Another Sunday outing

This weekend we went for another autumn walk to clear our heads of homework, emails and report writing and this weekend we chose a beach walk so Autumn's advancing was less pronounced.

I wasn't expecting to get a post out of it at all as we wandered along Porthcurnick Beach on the Roseland Peninsular, most of my time was spent looking at the shells and sea weed which were particularly impressive there. 

Once I had exhausted my 'ways to pimp your shell' hunt, (here are the best two)

we wandered up to have a look at the lovely Hidden Hut Cafe, which overlooks the beach, as we thought we might bring our next group of visitors here. 

Now, just looking at a Cafe never goes well and we ended up staying for delicious Roskilly ice creams and hot chocolate obviously, but what was particularly lovely about the cafe were the little flower arrangements dotted around. Simple, fresh and obviously picked from a much loved garden, they were charming.

With late Tagetes and sprays of berries...

colourful foliage and Japanese Anemones...

...in pretty glass vases.

Enamel jugs with Cosmos, Rudbeckia and Larkspur (my current favourites).

...an impressive array of squashes...

...and the most up market dog bowl ever!

The Hidden Hut is open until the end of October and then weekends only until Christmas.

Apparently they do Soup Sundays and Feast Nights too, so a return trip is very likely.

Autumn Walk

Last weekend we went for a meandering walk along the river Fal and the hedgerows were burgeoning.

The Ivy was flowering...

draped with strings of beautiful (but poisonous) Black Bryony berries, just like Christmas decorations.

Underfoot were rustling leaves...

 fallen Yew berries...

 and mossy twigs.

Fluffy Wild Clematis seed heads, not so good for foragers, but...

there were Rosehips perfect for Rosehip jelly...

Hawthorne bushes covered in haws...

 Blackberries still ripening for crumbles and Sloes perfect for steeping for Sloe Gin (but not until they've been frosted)

But the bramble leaves are turning...

with reds and yellows appearing...

...turning to browns.

And terrifyingly there are berries already on the Holly!

Jolly plant sale

This Saturday morning the Daisy! duo set off down to Boscowen Park in Truro for the annual Parks and Gardens plant sale. I wasn't sure what to expect having never been before and the first lesson we learnt was to go early as most of the good stuff had gone. The sale is usually around the first weekend of October from 8.30am - 10.30am - we got there at about 9.45.

Basically, the idea is that you go down to the park, find a jolly park keeper and point out the bits in the park beds that you would like and he digs them up for you (unless of course you choose bits that aren't for sale like we did. In fact we got as far as digging some things up that weren't for sale and the jolly park keeper had to replant them - sorry about that, got a bit overexcited!).

It was like a sweetie shop!!

A park keepers barrow full of Cannas, Salvias and Begonias for one lucky shopper

Jayne choosing Cannas

One of the beds that the Parkies had started to dismantle

This is one of the things we tried to steal - I liked it's silvery fluffiness, I just wasn't quick enough!

It has to be said that you would have been happiest if you were after perennial Begonias (which I most certainly wasn't) but there were lots of other things and all very cheap - a large sack of bedding plants was just £2.50!

I got 2 huge Cannas for £5 plus lots of advice on how to grow them. I am hoping that they will look something like this -

 These are still planted up in the road outside my house and the bright green leaves you can see are the variegated Abutilon that I was after too - we were too late for those.

I have been advised to leave my Cannas in the bag, bare rooted, until they die right back, cut them right back and plant them in a pot, keeping them frost free. When they start shooting I need to start watering and they will be fabulous! I'll let you know how I get on.

Truro Parks and Gardens are very active in Britain in Bloom and regularly win prizes. They do amazing displays all over the city, put up countless hanging baskets and have just started doing wild flower patches in central reservations. They vary their seed mixes and the wild flowers are still just about flowering even now!

This is a picture of some of the gorgeous wild flowers earlier in the year - lovely.

Chief Parkie told us that they have planted out 83,000 plants so far this year, most grown from seed in their own greenhouses, and some from plug plants bought in. 

That makes my garden planting seem really quite manageable!

And not satisfied with plant raising, planting and maintaining (and a huge amount of watering this summer), the Parkies are now turning their hand to willow sculpture. This is one of their pieces lurking in the plant yard - definitely not for sale!

A willow reindeer waiting for the festive winter display in the park.

Christmas is coming - aaarrghhh!

It's been a while but here's No 31 and 32

It's a long time since I added to my 'Flowering in my garden' series, so having missed the whole of the summer (the last post was at the end of May!) I thought I should pull my socks up and get on.

So here is  No 31 Rudbeckia

This is a plant that I planted for the first time last autumn in my new bed at the bottom of the front garden and it has been wonderful. Planted in November and then ignored, it was drowned during the winter and has been parched through the summer but even so it has performed beautifully, so I guess you could say it was robust and unfussy!

This is 'Goldsturm' and the centres are deep brown with a lovely circle of yellow specs.

Beautiful reflexed petals.

Tight buds...

and when they have opened and finished, the centre is a gorgeous, brown velvety cushion sitting in the centre of a green rosette.

It produces copious quantities of flowers over a number of months, this is just one plant, and it seems largely untroubled by slugs and snails!

It also acts as a lovely foil for other plants - here is my first sucessful Echinops...

and here is my No 32 - Larkspur, another first for me and almost as successful as the Rudbeckia.

This is Larkspur Dark Blue, grown from seed which came free with Gardeners Illustrated. Sown in April, they grew very slowly during the spring and early summer...

but once they went into the ground in July they grew away strongly. I kept them in a pots for so long because I was concerned about the snails and slugs. I had already had some of the plants that I had grown munched to oblivion and wanted to make sure that some got to flowering.

And here they are, four healthy bushy plants with the characteristic spires of vivid blue flowers. At this time of year many of the flowers in the garden are muted colours or faded looking but not the Larkspur (specially next to the Rudbeckia). Their colours hit the eyeball with a joyous vigour.

Larkspur have lovely ferny, soft foliage which is looking lush and green next to the fading Hostas.

The horned flowers are beautifully formed, and there are still spires of buds to come so hold off frosts, don't spoil my fun!