Illuminations

Some Flowers glowing yesterday in the hanging basket.The red Busy Lizzie looks like a stained glass window.The Salmon coloured Geranium flowers behind.
I can see this late flowering combination from the kitchen window.
The afternoon light illuminated the flowers and made me go back outside with the camera.
Its the last day of September today, how its flown by this year in the garden and allotment.

Butterfly And Birds

A photo I took the other day on my mobile phone of the most gorgeous colourful butterfly. They have not had the best of years with the wet weather over the past few months.
This one was resting a while on the long causeway hedgerow. He is the most colourful I have seen. Most of the butterflys in the garden have been Cabbage whites, and the Speckled Wood ones..
I'm back at work tomorrow and Wednesday so not much time for gardening.
Today I saw a Starling hanging off the fat ball feeder for a good fifteen minutes. The house sparrows did not even try to scare him off. That the first time I have seen a Starling in my garden since I moved in last November. He must have watched the Blue Tits and House Sparrows and thought they were onto a good thing.
I tried to get a photo today of the Robin, but he proved elusive. Next days off I will try to photograph the garden birds. I thought they had given up visiting but they returned in numbers today.
I will do a Butterfly post too with the few that I have been able to photograph this summer.

Colours And Cookies

The smallest Geranium flowers in the windowbox by the kitchen window. They seem to have got smaller as the season has gone on. Their magenta pink companion Gerenium has huge flowers. These are half the size and splashed with white and pink.
The petals on the right hand flower are showing signs of age. the hairy bud to the left is awaiting to open and flower.
One flowering plant that reminds me of Autumn in the garden.
I cooked a stufed Marrow today for the first time, then made home made Cookies for afterwards.
Autumn is about using the produce you have grown, and filling the kitchen with the warm scent of home cooking.
I have been relaxing today and enjoying the quietness of a Sunday.

Monkey Flower

Todays photo is a flower from Cats garden, the warm fiery tones of the Mimulus or Monkey Flower.I love the hairy throat that leads up to the pollen in the tubular petals.It almost has three green eyes in the top of the flower.
These have regrown from last year, maybe they self seeded or are perennials.The colours of these plants are usually striking orange, yellow, or red.
It was sunny today with no rain.I have not written that line very often over the past few months.
I brought the Chilli plants indoors today and harvested a good twenty chillis from various plants.They will live in the spare room over the winter.Most still have fruit developing on them too.Any one got some good chilli recipies?
Tomorrow is forecast cloudy but no rain, a perfect day to go to the allotment, to tidy up, dig the new Strawberry bed, and prepare for planting Broadbeans, and winter Cabbages..

Autumn Web Work

Autumn brings out many spiders in the garden who construct intricate webs between plants attempting to catch some juicy flys.
This spider loves the Rose Lady Emma Hamilton in the left border.The web is huge compared to the spider.
I'm back at work today, so more longer posts over the weekend.

Small Things

I am on a day off today and have slept far too much. I just had a quick look outside at the three Roses that are flowering again.
The photo is of the Dahlia with a Hoverfly landed on it. I enjoy photographing the small things in the garden, and occasionally the overall photo.
The bird food has been stocked up, but the only one I have seen is a Robin. A new, skinny one that comes and sits on the fence posts with head cocked, singing at me.
The darkness is drawing in now. I think my Chilli plants need to come indoors to overwinter. I have a lot of Chillis growing on the plants. I need to find a good Chilli relish recipie to go onto beefburgers in rolls, or with hot dogs.
The plants are looking tired now, like I feel after too many long days at work. The garden helps relax me and make me calmer. A good garden combines lots of pleasing small things, to make a perfect whole place.

Autumn Signs

I read on another blog that it is now officially autumn here in the UK. The nights are drawing in earlier and the sun comes up later.
The temperature is now around fifteen degrees centigrade during the day and in single figures at night.
The leaves of tree's are starting to change colour and drop. Hints of red and yellow are appearing in the Horse Chestnuts that I walk past on the way to work.
Conkers are falling to the ground, although I have not seen loads, so whether school children still pick them up to drill a hole in, and thread it on a shoe lace ready to do conker battles I dont know.
The Blackberrys are ripening.The other day I made two Apple and Blackberry pies with fruit from the allotment. I wanted to photograph the beautiful flower of the very spiny Bramble which surrounds the allotment plots. This bee flew into my shot at exactly the right time.
I watched gardeners world, and saw Carol Klein collecting Aconite seeds. I have the dried pods forming in the garden so I must do that....I have already collected some seeds from the Butterfly flowers ready to sow in the spring. Collecting seeds and storing them in envelopes with writing on them is a nice job, and another reminder of Autumn.
Another autumn job will be to go to the plant nurserys and buy some winter bedding plants. I will be planting my spring bulbs soon, then putting the Pansys, Violas, and Wallflowers out above the bulbs.
Gardening makes you learn how the seasons effects the way the garden looks, and how the seasons relate to the life cycle of plants and flowers. There is a beauty to this annual cycle that invigorates us, and makes us smile, no matter how many of them we have seen before.
For me its Blackberrys and Leaves that are the signs of Autumn is arriving.