Awful weather - typical Brits talk

Farway

Dull and cooler, for once, being darker & cooler, hopping out of bed seemed less appealing this morning so a mini lie in

Dusty I see the 'far right' headed your way yesterday. 😮 Yes I saw the news, that area, by Eastney Lifeboat, would be very easy to blockade, only one long narrow road in, sea on one side, mud flats & fences the other side.

2P visiting cat, seems similar the one who visits me, looks, cute, sits on the walls and mooches around but is wary.

No butterflies spotted, but my pyracantha berries are looking ripe, spotted a pigeon having a taste yesterday, so I moved a camera upstairs and hopefully can get The Birds once the berries are truly spotted.

Had some warm sun yesterday, and managed to trim the outdoor tomato foliage off, well most of it, let the sun & air into finalise the ripening.

Plus garden wheelie out for collection, not as easy as it sounds, I have to trundle it from back to front, via a shared access path which has part of the path getting overgrown [neighbour not cutting it back]. I always have secateurs in my pocket for that section. That bit comes & goes, along with the occupants, more changes than politicians promises aspirations

No gardening today, more or less up together, and rain is due tonight so I think I can skip watering for today

I did get some fleece over my Champion apple tree, apples still not ready yet, hopefully this will deter birds, not so easy to get at them

twopenny

Looks reasonable Farway. Not sure it would deter my blackbirds. They seem to see cover as a place not to be seen while up to nefarious things.

Wort work and gardening? I remember when I could do that. Very good for unwinding. Don't forget to wave at Bluey as you trundle off into her territory. Salute the departed 😄

Oh and your sunset photo is on the weekly round up page 😍

Less that's quite a haul of interesting insects. The bee garden program taught me a lot about bee behaviour which was a lot like that. I'm collecting stuff for a decent insect overwintering house though goodness knows there's enough places around here anyway.

Dusty it's good of you to give mention to the misses for her excellent photography when you could take credit for yourself. She's pretty red hot for the insects.

No gardening today. It's my turn for still feeling very tired and groggy. Rest isn't helping so I'm guessing it's something to do with the op and overdoing it. So gently does it again.

Going to look for more walnuts. I found that leaving them outside then using a teaknife to quater the pod and leaving them again causes the green to shrink and can be popped off. Then leaving the nuts to dry. They are the right colour and healthy looking but my winter stash, not to be opened till then. I have had a load one year that were all bad but we'll see.

Just copying photos so maybe something later of recent adventures 🙂 So, late summer drought still bought some dried, seedig plants into focus in the late evening light. No you don't have to zap these thistles Dusty!

LessImpecunious

Great photo 2P; and Mrs D's Clouded Yellow, my attempts with the one that landed briefly on a buddleia just looked like an off-white blob…

Dusty That's an interesting experimental crop, Less. I wonder how it works? Just left for the wildlife? Doesn't look like combine country!

Yes, it was location as much as crop combo that was the puzzle (though Gurgle did throw up a few refs which I didn't follow up)… However, location is adjacent to a pheasant shoot, and pheasants were certainly helping themselves; wondered whether grown for them…and in fact another Gurgle has just confirmed likelihood… At least it might keep them away from local roads where they are a ruddy menace occasional inconvenience (and the odd far-roaming ones away from our garden, several miles away…). Don't begrudge them attempting to escape their intended fate, but our dogs love to roll in pheasant pooh, which is distinctly aromatic…

Cloudy but bright here today, some rain this evening, but so far September has been (relatvely) warm, so hoping my late-sown autumn/winter veg have some chance of survival…

wort

2p thanks for the photo heads up, I don’t tend to go on the main pages often. My 5 min of relative fame 😹Your photo is definitely worth of front page , captures the season of mist and mellow fruitfulness perfectly.

My dd said the same about gardening after work, thought I was mad, but you know otherwise.

Dusty I don’t think I’ve ever spotted a clouded butterfly before, Mrs D has done well.

Farway, should I suggest to dgson to take off the leaves on his tomatoes 🍅 they are outside and it’s been very wet these past few days. Last I saw of his they were way more abundant than mine, but not so ripe. I can check them today, I am going to see both DDs at his house. Unfortunately there’s been a death of a very close relative and there’s stuff they are sorting, it’s been a tough week for them.

Rain due today, so might leave the wash for tomorrow when they forcast is better.

Farway

Rain overnight, still drizzle but mild

Wort Farway, should I suggest to dgson to take off the leaves on his tomatoes 🍅 they are outside and it’s been very wet these past few days. Last I saw of his they were way more abundant than mine, but not so ripe. I can check them today, I am going to see both DDs at his house

Yes, remove most, if not all leaves. Just leave one or two past the top truss. Leaving, with the warm damp weather, is a welcome mat for Blight. removing leaves now lets sun & air in, their job is done, it's the fruit you want now.

Love that pic 2P, caught everything just right. Hope your rest and easing back a bit has improved the groggy spell.

No birds spotted posing for a pic on the pyracantha, naturally enough now I have a camera in the right spot

No gardening, wet + my bashed knee. I still have GW to catch, plus a Parker's catalogue has arrived for me to drool over, and some maturing ISA thinking

Dustyevsky

2p: Dusty it's good of you to give mention to the misses for her excellent photography when you could take credit for yourself. She's pretty red hot for the insects.

She used to be pretty warm in other respects too 😁, but I'll ignore that and focus on honesty, which is almost always the best policy, even when it upsets people. That's why I get hot under the collar about the lies spouted daily in the MSM. 🤬

Mrs D often beats me with the photos nowadays. She carries her phone much more often than I cart a camera about, and good pictures are closely related to opportunity. With the Clouded Yellow, though, we were both there, armed with our 'weapon' of choice, and she got the better shot. Good for her! 😇

Well done to wort, and to you for spotting her front page picture.🙂 That Exmoor photo of yours is a stunner too! ☺️ While I wouldn't want those thistles here, up there they're in keeping with the rough pasture ecology.

wort: Dusty I don’t think I’ve ever spotted a clouded butterfly before,

We hadn't either, which is why we were so keen to get a photo, but if summers become hotter, they'll go further north, and more will be seen nationally. They even get into Scotland, but not often. In flight, they can't be missed, thanks to the very orange upper wing colour:

Clouded Yellow (upperwing) Mark Joy

Less, it's probably significant that mixed crop was next to a pheasant shoot. Around us the pheasants are usually fed from blue plastic barrels through an on-demand system, but labour's still required to top those up. Once grown, a field of food requires little or no human input.

Like you, Farway, we had a good, steady dose of rain overnight. I might join you and 2p in having a quieter day to rest various bits.🤔 I've only a short time in which to resubmit my plans to the local authority, or they cancel the lot.☹️ Our architect SiL cannot see what's wrong with the site location plan, and he's submitted hundreds of the things. There is a minor inaccuracy of scale on the detailed block plan, but this is an area of garden, not a block of flats, and I've given an 8 figure map reference, drone and Google Earth shots etc! I'll re-do that one using a commercial app, pay some shekels and see what the jobsworths say…..I'm still finding it hard to get over the £630 they require to make an easy decision on a matter so old, nothing can be enforced. 😐️

Today's photo features fresh fruit…..and a cake so good, the exhibitor ate the slice pictured before leaving the hall! 🤣

twopenny

Some decent rain seems to have fallen overnight and it's about 13c . Wouldn't it though because I had the walnuts outside 'drying'.

Nearly put the heating on this morning but didn't because I opened the electric bill this morning 😬 I pay more in standing charges than the leccy.

Yes photography can be weird. Spend ages trying to get something special and the best is some random shot. We have misty as one project and I was all set to go out today with the mist but by the time I got ready it's gone. Just grey and damp now.

Fed the birds and looks like that's about it. My search for new dwarf kale seeds has been fruitless, or should that be seedless?

So apart from a swim looks like I can't evade the Dom non today. Cleaning the car windows ready for the low sun and if it stops raining I need to look under the bonnet and see if I can understand the cramped engine parts to service.

Yes thanks Farway, slight anemia probably from so many salads so it's a red meat diet for a while because you know what iron tablets do to you 😲 beware though. I bought some minced lamb on discount from Tesco and it had a lot of water in......

Dustyevsky

2p: My search for new dwarf kale seeds has been fruitless, or should that be seedless?

They seem to be about. As we're on MSE, these are the cheapest:

https://premierseedsdirect.com/product/kale-borecole-dwarf-green-curled/?srsltid=AfmBOor8G41M154oRXG-_Z75PDpX8uEdtzHWAdUIPR5mKaP7YByxz0U3

Of course there's P&P, but there must be a few other items that could tempt you! 😈

Next year I'm going to try this, as well as the plain green one I've eaten this year:

https://premierseedsdirect.com/product/herb-purslane-golden/

😁

twopenny

Thanks Dusty but too expensive for the 6 plants I need.

We were eating Samphire on our walk the other day. It tickles me it's supposed to be a rare delicacy and we trample all over it 😀

I had a good find when I was hanging out my swim things.

Edit: missed you're post this morning because we seem to be in west country time sync again . The butterfly is a great shot but that cake looks amazing 👏 I can taste it just by looking and frustrated I can't have a slice or two!

LessImpecunious

MoreVeg have 12 Dwarf Kale seeds for 60p plus 1.90 p&p … https://moreveg.co.uk/products/kale-green-curled-dwarf

They specialise in tiny small amounts of seed (the opposite of PSD😁) - but rarely buy from them as I usually prefer to have too many seeds (we have a local seed swap group, and too much seed is always better than too little, especially for the cack-handed and slug-prone…). I don't grow Dwarf Kale, or could offer to send you some seed (for 91p p&p, or maybe some of those delicious-looking strawberries 😎) (mods please note, joke, not actually trying to transact business).