Autumn has arrived

Yep, there are clear indicators.  The asters are in bloom next to the rosemary in the back yard...

the rudbeckia are going great guns at the foot of the driveway (need MORE of these!)...

... and the cats' bellies are at full extension, to maximize absorption of the somewhat paler sunshine:

Honorine Jobert

The japanese anemone always redeems itself at this time of year. Actually, it started blooming quite early - at the end of July - but it took until September to reach its full height and glory. It is especially tall this year, almost as tall as me (see portrait-by-geek above). Also especially glorious is the hydrangea, which has been blooming up a storm since the middle of August.  You can see it in the background.  Enjoy it now, since the nights are getting colder, and it is one of the first (after the hostas) to succumb to anything approaching frost.

"Yes, yes, the white flowers are very pretty, but did you notice that this tree is crooked?"

More catching up

I took this photo at the end of August, to show the "other" apples in the jardin. This is just a baby tree, and it had a hard start in life. When we bought the house the tree was leaning way over to one side, with its roots exposed on the other side. Every time Mum comes to visit she props it up with forked stick. This makes it happier, which has made it start to produce more fruit each year, which then makes it heavier, so it leans over again. Also, as the summer progresses, these other perennials start to swamp it too. I now know that they are phlox! The combination is (was) charming. Now I am picking the apples, for my own health and the health of the tree.

Catching up

You know how sometimes you stand up, stride out of the room with purpose, and then, within steps, completely forget what that purpose was? I think it happens to cats too. Oz looks like something out of a George Booth cartoon in the New Yorker.

I've had that same manic look on my face since the beginning of August. Around that time, I decided I should photograph all the daylillies for the blog, so that I would remember their various colours for next year, in case I want to move anything around. Here's the one picture I managed to get:

I like the closeup, but it sure doesn't help me remember which of the daylillies it is. Fortunately, the very next photo in the series helped me to ID the location.

It's probably not obvious to anyone but me, but Oz is pointing out that this particular daylilly is in the back border, to the right of the maple, to the left of the pergola-with-the-monster-rose, and just behind the lupins. Intelligent kitty!

The mysteries of composting

I could kick myself now for not taking pictures of this during the summer. My approach to composting is decidedly laissez-faire.  I just keep burying the kitchen scraps in the same old square wooden-slatted bin, without doing all the turning and emptying and babying that you're supposed to do.  So it's not too surprising that in the early summer I noticed some green leafy things growing out of the pile, looking as though they meant it. Hmmm, they looked sort of familiar, but they weren't one of the usual weeds.  I left them, and they grew taller and wider. Soon there wasn't too much room left for burying new stuff - I was sneaking in the peelings around the edges of the bin. But the leafy things were flowering - pretty little pale yellow flowers.

Then, last week, I got fed up - the leafy things were taking so much space I couldn't dig anything in.  I grabbed the pitchfork and jabbed at the roots of the leafy things, to pull them out and mix them in with the rest of the compost. When I pulled the fork back out, beautiful pale golden nuggets fell away from tines. My first-ever potato harvest! I scrabbled around in there for a good 15 minutes, pulling out the little beauties. Then I scrubbed them with the fingernail brush and left them in a little dish so that the geek could take their portrait:

And then we ate them for dinner.  Yum! Creamy, buttery goodness.  I must try to remember to throw out some rotting ones again next spring.