Awful weather - typical Brits talk

DD265

Beautiful roses! I shall add a few photos of mine...

This is Arthur Bell (a sentimental one for me)


A cheapy from B&M


A climber from B&Q - I don't have much height for it to go at, unfortunately. I think an arch might be overkill...


The first rose I bought from the garden centre, and I have a sucker from it in another pot.


I can't think when/where I acquired this one, but I adore the colours


As you can see I've been struggling with black spot (and aphids). Initially I was stripping leaves but on advice from my grandparents I am keeping them on now, and will be more aware of it in spring next year, hopefully catching it early enough.

The best thing I've done in the garden this week is get a retractable hanging basket pulley, meaning I can reach the hanging basket to water it now. Well worth the £8.

wort

Lovely roses dd265, the apricot one is stunning. I've a soft spot for Arthur too! I'm afraid I get black spot on all the roses in my garden, and I even tried using chemicals one year every 2 weeks as prescribed but it didn't help and then I kept forgetting,😬 
Another warm day, need to get my washing out! 

Farway

Lovely pics again, the sunset & peonies was a match made for a camera, as is DD265 last one with rain on.

Warm, bit dull but bright enough, today's garden tasks are get the garden waste bin out for collection tomorrow and tie in the new blackberry canes for next year

The rhubarb was pulled & a crumble duly followed, plus one pea pod picked, popped & eaten, only few left now but a taster was all I wanted this year, and it was from a left over own saved pod so MS again

Once I wheel the garden bin round the front I'll trim back the red campion which is now setting seed, I'll give the pods a good shake over the semi wild verge near me to try & spread them about a bit

For some reason the evening primroses that always came up seem to have deserted me this year . However I fortuitously sprinkled some in the volunteer border & they've taken OK thus I have a fresh seed source for 2022

On fortuitously I was trying to master manual focusing using my new cheap Chinese lens that arrived yesterday when a bee settled just as I clicked the shutter

The flowers are Thorn Free blackberry

goldfinches

@Farway - I'd say you'd mastered that manual focussing brilliantly, I can see every hair on the bumble's back in wonderful detail, lovely photo. That peanut does look happy too.
@DD265 - lovely roses and the raindrops one is a wonderful colour, reminds me of apricot skins.
@twopenny - your neighbour's plain daft to prefer a bin to Blush Noisette, lovely arrangement in your sitting room too. The pigeons and blackbirds are eating the cherries from the ornamental here even before they've ripened.
@wort - your paeonies catching the sunset are gloriously effulgent.
@pink_poppy - I thought that was a banana inflorescence for a moment, it looks tremendously exotic in your photo.

twopenny

Not so much an arrangement Goldfinches. More cutting them off and sticking them in a jug.

It did look very 'Homes & Gardens' for a couple of days though :-)

Only jobs are cutting brambles and hammering in wires and I'm very much not in the mood. It will still be there at the weekend.

Did work up the energy to pinch the broad beans. Probably ready by tomorrow.

Davesnave

Sorry no new photos from me, although I have potential subjects in mind. DB has been called away on a mercy mission for aged parents, so I'm suddenly doing 2 people's jobs and facing a couple of other challenges too.

Worst among them is keeping the hay crop clean, as I have a mentally unstable and vindictive neighbour who saves beer bottles all year, then launches them into the hay field just before we harvest. It's either in the hope they'll smash and spoil that part of the crop when the cutter goes through, or remain undetected and injure animals fed on it. He's a nasty piece of work, but fortunately not too bright, so I know pretty much where the bottles will be, just not when they'll arrive. Eleven were there on Wednesday. Last year it was 15, so either I've missed some, or perhaps more are coming! I wish our partner farmer had done the cut last week, because the outlook doesn't look settled now. I understand he consults the mystic Devon weather runes, otherwise known as 'Country File.'

Apart from a couple of hours methodical field walking, I've also been charged with sorting-out the main garden, neglected in favour of chicks and the new herb area. This will be interesting because I've never been allowed to do more than weeding....  until now! I've already planted some nice shrubs.

So, it's promises, promises only here and I've even cancelled a walk I was due to do tomorrow due to the amount of jobs piling-up and not wishing to leave the place unattended most of the day. I suppose it will keep, but these weeks of summer before the school holidays are precious.

twopenny

Arrangement goldfinches? Lol. Trimmed off the arch an jammed in a jug. But it did look very homes and gardens in the room.

goldfinches

2p - I do agree that your room looked enviably attractive. I especially liked your blanket on the back of the arm chair and the floral chair/sofa in the background on the right; in fact, I made a mental note to ask you where you bought the floral fabric sometime. 
Davesnave - commiserations over your 'orrible, mean spirited neighbour. Interesting that he manages to amass such a low number of beer bottles annually but I do hope that if there are more that you find them before your field is cut. Hopefully one day he'll move and someone nicer will move in. Sorry to hear that your DB had to ride to the rescue but hope you're enjoying planting up the garden with your choices and not working too hard.

I'm just off to the supermarket for more milk and intend to check a broad bean plant that I noticed had self sown at the corner of a churchyard earlier this year so I'll maybe take a photo of that and stick it on here later.

twopenny

Dave our posts crossed. Takes ages for me on a Kindle with the new set up.

Love watching the hay making locally. Was hoping to get some photos as it looked so idylic but they were at it like wild things with rain forcast for tomorrow.

Thank you Goldfinches. The throw was a cheapie from the Factory shop to add colour. Lockdown you could buy cream paint or white and I was beginning to feel like I was living in a vanilla ice cream. But also nice for snuggling in winter. The chairs, one Great Great Grandfathers been with me all my life, the other was a sale bargain and still frighteningly expensive and in Chalfont chintz when it was last in fashion. Winged chairs may not be vogue but to snooze as you listen to something they are the business over modern ones.

I'm stuck with them partly for comfort but they were what came with me in the move from a big house and lockdown hasn't been great for shopping.

Been out to survey the garden, plucked a few lawn weeds, picked a mug full of raspberries (that programme of autumn ones in second year has been a sucess), seen that my £2 rescue rose Dublin Bay has more buds - Yay.

Broad beens are nearly there. I have the local gammon steak waiting. Strawberries not so good due to the everlasting dry.

Lawn needs mowing but I decided to walk a beautiful valley river path instead. Saw a beautiful wall with several highly scented old roses on top and a glorious tree that Jeepers would have liked. Maybe a dog wood.

Davesnave

There is a wine bottle too, goldfinches, so I guess that's Christmas! Academic at present as the drizzle has arrived so I won't be wading in waist high grass for a while.

And we couldn't have walked yesterday anyway, as my friend had a long-promised mini-digger in her garden, re-landscaping in preparation for paths and patio. It's a new build,  so there will probably be enough bricks now to build a wall and sufficient clay to fashion the odd statue or two.

I managed to whizz round everything with the mower yesterday and plant a few shrubs, but I had to nip into town for things we'd run out of too. Morrisons seemed to have had some kind of disaster, judging by the state of their plant display. DB confirmed she'd seen the same when passing through a few days ago. They normally keep their stock better than many other outlets.

I had the camera on the wrong setting when I took the picture of the next plant I wanted to extol the virtues of, so here instead is another geranium, this time a double one, Geranium pratense 'plenum violaceum, here fronted by another great plant, especially for the insects, Echium vulgare. The latter wasn't planted there, it just seeded itself in the right place.