Four Seasons in a Week?

They'd rather be outside.

Before emigrating to the UK, I lived with four discernible seasons.  In winter, the snow'd get mid-thigh, so I'd let the springer spaniel break a glee-inspired crooked path through the snow to the car. 

This week in my garden, the temps are decidedly winter, but visually, one could argue 4 seasons co-exist here.





1.  In the spring category, bulbs known & unknown are coming up.  Although called summer snowflakes by their friends, the leucojum aestivum took the best photo.  Here, you can see a winter jasmine checking them out.  The yellow leaves against the wall = grasping wisteria that escaped pruning.

Leucogjum aestivum, aka summer snowflake.

2.  For my faux summer, there's still a lot of bloom in the garden - snap dragon, lavender, bergenia, hesperantha, some purple thing I can never remember the name of because I don't really like it but the rest of my family does.  And of course, my good friend calendula.

Calendula.

3.  Clematis seeds represent late summer, early autumn.  It's self-seeded in various cracks & pots over the summer, so I should dead head it, but they're so lovely to look at, I'm being rather foolish about them.

Clematis seed heads.

This clematis was here before us, so identity unknown.  Comparing a bad photo of it in early autumn with Google Images gave me several options, all of which look alike to my untrained eye.  Maybe western white clematis - clematis ligusticifolia - which apparently is native to the west coast of North America.

Last of the clematis blooms.

4.  For something well into autumn, weigela.  I got this one by layering an old shrub in my previous garden.  That house was built in the 1970s, the garden still containing much of the original landscaping, so this guy could be from that era.  It's leaves are unveriegated, the blossoms pinky purple.  Not much to go on, in terms of identification, but that's what it is.  I rather like the old guy.

Weigela photobombed by the cotoneaster.

5.  For all this pretend-season foolduggery, one (me) must admit it's actually winter.  This week we got the dread snow, which I'd hoped would kill off the chard. 

Please let it die.

As written previously, this chard came under the guise of a Christmas present in seed form.  Despite our best efforts, none of us enjoyed eating it, though the colours were pretty stunning.

Post snow photo.

The snow did kill off the cosmos next to it, though.  When I removed the cosmos, I found this sneaky little chard growing to beat the band.  You can see it behind the grown-up chard in the post snow photo.

Really purple chard.

So my love-hate of chard continues.  Its colour may win a permanent place in the flowerbed.

6.  Tales of Brer Fox.  I've been watching his antics in the back garden via my wildlife cam.  One of his regular habits is to stand in pots to get a better look at things before exiting the garden.  The snow revealed that a certain Doodle (who shall remain nameless), tracks his every move.

Doodle tiptoeing through the garlic.

This is the first time since last spring that Brer Fox dug anything up, though.  Hopefully this was one raucous night that won't be repeated.

Very glad Brer Fox left the bulbs for replanting.

Mizzy BunnyButt scouring for next week's SoS.

Thus ends the four seasons pretence.  Please be sure to hop over to The Propagator for his Six, plus links in his comment section to other Six on Saturday garden blogs.  New blogs come up over the weekend, so be sure to follow #SixonSaturday on Twitter as well.

See you next week!

Six Things Great & Small

Big Nose Dog ready for trick-or-treaters.

Oh my goodness me, it's nearly Halloween!  A day everyone in this house looks forward to, including the dogs.  A garden wouldn't be my garden if there weren't a pumpkin patch in it, but since moving to the UK, the results haven't always been what I'm used to.








Which brings me to my first of the six.  The pumpkin.

1.  This variety was billed as prolific, with fruit the size of footballs.  I'm nothing if not gullible & got several plants.  One lone, tennis-ball-sized midget is the year's full crop.

My jack-o-lanterns will be courtesy Asda this year.

After only 18 years, I need to admit defeat & research growing pumpkins here.

2.  Here's something tiny that I'm not going to complain about.  With the various critturs that run through the garden, it's a gift, finding one of these fellas intact.

Fancy little parasol.

3.  The last of the small guys, the bugle weed always meets black tie standards.

Creeping across the pavement, headed toward the lawn.

4.  Now for the big guys.  I got chard seed as a stocking stuffer last year, not something I knew much about.  

Beautiful foliage.

It grew like wildfire, so we gamely looked up recipes, cooked our hearts out & came to the conclusion we aren't chard eaters.  The neighbours were grateful, however, and I love how it looks, so'll probably plant it again next year.

Stunning colours.

5.  The other large finalist is a thistle that self seeded in the border.  Enticing to gold finches, I tell anyone who looks askance at it, but secretly, I simply love a good thistle.  

Love the flowers.

My phone camera doesn't do the colour justice, the darks & lights in one bloom.  This one's a beaut (although the fuschia behind it might disagree).

6.  The last selection will be one of several Unknowns in the garden, most inherited, though some self seeded.  These lovely, delicate things grow in any pavement crack they can find, have bloomed most of the year and even now, valiantly resist the cold.  Any idea what it could be?

Tubular yellow blooms, leaves similar to a bleeding heart.

Hope you enjoyed visiting the garden.  Our Artistic Director & I look forward to next week's Six On Saturday.

Mizzy Bunny Butt, aka our Artistic Director.

Check out all the other Six On Saturday contributors at The Propagator's site.