Tips for September

Now the rains have arrived start giving lawns a light trim.

Remove the spent flower spikes of earlier flowering perennials.

Take cuttings of tender plants such as salvia, lavender, cuphea and verbena.

Start saving seeds of favourite plants. They keep well in paper envelopes in the fridge.

Finish trimming hedges.

Discussing the Weather

It has been an interesting and busy month. According to good old fashioned British tradition, we must of course discuss the weather!
It was so hot at the beginning of the month that we were watering trees, shrubs, perennial borders and ourselves almost constantly.
Cornus, rhododendron, cercis, phlox and asters are particularly drought intolerant. However with the help of the long hoses and leaky pipe we were able to manage until the rains finally arrived. And arrive in style they did! We were deluged with water that filled the gutters, overflowed the drains, swamped the new toilet block and ran off down the drive, into the horse pool. Since then it has been intermittent 'wetting rain' which is much preferred. All the grass has turned back to green from a dusty hay colour, which of course means that we were out today giving it all a light trim.

The re-enactment of the battle of Worcester by the Sealed Knot group was a great success, (see picture).

Several fields along the old main drive to the house were taken over for an encampment and battlefield.
Guns, cannons, smoke, fire, horses, men dressing up, women and children.... it was great fun to watch, with the light hearted yet very informative commentary issuing over the (not very authentic) tannoy system. We went with a friend from Poland who thought that British people are .... eccentrically British!

Unfortunately the eggs taken from the white peahen were infertile.
The new keeper put it down to the fact that there are two males and only one female. I'm not sure what that means.

Now our main task in September is to cut all the yew hedges. Richard and I started trimming the Fountain Beds just before the August Bank Holiday. We only have another 4 weeks of cutting to go!

There was some sad news in the middle of the month when we were told that Bill Roberts, the husband of Isabelle who used to take the money on the gate, passed away. We all send our prayers and condolences to Isabelle, who is currently with her family in Canada.