Back from holiday and into the leaf-sweeping!
Back home from two weeks in sunny Greece to find Mother Nature as bountiful as ever; our present, a thick carpet of London plane leaves from the tree outside the front garden. No prizes for guessing the main gardening task for the next few weeks! Into the recycling bin they go.
Just before our holiday, we harvested the remainder of apples from the ‘family tree’; any damaged ones were turned into crumbles and we froze the remaining good ones (and there were plenty), others were wrapped in newspaper squares and stored in trays in the garage. I always saw fuchsias as latesummer plants, but this autumn’s incredible mildness seems to be prolonging the display of ‘Hawkshead’ and ‘Sarah Southern Belle’. But stealing the show for flowers, however, are my old boyhood foes – the chrysanthemums (grandad, football, show chrysanths and shouting spring to mind!). The ball types make impressive plants for containers, but my planting of ‘Starburst’ left a little to be desired. I lost the label with the height, planted it too near the front of the bed and didn’t stake it. Not my greatest achievement. However, they look fantastic in a vase!
Birds are making increased appearances again, which has meant regular topping up of feeders.
My superstitions have been kept under control as at least two magpies seem to visit the peanut butter feeder together (two for joy sounds good to me!). In the vegetable plot, sprouts, cabbage, carrots, leeks and parsnips are all doing well, but garlic, shallots and onions can wait until spring to be planted for a change. It’s astonishing how this tiny plot has performed, but even if it only produced a few edibles, the joy of picking, cooking and eating fresh would still be worth it.
In the greenhouse, salad leaves are hanging on and tender plants are on the staging, with fleece at the ready for the first cold spells. Mini cyclamen appear to have summered well, with plenty of flower buds showing. Plenty of jobs to do at this scruffy time of year, with top of the list – as you might guess – leaf clearing!