September 8th

Cooler weather is a relief …

It’s now a relief to have cooler temperatures and see the garden revert to green rather than parched brown,   although its irritating when favourite plants don’t perform as hoped.   As ever it’s a learning curve and I’m now looking at the garden with fresh eyes to see where improvements can be made.  Not everything has suffered though, and echeveria and sempervivums grown in pots are thriving.  Penstemons are having a second flush of flowers – early flowering having been halted by the heat.  I’ve been busy taking cuttings from all the penstemons and salvias ‘Amistad’, ‘Nachtvlinder’ and ‘Christine Yeo’.  The latter two are meant to be hardy, but I overwintered newly bought plants in the greenhouse last year just in case.  However,  I’ve now planted these in the garden and taken plenty of cuttings as insurance against another cold winter.  The next job is to take cuttings from all the scented leaf pelargoniums I use in outdoor pots and in the greenhouse.  I’ve grown some statice plants this year for dried flowers and have hung the many bunches up in the garage.   They’re all drying well.   Dahlia ‘Rip City’ has been as reliable as ever, flowering now for weeks.  I bought seeds of cosmos ‘Xanthos’ at the RHS Malvern Spring Show this year.  Sown in May, the plants are now just coming into flower.  It’s a lovely plant and I’ll save seed from it.  A real success has been the first crop of plums from our ‘Purple Pershore’ tree.  It’s still quite small and I was concerned that the weight of fruit would break the branches, but all is well.  The fruit is harvested and before the wasps found it too!