Home Garden.

This tiny rose blooms all on its own.

As the Summer now goes into Autumn, we can now well and truly feel that Autumnal nip in the air in the mornings.. Its been a while since I was here, and to be honest, after a family bereavement , I took stock of myself, and took time out from blogging for a while to spend time with family.

I have found myself out in the garden snipping back, and tidying up. Dead heading and even the leaves are starting to fall early and turning golden. The nights are drawing in, and by 8 pm it is already dark..

Hubby has been really busy, he cleaned out both sheds in the allotment and has been digging out the Main Crop of potatoes for storage for winter.. As well as cleaning the green house at home, and getting that all ship shape to take in the plants that will over winter in there.

Sweetcorn

All the sweetcorn is now picked and we have counted around 60 large cobs that have now gone into the freezer. I have picked so many raspberries, and blackberries, that have been frozen. And have enjoyed making Pies and crumbles with these.

Its been a while since I felt like doing a post.. So here I will leave you with just a few photo’s of the home garden and what is in flower right now.

Happy Gardening All of You.

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Fuchsias saved from last year in full bloom

Cosmos Double bloom

Cosmos

Geraniums

Begonias

Pots on the Patio Begonias

Begonias on the front garden The ones under the window the blooms are larger than my hand

Olive Tree when it was in flower

Olive Bush with small fruits

Today is the first day in along while we have had clear blue skies.. The temperature may only have been 4 deg C this morning and it’s not much higher this afternoon. But it’s so lovely outside

So I took my camera out onto my back garden to show what is growing at the moment. We had a giant red-leaved Yucca plant which was at least 6 ft high until the snow of 2010. Then the heavy snow and the keen frosts killed all the foliage.. My hubby cut it down at the base thinking it had seen its last days.. It had been growing in a large half barrel and during the successive summer and autumn we piled up more pots on top of it and forgot about it..

It wasn’t until the following Spring that we removed the pots to find to our amazement lots of baby new shoots growing from around the cut down base of the plant..

I do not know the fancy names for this Yucca. Now we bind up these lovely 6 yr old shoots like this to prevent the frost from getting to the centre it works

In front you may see what looks like a Christmas tree.. You would be right.. Last year we bought and paid quite a bit of cash from a garden centre for one said to have roots on.. But on getting it home after Christmas to re-pot it we found it had been hacked and hardly any root at all it didn’t survive.

This Year hubby checked on its roots before hand, and this little beauty we hope will grow and thrive and be our outdoor Christmas tree for a few years to come

Christmas tree with roots to keep on enjoying the festive seasons to come

We also have colour in the form of our Yellow primroses. These are the wild variety and not the cultivated ones.. And I planted these plants last spring, They have been in constant flower on and off even if only one flower in bloom right through last Summer and Autumn.. And look at them now

Throughout the year I always feed the garden birds and add meal worms etc in the nesting season .. But we often forget about the Bugs.. I have a little Bug house which has had quite a few takers for its first Autumn as I put it out last Spring.

You can see where there is someone at home.. As the holes are filled in to keep them snug as a bug in a rug..

So what else is going on in my back garden.. Well the clematis I cut back now looks dead, but don’t be fooled, because before long as soon as the warmer weather arrives it will start sprouting again.

Then there are the wallflower that I planted.. I grew these from seeds and planted them in the allotments and transplanted them at the end of October into the back and front garden along with some winter flowering pansies.

The pansies in flower are in the tubs on the front garden and the small ones I had left over I put with these wallflowers to keep company.. This square patch was where we had the old decking, which we pulled up last summer.. As yet I have plans for this little patch, and want to add a little turf to extend the lawn a little way.. But that is a job for spring.

There is a Mole and he lives in a Hole.

The Moles have been busy,, I wonder why? lol , those reading my other blog who are following the story of the Elder part 1, will smile that I have a few mole hills in my lawn.. But they have to live too!.. And will find their way back to the fields when the worm supply is not as tasty.. 🙂

I have also had plenty of herbs growing too this Spring and Summer.. some like Basil do not survive our winters.. But chives, mint, Sage and Rosemary have all done well and I still keep clipping away at the rosemary .

Last Summer I bought a lovely scented Jasmine.. It’s not the yellow flowering winter variety and I was not sure if it would survive outdoors.. But It had grown so well as I trained it up a metal trellis that it became too big to bring indoors.. So my husband put supports around it and we wrapped up in bubble wrap

Jasmine bubble wrapped

This is what the Jasmine looks like inside.. Healthy and lots of fresh buds sprouting

More bubble wrap in the home Greenhouse, as the geraniums and other plants are under here.. Yes it’s looking a mess.. but come spring order will be made out of chaos

Greenhouse at the bottom of our home garden covered in bubble wrap to keep warmer and frost free

Last but not least is the Camellia in bud.. We bought two of these plants last year.. this is the only survivor.. we do not know why the other one didn’t survive as they both were planted in the same type of compost in separate pots and watered the same way. Yet the other just lost its leaves and withered away.. The plant below was attacked by black-fly last year, but I gave it a dose of garlic, crushed and fermented in water.. It kept me away from it for a day too 🙂