Seeds and Stuff - August 2016

We've had such a hot dry summer this year that, for the most part, the garden has looked very withered and a bit wilty!  I begrudge watering anything that isn't edible, so the flowers are always left to fend for themselves, unless they look REALLY unhappy, when I will give them a scant watering.  Only the one though!

The kiwi fruit that I was sure I'd chopped up last year has reappeared with renewed vigour and I'm now trailing it along the back of the pergola, intertwined with a passion flower and climbing bluebell plant.

I have a wishlist of plants that I would love for my garden and Tracy and Linda gifted me a hibiscus blue bird - on my list - for my birthday so I could finally get the bloody camellia out that I've hated for ever!   However, that fell at the first hurdle as the roots had been cemented in - why, oh why?!  So, instead, I had to saw that down and the hibiscus is now in a pot plonked on top of the hated camellia's roots - so annoying, as I really wanted to get it into the ground. We'll find a way round it one day, I'm sure!

Finn has been hiding in the undergrowth again - and always reminds me of the Tiger Tiger Burning Bright poem.

It's only his freckly nose that gives him away!

I got three pounds of blackberries off the hedges this year and they are currently in the freezer, awaiting some brandy to soak them for this year's Christmas presents!

One of the least welcome visitors to my garden this year is a (admittedly, very pretty) cat which has been tormenting Finn for weeks now - and we keep spotting him on the fence posts of neighbouring gardens, watching for Finn, ready to aggravate him into more barking and throwing himself at the fence panels, which is amusing and annoying in equal measure!