It doesn’t look as if there is going to be much of an autumn show but one or two plants are still struggling to flower for the first time. This little nasturtium self seeded under the rowan tree and is only now putting out intense orange flowers.
It clashes horribly with the pink anemones but is welcome none the less for its splash of cheerful colour.I grew these verbascum phoeniceum from seed in the spring.
They germinated well and I had plenty of plants to dot around the beds on the first tier. I hope they will look good with the foxgloves next year and be as popular with the insects. I had more plants than I needed so I dibbled a few in on this awkward ledge. Of course the only ones to flower this year, would be the ones that I can’t see unless I clamber into this difficult space at the side of the garden.And finally this honeysuckle. It was a very old bushy plant which struggled with an endemic black fly infection.
It was covered in the pests last year and they appeared again, very early this spring, in numbers that obscured the few flowers struggling to open. Then some mad woman went and chucked bowl after bowl of coop antibacterial washing up liquid over the bush which promptly went, “Arggggh,” and dropped all its leaves. At that point I cut it back to a few twisted woody stems and thought I would soon be digging it up and throwing it out entirely. I had a very pretty climbing hydrangea from Mum and Dad which I thought would be perfect in the spot. The honeysuckle had other ideas, it immediately sprouted new growth, has grown vigorously all summer, and is now showing these very pretty flowers which are even providing shelter for hover flies. 
It’s a scarred battlefield hero and has earned its place in the garden. As for the hydrangea, it is now flowering happily beneath the summerhouse and I hope will one day clamber up around the decking.
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