining again. At least it fills the water bin - the council garden waste bin - as we recycle all it has another use.

So to fruit and pears and apples aplenty.

One big one we took yesterday to P along with some pears.

And there are contrasts like the dying ash tree over the far wall and the rose A and P gave us that lover the trellis by the shed.

And we have light coloured flowers to dispel the gloomy clouds - 

Japanese anemones above and Anthemis below. R and I both want more Anthemis - they have flowered well this year.

But one cannot escape the approach of autumn - Virginia creeper on one of the sheds colouring up and Sedum spectabile coming into flower.

Parsley is still doing okay as are the yellows in the back bed where R would like a load of topiary.

And it is still raining and weighing down the poor Annabelle and Sunflowers,

R upstairs on her bed, warm and writing, time to make her a cup of tea.

THISTLEDOWN

 Teacher - Right lad what is Thistledown?

Lad - Er, sir, raining like hell?

And boy has it been raining, so much the surface of the road in the village has risen and is partly blocked pushed up by water.

Been to Connemara so no blog for a bit but gardener has trimmed the lower garden - a bit hard with it so wet. 

Paths flooded and the spring in the middle of the lawn has returned. I have been out raking clear streams and so on.

The image on the right shows then usual stream out of the wood with two adjacent new springs.

The sweet peas have been flattened and the paths are strewn with sticks blown off the trees.

Than the sun comes out to light up the very full pond, the euonymus already starting to show autumn colour and give us a little sunny hope.

That was yesterday, now the heavens are open again and decanting their load onto us.

But when the sun shines some things catch the eye - like the lichen on the great white cherry. So out to pick fruit in the rain - it has knocked all the plums off the tree but we have pears, damsons and the Bramley apples are huge.

And the Elephant grass is over ten feet tall and still growing! R does not really like it but it does give me some rather thin bamboo-like canes to use elsewhere. My son has done up a house but found bamboo in the front garden. I looked up how to get rid of it and the main advice was get in a digger and grub it out. This is not feasible where he is. Would injecting Round Up into the top of the cut stems work - like they do for Japanese knotweed - we may see, fingers crossed.

Sun is out, no it is not, yes it is, I give up - coffee time.