Author Archives: Graham wright

10 Plants that struggled in the drought

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After a string of dry years, this spring and summer were the driest yet. And although we didn’t have the record high temperatures seen a few years ago, it was still hot, with more sunshine than we’re used to, and drying winds that stressed plants further still.

As if that wasn’t bad enough, I’m gardening on thin, free-draining, sandy soil, which loses its moisture very quickly. So which plants failed to cope with these exceptional (or perhaps, no longer exceptional) conditions?

  1. Viburnum (Viburnum plicatum f. tomentosum ‘Mariesii)
    This is a glorious shrub, with fresh green leaves, a tiered branching habit, and branches smothered in clusters of bright, white flowers in late spring. Under normal conditions it’s dense and bushy, filling a large space. This year, by early August it had shrunk back, lost quite a few of its leaves, and those that remained hung down limply.

2. Phlox
This is Phlox ‘Peacock White’. Phlox prefer moist soil, so it’s no surprise this struggled, as it has done most years. You can see it’s trying to flower, but the flowers didn’t come to much.

3. Clerodendron trichotomum
A slightly rare shrub with white flowers and very striking berries, this too should have been full and lush. Shortly after I took this photo it went into early dormancy – we’ll have to see whether it comes back to life next spring.

4. Corylus maxima ‘purpurea’
A vigorous (normally!) large shrub with large, dark leaves. By early summer it was obviously suffering. This year it hardly put on any growth, and looked sick from early summer onwards.

5. Ligularia
Ligularia dentata ‘Midnight Lady’. This too is a moisture loving perennial. I planted it by the pond, in a bed with a pond liner beneath, to create a bog garden. Unfortunately the pond all but dried up, and the pierced liner beneath these plants couldn’t hold onto the moisture. The ligularias did eventually produce some flowers, but they didn’t hold up. The leaves would be expected to be large and lush.

This is what it should look like (as you can see, slugs and snails love the big leaves)…

6. Hydrangea (H. paniculata ‘Limelight’)
I have one large plant, and a few smaller ones, struck as cuttings. Hydrangeas are not known for their drought tolerance either, so perhaps not such a good choice. Having said that, planted in shade, it has been reasonably resilient. Until this year, at least. This photo too was taken in August.

7. Cornus kousa
A large shrub/small tree, grown largely for its showy white flowers (which are actually bracts – the flowers are tiny) followed by strawberry-like berries. Last year it only produced a handful of flowers. This year there were none, and the plant sulked from shortly after the buds broke. I’m wondering if there’s more to this than a lack of water. We do have honey fungus in the garden, so it could be this cornus is under attack.

8. Persicaria ‘Purple Fantasy’
Oh Dear! No amount of watering was going to save this rather vulnerable perennial. It puts up shoots early, which tend to need protection from the frost (unfortunately I didn’t get around to fleecing it). It’s first shoots were hit by frost. It sent out new shoots, but they too were killed off, by a late frost. It recovered again, but by August, despite attempts to keep them watered, all of the plants had shrivelled and died.
On the plus side, I split up some of the clumps and replanted them in shade, and with the wet autumn they put out some new growth, so there’s hope for next year. Here is one I moved (taken yesterday).

9. Aconitum
The flowers were poor, and the foliage withered before the flowers had finished. The late flowering ‘Carmichaelii’ varieties weren’t much better either.

10. Roses.
I’m beginning to wonder if it’s worth continuing to grow the traditional bush varieties in an open border. Rosa ‘Wollerton Old Hall’, a climber planted against a north-facing wall, did okay, as did Rosa ‘Clare Austen’ (planted against a shed, again facing north). ‘Dame Judi Dench’ (pictured), ‘Munstead Wood’, ‘Tuscany Superb’, and even ‘Gertrude Jekyll’ were sick specimens this year. On a pergola, ‘Constance Spry’ and ‘Lady of the Lake’ fared little better.

The flash of red behind gives a clue to the plants that coped well with the dry season.

In the summer, we did as much watering as we could. The four water butts ran out early on. I’ve been holding off, but I think it might be time to re-evaluate my planting plan. The problem is, of course, that if we switch to plants that like a Mediterranean climate, and then we get a few cooler, drier summers (because despite climate change, these things do go in cycles), we could find ourselves with the reverse of what we have now. I.e.; plants curling up and dying because it’s too wet and cloudy. Ideally we need plants that will cope with wet or dry, hot and cold – if such plants exist (actually, I think they do).

In my next post, I’ll highlight the plants that came through the drought unscathed…

Blowing raspberries

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You may remember me reporting that most of my yellow raspberries turned out to be red! Well on closer inspection, I noticed that while those bearing red fruit had red thorns on the stems, on the yellow fruiting stems the thorns, like the stems themselves, are green…

Further observation may be required in subsequent years, but I think this will be a reliable way to identify which are which when they’re not bearing fruit. If so, then it’s similar to foxgloves, where the standard purple Digitalis purpurea have dark stems, but the stems of the rarer, white-flowered sports are paler.

I think some of the canes in the pot of supposedly yellow raspberries I bought were actually red. And the red ones seem to spread prolifically (they keep popping up all over the veg plot, and beyond). I’d go back and complain, but the nursery is long gone (perhaps, just as well?) In any case, I took the bold decision to dig out all of the canes with red thorns, leaving just two clumps of yellow-stemmed plants…

When these have finished fruiting I’ll divide them if I can, and reset them along the row. The yellow berries are a little bigger, and seem not be be favoured by the blackbirds, which deprived us of much of the red crop (and have now disappeared, presumably to eat someone else’s raspberries!)

Colourblind Raspberries Devoured by Wildlife

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I used to think raspberries were so easy to grow. The plants are very hardy, vigorous, and generally produce lots of fresh berries that would be expensive in the supermarkets. You really need a support structure, and there’s some tying in and pruning to be done, but that isn’t too much of a chore. This is a photo of our row of autumn-flowering raspberries, taken last week…

Looks okay, doesn’t it? But appearances can be deceptive, and recent experiences have left me thinking raspberries are not the easy crop I thought they were.

Last year my attempts at ‘double-cropping’ – leaving some of the canes to over-winter and produce an early crop – produced strange results. The over-wintered canes had masses of flowers, which attracted large numbers of pollinators, but while small fruits formed, they never grew or ripened. Except for just one of the plants, which gave us a small crop of yellow berries.

This time I thinned the canes out more and made sure they were properly tied in. And we’ve had a good crop of berries. Which is great. Except for two problems. The first is bizarre. The plant that cropped last year has once agian given us yellow berries. All of the other plants have produced… red berries!

Now, they’ve been in for a few years, and I’m trying to remember whether they’ve fruited before. If not, then the pot of canes that were supposedly the yellow variety may, in fact, have been mostly red – in other words, I was sold a pup! But if they have produced yellow berries before..? Well, then I really don’t know what’s going on.

Now to the second problem. I’ve grown raspberries in previous gardens without too many being taken by ‘wildlife’ (apart from one year when a pesky varmint squirrel took a fancy to them). This year, in this garden, it seems everyone wants a piece of them.

The initial problem was blackbirds. I know they love strawberries (you may be familiar with the popular William Morris ‘Strawberry Thief’ pattern). But they’ve been quite brazen in raiding our raspberries. There’s now a family of blackbirds – mother, father, and fledgling – at it. In their anxiety to get to the berries they try to settle on branches that won’t hold their weight, which means many of the side shoots are broken and the fruits are dying. And they generally only manage to take a peck out of each fruit before moving on to the next one.

And as if the blackbird problem wasn’t bad enough, now our raspberries have been discovered by wasps. They too ruin the fruits, and their presence makes picking those berries that are intact rather hazardous. We’ve had to employ our secret weapon, which is beginning to have a beneficial effect.

It seems that raspberries, like so many other crops, need protection. A fruit cage would be the ideal solution, but though it would be great for keeping birds away, it would need a very fine mesh to keep the wasps out. Which would, of course, keep pollinating insects out too, which would mean, no fruit!

Netting the row might be possible, but when the row is ten feet long, seven feet tall, and four feet wide, it would be a bit of a task! Certainly it would be worth getting something set up before the fruits start to ripen. Oh well; maybe next year! Although if the double-cropping works, I may get berries in autumn too. I’ll cut out the fruited canes once they’ve done their job, tie in the new ones that are growing up, and see what happens.

Gardening is supposed to be fun! At least we’ve started to see more butterflies in the garden now (so far, it’s been a lean year). Today we had a couple of tortoiseshells, a red admiral, and this comma butterfly; all enjoying this little buddleia bush…

A Few Late Spring Highlights…

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The garden is really beginning to get going now. The mixed hedge between us and the field that wraps around us is fully out, with blossom from hawthorn, crab apple and blackthorn. We had a succession of blossom from our fruit trees, starting with damson, then pear, then apple, but that’s finished now, and little fruitlets are beginning to form.

The tulips in pots and the garden are all but finished too, with the exception of a new variety we tried, in the white border, called ‘White Triumphator’…

The Viburnum plicatum f.tomentosum ‘Mariesii’. is looking at it’s best now too…

To it’s left is a Ceanothus (I think it’s ‘Puget’s Blue’), which is making a great combination with neighbouring plants on both sides. It’s set off beautifully by the purple hazel (Corylus maxima ‘Purpurea’) behind, and goes well with the pale pink tree peony in front. The rose in the left foreground, (Gertrude Jekyll’) is about to burst into rich pink flower – if the peony can hold on until then, this will complete the picture…

Fagus sylvatica ‘Dawick Purple’ is starting to take shape – it’s been in the ground for three or four years now…

In the sunny rockery at the end of the garden Lithodora diffusa ‘Heavenly Blue’ is stunning; here being raided for nectar by a busy bee…

This Laburnum is a seedling I rescued from a customer’s garden (they didn’t want or have room for another)…

Around the pond the camassias flowered almost unnoticed. In our thin, dry soil they have turned out to be weedy little plants. The Siberian irises are another matter, having grown strongly and been split numerous times in the five years we’ve been here, and now spread across the garden. They will soon be out and, unlike the camassias, should produce a spectacular show.

Things move fast in the garden at this time of year, and it’s easy to miss things, or feel that you haven’t made the most of them. We’re currently engaged in the mammoth task of pulling out the sea of pale blue forget-me-nots before they drop millions of seeds, and looking forward to waves of colour spreading across the garden. The only spectre is the potential for another damaging drought. We haven’t had rain for weeks now, and there isn’t any forecast for the foreseeable future. I guess this is what climate change looks like.

Hodnet Gardens March 2025

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I’m lucky to have not one, but two gardens to visit near to me here in North Shropshire. Both are wonderful, but each has its own character. Wollerton is an intimate garden, on flat ground, with a series of small garden rooms. Hodnet, on the other hand, is more open, with landscaped grounds sloping down from the house to a series of man made lakes.

Hodnet has just opened up for the season (Wednesdays, Sundays, bank holidays and for NGS visits, as well as a few plant fairs). The weather was forecast to be good last Wednesday, and as both myself and Mrs PW are now officially retired (or ‘Jubilado’ to use the joyful Spanish word) we decided to visit. It seemed a little early, but having seen Magnolias blooming elsewhere, we were hoping some might also be out at Hodnet. We weren’t disappointed….

Hodnet has a ‘Magnolia walk, with a selection of varieties, including this pink one with blooms the size of a dinner plate…

There were plenty of camelias out, as well as some rhododendrons…

One of the garden features is a circular design with beds of peonys and roses set around a central statue. While we were there, the gardeners were busy piling copious amounts of mulch around shooting roses and the new peony shoots that were thrusting up through the ground…

Cherry trees were blossoming, making impressive highlights here and there…

Early flowering bulbs were everywhere too. The daffodils were coming o an end, but still looking great, in huge drifts…

Snakeshead fritillaries have been effectively naturalised in one area of grass…

Elsewhere, in grass shaded by trees, wood anemones are thriving…

And a honey bee was making the most of a little patch of aubretia that was in full bloom, trailing over a dry stone wall…

With so many plants bursting into life, and warm, sunny weather forecast for next week, it’s a bright and hopeful time of year. But don’t get too carried away just yet – there may be some frosty mornings to come before summer properly arrives.

Paths, Patios, and Pesky Peckers..

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Over the past month or so I’ve been fitting in a few hours here and there on finishing the hard landscaping. This is long overdue. The rest of the garden – the really important parts; the borders, shrubs, trees, etc. – has been done for some years (although, like all gardens, it’s in a state of constant development). While the shapes of the patios and paths were laid out with the rest of the design, the work of filling in and laying a finish has been intermittent. It’s back-breaking work, and fiddly when you’re re-using materials reclaimed from elsewhere as much as possible.

This is the path that runs up the garden from the house, past the garage, with straight lines and a couple of 90 degree turns…

The old reconstituted slabs (which I’m re-using) were, until this week, just laid on top of grass on this stretch beside the garage. I’ve now dug out the soil, banged in some of the bigger lumps of concrete, blocks etc. for the edges, and filled in with smaller pieces of rubble, and gravel. The next stage (once I’ve gone to pick up some more bags of sand and cement) is to cement in a row of the diamond-patterned engineering bricks along either side. Then I’ll top up the middle with scalpings (re-claimed from hard landscaping I removed elsewhere in the garden) and cement in the slabs. To show what it will look like, here’s the section of path I’ve done already…

I’m pushing on now. I’d really like to be able to move around the garden without that constant element of danger that ‘pavement surfing’ brings. There are three areas of paving to be finished. The main patio is behind our garden room…

The digging out and filling in is done. Next, I’ll need to order some new paving (there isn’t enough of the re-claimed stuff) and set about laying it. Queue more back-breaking work lifting heavy paving stones and knocking up concrete mixes! This area catches the morning sun, and I’m really looking forward to being able to sit out here and have breakfast, and mid-morning coffee. Despite the importance I put on the planting, I would concede there is also great value in having nice patios to sit on! We’re thinking of a natural slate for this patio, enhanced by the addition of lots of plants in pots.

There’s another sitting area under a pergola, beneath the large birch tree, at the end of the garden…

This get’s the sun until early evening in summer, so it’s where we would eat out on summer evenings. Ideally, we’d like to have a pizza oven, but whether that will ever happen or not is anyone’s guess. This patio is a bit of a mish-mash. I gave up lifting the existing paving, which was all over the place, because it’s concreted in like you wouldn’t believe. I’m leaving the rest where it is, but I’ve made good, and then used those stones I managed to salvage (along with some of the engineering bricks) to make an edge for the new shape patio. The rest is being filled in with slate chippings reclaimed from elsewhere (we need to wash the rest before we can use them to fill in the gaps, hence it not being finished yet).

The final paved area, outside the back door, consisted of the diamond bricks laid directly onto sand…

We haven’t quite decided what to do with this, but it will probably be a mix of new slate slabs and any of the bricks we have left over. This will be the last of the hard landscaping jobs, e.t.a. this September (but don’t hold me to that!)

We’re still overrun with sparrows. The primroses in our tiny ‘woodland’ patch were progressing well, but we didn’t seem to be getting any flowers. Something was eating them. I thought it might be voles. Or possibly wood pigeons – we get a lot of those too…

But then I caught the sparrows at it. Here’s the result…

There are a few primroses elsewhere in the garden that have so far survived intact…

It’s hard not to love the birds, but they can be infuriatingly mischievous! The sparrows seem to congregate around us, I think because we are an oasis of planting in a largely treeless wasteland of intensive agriculture and butchered hedgerows (thanks to those ‘custodians of the countryside’ – the farmers). They also like to nest in our eaves (the sparrows, not the farmers!)

After a prolonged period of cold and dull weather the spring flowers that have been peeping up above ground finally managed to open up. These are Crocus tommasinianus that are being rather slow to naturalise in the grass…

Yellow crocuses, already in the garden when we arrived, but moved to beneath one of the pear trees, are coming out now too…

We planted quite a few of the little blue anemones. They disappear completely once they’ve flowered, so it’s easy to inadvertently disturb them later in the year, which could explain why they are few and far between. One of them has put out an early flower though…

Unlike some of the other spring flowers, snowdrops seem to like our ‘terroir’ and are spreading nicely…

After a brief, bright interlude, we’re back to foul weather. It’s much less cold, but wet and very windy. Still, the emergence of spring flowers is a sign of things to come. Buds on shrubs and trees are beginning to swell, and the days are getting longer. It shouldn’t be too long before the garden really gets going…

Late Butterflies

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Its been reported that this has been a very bad year for butterflies, and that’s certainly been borne out in our garden. So it was satisfying to see two very attractive species in the garden at the weekend. The first was a Red Admiral, here feeding on an aster (one of the self-seeded Symphyotricum novi-belgii varieties)…

I read somewhere that ‘Red Admiral’ is actually a corruption of the original name of ‘Red Admirable’, which makes more sense. I’ve never noticed the two little blue patches at the back of the wings before.

We also had two Comma butterflies flitting around, mostly attracted to the Verbena bonariensis…

No doubt those Commas were drinking as much nectar as they could before the season comes to a full stop (see what I did there?) The growing season is beginning to shut down now, with autumn colours coming out in the leaves. This is the orange-flowered witch hazel Hamamelis ‘Jelena’…

The weather has turned cold, and the sun is low, and gardening is less about topping up the sun tan while you work, and more about wrapping up and trying to keep warm while you tidy up for the winter. The cannas have been dug up (apart from the one shown at the foot of the page, which I left in the border to continue flowering) and put in the greenhouse for protection. As has this garden friend. She keeps us company in the garden all summer but, like me, can’t take the frost…

Note the tomatoes . Another of this odd season’s disasters, they sat and sulked for so long before finally starting to grow that they’re only now beginning to produce fruits!
The dahlias will be next to be stored. It’s so frustrating to visit gardens and see dahlias full of flower, when our two plants produced only one flower each all season. Yes, that’s just ONE flower each! I’d blame the peat-free compost (which we have had problems with in the past), but while one (Dahlia ‘Happy Days Red’) was in compost, in a container, the other (Dahlia ‘Bishop of Leicester’) has been in the ground for the past three seasons. I really don’t know what went wrong. Must try harder next year (and with both of us retired by then, we should have more time).

text & images © graham wright

The Last of Summer

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It’s getting cold now. Day length seems to be shortening rapidly. At least the sun is beginning to shine again, after a prolonged period of dull, wet weather. The summer perennials are putting on their final show, with asters taking centre of the proverbial stage…

There were some clumps of a tall, small blue flowered variety in the garden when we arrived. We added a couple of plants bought on a visit to the Picton nursery in Malvern, who have a national collection. Unfortunately I seem to have misplaced the labels, but I believe they’re Symphyotrichum novi-belgii varieties. They have bigger flowers, and a deeper colour.

What I’ve discovered, in just a few years, is that all of these not only spread like crazy, but also set seed very easily. Consequentially, these asters (which used to be called asters, but were subsequently re-named by those evil botanists as Symphyotrichum) have mounted a take-over plan. The resulting seedlings are showing variation from the parents. Most are watered down versions of the varieties we introduced (presumably being a mix of different parents). But we’ve also had some pure white ones come up. Some are unimpressive. But others, like this one, have bigger flowers and may prove to be worthy garden plants…

I’ve transplanted this clump from the inappropriate place it had set seed, to the back of a border.
These various asters do make a good show at a time when there isn’t that much else about, and even the small, washed out flowers of the worse specimens are proving popular with the bees. But they need judicious editing. I’m setting about limiting the spread by forking out the underground shoots that are spreading out in all directions. I’m trying to remove spent flowers as they go over, to limit seeding. And when the poorer specimens have finished flowering, I’ll dig them up and get rid of them.

Curiously the Symphyotrichum novae-angliae variety (‘Sapphire’) which has done well in previous years, hasn’t spread at all, and this year has been all but destroyed by molluscs. Aster x. frikartii ‘Monch’ has been slow to establish too, and is struggling to hold it’s own in the border. A shame, because it’s flowers are larger and more brilliant, and it flowers for longer.

Many plants struggle in our thin, dusty, sandy soil, but a few seem to love it so much they become uncontrollable. So far, I’ve discover three like this – the novi-belgii asters, lysimachia clethroides, and an un-identified variety of perennial sunflower which required an intensive programme of removal to eradicate it.

Other plants that are providing some colourful flowers in the garden at the moment include Rudbeckia fulgida var. sullivantii ‘Goldsturm’, here nestled among Stipa gigantea…

Helenium…

Hylotelephium (formally sedum – for the sake of ease, I now refer to them as Hylo’s). This variety is called ‘Xenox’…

Elsewhere Gaura – I beg your pardon Oenothera (have I said I don’t like botanists?) continues to flower as it sprawls all over the borders…

Anemone ‘Honorine Jobert’ has been flowering for a long time, and looks sparkling against the dark leaves of Actaea simplex ‘Brunette’ and the orange berries of the pyracantha…

Ceratostygma plumbaginoides seems to do well in our garden, keeping its head down for most of the year, and then producing these lovely, vivid blue flowers in late summer/early autumn…

We’re still getting a few roses, though the plants are looking a bit sickly. This is climbing Rosa ‘Wollerton Old Hall’, with a spider laying in wait for any unsuspecting insect visitors…

The woody salvias are still going (although the perennial Salvia guaranitica ‘Blue Ensign’, which dies back to nothing each year, hasn’t managed to flower yet). We have bright red ‘Royal Bumble’, and this, the dusky purple ‘Nachtvlinder’…

Colour is coming as much from fruits and leaves as from flowers now. This Euonymus alatus has been in for two years now This year it flowered, and has produced striking fruits. The leaves normally colour up a deep red…

We have a grape vine – a cutting from one growing at Dyffryn Gardens, where I used to be a volunteer – growing on our pergola. I can’t remember the variety. Being outside, any grapes it produces are unlikely to ripen, but they look nice…

And the vine leaves are giving good autumn tints…

According to the song by the Eighties band The Icicle Works, autumn is the finest time. Personally, I always find it difficult, because I love warmth and sun, and hate the cold. But even I can’t deny it is a time of great interest in the garden. I guess I’ll just have to pull on a big coat and enjoy the show.

text & images © graham wright 2024

Jam today

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Of the six fruit trees we planted in our mini orchard in the autumn of 2020, the damson has grown to be the biggest, and this year produced the most fruit. Last weekend we picked around three kilos..

The variety is ‘ Cheshire Damson’. They’re surprisingly sweet – I’d always thought they were too sour to eat fresh, but these are almost as sweet as plums. But as there were too many to use before they go off, we decided to have a go at making jam (a first for us). Here it is (well, most of it – we’ve already used one jar and given another away)…

Making jam is a bit of a faff. Luckily for me, my better half did most of the heavy lifting. We both took turns at picking the stones out from the pan while the mix was cooking. It was a bit like fishing, and a messy job. The alternative would have been to try and cut them out from the fruit before cooking, but they don’t come out easily. The recipe came from the internet, but apparently it’s a standard recipe – just equal amounts of fruit and sugar, plus a little bit of water. It wasn’t clear whether the weight of the fruit was with, or without the stones! We weren’t sure the jam was going to set, but it seems to have thickened up reasonably well, and it tastes good.

Once most of the damsons had been picked I took the opportunity to prune the tree. For free standing apple or pear trees, you would normally prune in the dormant season, but damsons, plums and cherries are in the genus Prunus, which can be susceptible to a disease called silver leaf, which spreads more easily when it’s cold and damp. To minimise the chance of infection, it’s recommended they should be pruned in summer. September is a little late, but it was a dry spell (quite rare for this year).

The growth of damson trees seems to be somewhat wayward, and I had to cut out a lot of branches that were crossing or growing into the centre of the tree. Once I’d dealt with these to reduce the congestion and open up the tree to more light and air, I trimmed a little from the ends of the outer branches – particularly at the top – to an outward facing bud, to reduce the height. So hopefully it will be going into autumn in good shape. And in the depths of winter, when we’re tucking into bread and jam for tea, we’ll remember the garden at its verdant best!

text & images © graham wright 2024

Autumn fruits…

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It hardly seems as though we’ve had summer yet, but looking at our apple trees, it suddenly struck me that the season is coming to a close. Perhaps their progress is ahead of schedule this year (although I don’t know why that would be with all the cool weather we’ve had, and the slow start to the growing season). These are apples on ‘James Grieve’, a lovely eating apple that can also be used in cooking. Sadly, it doesn’t store…

The tree is laden with fruit. I did some thinning earlier in the “summer”, but conservatively – I don’t like to take off too many because the trees will lose fruit in the ‘June drop’ and again in the ‘pre-harvest drop’, and if you’re not careful, you can end up with too little. Apples have been falling every day – exacerbated by the windy weather. All have been attacked by pests, and tend to have rotten patches and contain grubs (and sometimes an earwig will crawl out of a hole!) The grubs are, I think, larvae of the codling moth.

Looking at the apples that are still on the tree, most seem to have some sort of insect damage. I really must take more care to put grease bands on the trunks in good time next year (although the pests seem to find their way to the fruit anyway). The windfalls are fine, but we’ve had to cut them up, and use them quickly before the rot spreads, which is difficult because there are so many of them.

We have two apple trees. The other – ‘Worcester Pearmain’ has less fruit, but they’re a good size – last year it produced a crop of under-sized apples. This variety keeps much better – if we can find some that are undamaged.

The pears aren’t so good. ‘Packham’s Triumph’ isn’t living up to its name, having no fruit this year. ‘Concorde’ is better, but not exactly laden down. Although they are supposed to be in the same flowering group, there wasn’t much of an overlap, which could explain why fruit set was patchy. Touch wood, the pears don’t seem to suffer anything like as much damage from pests as apples; the one exception being wasps (of the social, yellow jacket kind) but so far, there have been very few of these this year.

Of the six trees in our mini orchard, it’s the damson that has grown the most, and this year it’s got quite a few damsons, which are ripening well. We’ve tried a few windfalls, and they were surprisingly sweet, but we’ll probably try our hands at making jam (a first!) with most of the crop.

The summer raspberries are in their first year (the first set of canes we planted didn’t take) but we’ve had some fruit from them.

The autumn raspberries have been a continuing trauma. Once again they put on impressive growth, but only one cane is producing fruit. The yellow berries are very tasty, but it’s a meagre crop for a whole, lush row of raspberry canes. At the end of the season I’ll thin the canes out a bit more, but leave some to see if they produce fruit early – alongside the summer ones. They should also produce new canes for autumn fruiting. This is known as double-cropping (thanks to Cathy at Rambling in the garden, who does this successfully and has been advising me). I wonder if my soil is short of potassium, which promotes flower growth? Wood ash is touted as a good source of potassium, so I may have to get the wood stove going this winter to provide a supply for next year.

The veg patch has given us a better crop of peas than in previous years, which we’ve tended to have raw in salads (there haven’t really been enough for main meals).

Broad beans have been similar. Both are coming to and end now.

The runner beans have been very slow again this year; it’s only now that they’re beginning to produce a regular crop from what is now a lush wigwam of plants.

While butterflies have been in short supply this year, there’s been no shortage of earwigs, which I suspect have been responsible for eating the flowers on the runner beans, and delaying the crop. I try to tolerate wildlife where I can, such as this caterpillar of a vapourer moth on the plum tree.

The fruit and veg may be telling us the season’s coming to a close, but the garden has more to give before autumn sets in. Asters grow well in our garden, and spread well too, so we have plenty of them. They’re close to flowering, and should put on a good show.

Hydrangea paniculata ‘Limelight’ has this year achieved something like its full size, with lots of large flower heads which will persist and look good (as they dry) well into winter. Hydrangeas are known to like plenty of moisture. The paniculata varieties are more drought tolerant, though as you can see from this photo, the leaves are somewhat droopy – we really do need some rain now.

Hesperantha (formerly Schyzostylis) is a tough plant that has spread freely around the pond. It’s a late flowerer, and is doing its thing now. In the background is a purple Lobelia x. speciosa ‘Tania’. Unlike the more popular Lobelia cardinalis ‘Queen Victoria’, which I’ve not managed to get through a winter, this one is in its third year.

And the Japanese anemones are in full bloom now. This is A. ‘Honorine Jobert’ against a dark backdrop of Actaea ‘Brunette’ (which is readying its fragrant white flower spikes as I write) in the white border…

Summer will soon be drawing to a close. It seems particularly unfair that while so far it’s been largely cool and cloudy, we’re in the middle of another drought. Maybe there’ll be some more warmth and sunshine (as well as rain!) to come before autumn. We live in hope. Actually we don’t – Hope is a small town in Derbyshire – but you know what I mean…

text & images © graham wright 2024