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weather: autumn 2004
Week beginning Wednesday 1st September - September begins warm and dry. High pressure has set in over the southern part of England, and we are getting the sort of weather that we might have expected, but never, experienced in July and August. Sunday Sept 5th is very hot indeed, probably the hottest day since June.
Week beginning Wednesday 8th September - The warm, dry weather continues .. until Friday the 10th, when heavy rain rolls in.
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the garden diary: autumn 2004
This diary is simply my record of what I did in the garden and why. Maybe
at the end of this year I will find it useful to read back through the diary.
September, October, November and December 2004 are lumped together under
'Autumn' and time constraints may limit how often I write.
So, I wrote nothing for 'Autumn'. Going to work and looking after Joseph became a full-time occupation from mid September and I had little time nor inclination to keep this web site updated.
Any time I had for the garden was spent 'tidying' up; autumn (and early winter) has been more about observing than doing. The garden itself kept going quite strongly well into October, with rudbeckias, echinacea and asters providing colour until the heavy rains of October finally left them straggling.
I
harvested 60-odd gourds, all these form two plants raised form seed. Shame
you can't eat them. Next year I might try courgettes in the same spot in
the garden.
I decided that something had to be done about the eucalyptus tree, which has grown at an alarming rate over the last two years, and had me worried about its roots undermining the house, let alone the patio, as well as blocking out pour neighbours share of sunlight. I personally think the tree is unsuitable for the garden, but have not been allowed to get rid of it, so have had to settle for a tough pruning. Every six months I will repeat the process to keep the tree under control.
I continue observing the bird life. As well as the usual residents, we recently have had several blue and coal tits in the garden, which is good, but also two squirrels, one of whom is increasingly audacious in it's attempts to strip the garden of food, which isn't so good. And of course there is a growing cat that prowls around the garden from time to time; I have only witnessed the one pigeon being taken by it, but whenever I see it I scare it off with a hail of small stones.
Sunday 5th September 2004 : early morning
I'm writing early in the morning whilst Deborah feeds Joseph, who woke me up very early this morning. It is a real beauty of a morning, with a shroud of fine mist atop the hills. It looks like being warm again. So far September has been dry, still and warm, a far cry from August.