Autumn Almanac

Summer crops have finished, the last of the tomatoes have been pulled. For a few weeks the cosmos was like a crazy constellation of fluttering purple stars, lighting up the garden and in their midst, the deep blood red, lion-headed dahlias stood proud and tall. Even those are on their way out now and the beds are gradually being cleared and composted to make way for winter crops and spring flowers.

Photos are crappy but I suspect they'll be a nice record later in the season as things change.

The Height of Summer

It's been a couple of months now that we've had the new plot the new plot and after two weeks away (thank you, kind watering friends), things are really cranking. We've added a trellis for the cucumbers, the cosmos, French and English marigolds and long-awaited dahlias and  are flowering, first batch of lettuce are going to seed, second batch are just putting their roots down, bean pyramid is up, eggplant is finally putting out pretty mauve blossoms, tomatoes are covered in unripe fruit (c'mon!) and the tomatillos are laden with little green lantern-like cases which house the developing tomatillos (hola, salsa verde!). I've been very happy to see aphid eating insects like ladybirds and solider beetles patrolling the plants and the thick mulch seems to be keeping the weed seed bank at bay. So far, so good...

 

 

Here's a bit of a sequence of the changes over the last few weeks.