Six on Saturday - End of July 2023

 It has been a strange sort of a week weather wise with very low light.  We have had some rain but as in the case with the weather yesterday it never did, though threatened several times with a shed load up somewhere on the Mendips, which explains why the reservoirs locally are 85% full.  Washing was dried outside, dead heading of roses and pruning back of rosemary, lavender and phlomis shrubs this week means the front garden resembles one of those men's hairstyles in vogue similar to the old fashioned short back and sides but with a few 'artistic' gouges, fauxhawks or side partings.  In a couple of weeks and for the next year it will look far better than if it had been left in the grunge rewilded format!

Six specifics now to remind myself of what caught my eye or rather the camera this week.  I join as many others do, under Jim's post:  Six on Saturday.

Here we go:

1: Diascia Personata is continuing to flower, with taller stems than I would like, needing to be helped to an upright position, maybe it is lacking in light.

2. As well as the above which was bought at a garden open day, this little Persicaria was bought at a road side stall of a garden, that was going to be open the following week.  It is called Persicaria Virginia 'Bat Wings', I have no idea of what it will be like, for now it is planted in the so called shady border.

3. In another part of the garden the rain and low light have suited Persicaria amplexicaulis 'Golden Arrow'. A small piece came as a present from my friend Maggie who does garden up on the Mendips and yes she does get a 'shed lot more rain' than we do on the windward of the hills. I'm looking forward to the elongation and seeing the bright flowers which will no doubt make an appearance on my 'In a Vase on Monday' Posts.

Persicaria amplexicaulis 'Golden Arrow'.

4. Close by the Golden Arrow is the fourth of the new rose collection.  Rose Home Florist Timeless Purple.

5. In the same area The Fuchsia 'Delta's Sara' had the nipping the growing tips action imposed on her starting when the shoots were just 15cm heigh, and this has given me a better sized shrub for the spot as compared with last year. As with the other Fuchsias in the garden the flowering season has begun.

Low down the first blooms are nicely offset by the dark leaves of Oxalis Triangularis.

6. Bumblebees: if I am sitting in the conservatory or peering out of the kitchen window I can tell straight away if it has stopped raining or the morning temperatures have risen from the activity of the bumblebees.  I am not a voyeur, but on seeing a couple of bumblebees on the ground, I was fascinated as to what they were doing.  Below a smaller bumble bee with yellow was a much larger one with no yellow markings but with the same red-tailed markings. Thanks to the Bumblebee Conservation Group I was able to identify these as the Red-tailed bumblebee (Bombus lapidarius)

I feel jittery, as we are waiting for arboriculturalists to arrive some time this coming week to tackle the vast overhanging branches or the ever green oak. When will they come? Communication is not that great, will the plants in the garden get damaged?  Protection is being considered, but in a few months time all this anticipation and anxiousness will be in the past.  We have another couple of projects in the pipeline which will involve a temporary removal/protection of plants.  How we gardeners 'suffer' if our little domaine undergoes such upheavals.  Do we feel too much for our gardens and plants?