Six on Saturday - 5 September 2026

We are sighing with relief as rain arrives every few days.  Gardening is once more a great pleasure, as I am sure several of us will admit to when you read other posts linked in to Jim's weekly Six on Saturday post.

1. The garden has perked up nicely following cooler temperatures, a little rain, and some cloud cover. The colour change had started to creep in a few weeks back, the Cornus sanguinea 'Midwinter Fire' as it feel its chlorophyll needs stashing away, do doubt brought on early due to the drought.

Cornus sanguinea 'Midwinter Fire'

2. You have to bend to see these little gems, but it is worth it.  From one small pot several years ago, I have from time to time split the clumps and they finally form a 'fairy circle' around the Ginkgo Tree. The  Acis autumnalis have just started to come up, and strangely not that evenly, as regards to timing. Next week the whole ring will be up and flowering.

Acis autumnalis

3. Another bending moment is required to view the lovely Cyclamen hederifolium that are appearing around the garden.  In a few weeks these will have beautiful leaves lasting all winter, many with unusual patterning.

Cyclamen hederifolium coming up

4. Am I scraping the barrel with this one, or scraping a fungus off a terracotta saucer?   I read that 'The bright yellow fruiting bodies commonly seen in houseplant soil belong to Leucocoprinus birnbaumii, a saprotrophic fungus known as the flowerpot parasol or plant-pot fungus'. These growths are likely to belong to Leucocoprinus birnbaumii, the "flower pot" fungus. I saw this on another base of pot and saucer, a few weeks ago, and went slightly wobbly at the knees wondering whether this would be fatal, not so I read but it is the tell tale sign that I may have been overwatering!

5. Athyrium otophorum var. okanum got moved to the garden from its pot in 2024, but this year proved dire for its health where it was.  This week, I decided to dig it up and hopefully with a lot of tlc it will recover so it is a question of  'In the convalescence bay' rather than  'The exit bay'. At least if we have as hot and sunny a summer next year, I can easily move it to the shade, and water it, but not overwater it! Hopefully it will look like this next year. 

On the subject of ferns,  my three ferns in lovely pots also looked a little bedraggled a few weeks ago. Each year I have a little moth/caterpillar which feast on it.  The leaves then start to get brown and tatty.  For the last few years, and again these have occupied the same pots now for probably fifteen years, I trim all the leaves back, and soak the whole pot and top in a bucket of dilute seaweed extract.  It only takes a couple of weeks for new fronds to form, and I have the pleasure once more of delicate new green fronds along the shady side alley.

This was a fern that 'appeared' in the Kenilworth garden, the first one one is probably a year older, than the other two, and new ones have formed in the garden here too.  

6.  The sting from the sun has gone, and I felt it was time to consider a freshen up of the succulents, and with rain now in the offing, they can now be moved back to each side of the front door.  Each year I have left them there more or less all summer, but this year they would have been too hot, and have been in the back garden since late May. Some have been repotted, old leaves removed and cuttings taken etc.

The balance are back in the shed or still out in the garden. It is usually 5C above forecast temperatures here, and I only move the succulents into the conservatory when the forecast is for ground frosts.

I continue to reposition, trim, edit, and take cuttings...all wonderful activities preparing for next year.

Green Olive and Semolina Pavé from Bake with Jack Homebaker's Club

I was enjoying a delicious lunch with friends on Friday, as part of our book club,  when I said I had planned making a pavé.  I explained what a pavé loaf is but not in french: 

'Un pavé est un bloc solide en pierre, en béton ou en bois utilisé pour le revêtement des rues, des cours ou des terrasses'.  With the criss crosses in my mind I had the dark bricks that you sometimes find in victorian stables.  The loaf is only shaped like this, and is definitely light and delicious. 

A pavé loaf, or pain pavé, is a rustic French bread named after the French word for "cobblestone" due to its flat, low-profile, and blocky rectangular shape.

Of course I followed Jack's step by step demonstration via the Homebaker's Club, and I followed the final shaping demo twice to get it just right.  I didn't have the full 150g green olives as required but found around 100g in a couple of pots I had, some of which were marinated in  a hot spicy mixture, which I partially washed off.  As several of the bakes use fine semolina,  I was pleased to find it online.

The dough is pretty sticky but I kept to Jack's technique, and found leaving it a few minutes before continuing with the hand kneading effective.  It makes for a large loaf of around 800g with slices having a good oblong profile.

We had some for lunch today with red peppers, tomatoes and cured meats, which followed a delicious chicken and asparagus soup. That had been made a week or so ago, and came out the freezer this morning.  It was a lovely lunch to follow a long morning working in the garden.

Each month with the bread recipes, Jack who is also a chef, gives extra recipes and tutorials on using the breads. Jack is such a good teacher it is worth joining the club, if only for a month or two to decide if this is for you, here is his offer regarding using this bread to make Crisp Bread with a tasty Avocado dip:

'Odds and ends of bread are a useful and fortunate byproduct of our life enriching hobby as homebakers if we have a library of recipes to help us create something delicious with them. When these crispbreads are properly dried they keep really well, indefinitely perhaps. Keep them in an airtight container or food bag and they will be there, ready for dipping or spreading or just snacking whenever you need. Our Green Olive and Semolina Pave is the perfect match for a creamy avocado dip topped with insanely tasty oil of chilli, mint, basil and garlic. Try not to be put off by what seems like a big, long list of ingredients, once you break it down there really isn’t that much there. I have no shame in telling you that I ate this entire dish for my lunch on the day of filming. It was wonderful.'

Six on Saturday - 29 August 2026

At last we are having some rain:  it is as if the soil is sighing in relief and exhaling this wonderful smell called petrichor. Yesterday even with threatening rain I went out to do a little gardening enjoying for a short time the feel of drops landing on my back, through my thin tee shirt, until it started to get heavier. More than happy I tidied away my tools and went inside.

1. It will soon be the season for moving Aeoniums back to less open situations even if it is to shelter from the rain.  They are in fine form as this Aeonium ‘Schwarzkopf’ shows,

Aeonium ‘Schwarzkopf’

2. At the Taunton Flower festival not long ago,  I very much admired a certain Aeonium on the display, but sadly they had sold out.  I 'cheeked' Tom, suggesting that such large plants could easily spare a cutting, and that I would pay of course. I was invited to the back of the stand and shown some of the pieces that had inevitably been knocked off during the journey, and I selected one of them.  I am pleased to say that I believe that Aeonium Medusa seems to have overcome any trauma, and is settling in well. From what I have read Aeonium Medusa it is a mutation of Aeonium Velour so should have a similar naturally branching form, which I particularly appreciate on my Aeonium Velours.

Aeonium Medusa

3. I went past my friends shop, called  Thomas D'Arcy Garden House and right in my eyeline was a delightful pot of Achillea ‘Paprika’ (Galaxy Series). I had recently watched a gardener's world on iplayer which featured John Cullen and his National Collection of Achillea, it was on  Gardeners' World Episode 19 of the 2026 series. I was only going to say hello to Chris, but came away having spent my 'sweetie' money for the week.  It is now planted out in the garden. The earlier flowers got somewhat bleached by the searing sun.

Achillea ‘Paprika’ (Galaxy Series)

4. One of my little pet enjoyments in the garden is to try and propagate almost anything that grows.  It is a close call and probably goes joint first with cutting things.  A few weeks back I cut back really hard the Helianthemum Golden Queen growing in the gravel garden, and now it has bounced back beautifully and growth will have hardened off well by the winter.

Helianthemum Golden Queen
forming a neat cushion after hard prunning

I thought the same ought to be metered out to the ones growing round the seating circle, so a similar strict back and sides were carried out this week.  More cuttings were taken and here are the two results, with the first round of cuttings nicely growing away in the foreground, and the new ones in the second pot behind.  

5. Bergera koenigii, the leaves of which impart a delicious curry flavour to indian dishes, is giving the gravel area a rather tropical look as the plant grows a good crop of leaves.  Next spring when it starts into active growth, I intend pruning it to maintain a bushier form, rather than it continue to grow skyward.  I read up about the best time to do it, and it wasn't now! 

6. It was a very sad time at the start of the week, as I decided that it was time to remove the apple tree D'arcy Spice.  It has been beset by squirrels for the last three years at all times of the year, and not one single apple has reached anything near maturity.  I am constantly trying to frighten off the squirrels, and after spying five squirrels all in the garden at the same time, I decided I had had enough! Growing fruit has been a disaster in this garden, with pear trees, apples trees and rows of strawberries removed over the last few years.

Getting the roots out was taxing in the dry soil, and several bags of compost have been spread over the area. I am now contemplating what best to plant in that area. The 
Japanese Umbrella Pine Sciadopitys verticillata is a contender to be moved from its pot to somewhere in that area, but I think I shall wait till the soil settles a little, and plant it out in a few weeks time. 

If you have read to the end of this post, you obviously enjoy reading about gardens and gardening, so let me suggest your follow the link to Jim's 'Garden Ruminations', where if like others you would like to join in this sharing of things from our garden, you can read about how to go about it. Jim's Garden Ruminations is where similar posts to this one join in. 

Six on Saturday - 22 August 2026

At last the heat wave has broken this week.  Night time temperatures are comfortable, and we have had a little rain. If it had not been preceded by such very hot and dry weather we would say it was sufficient. This weekly blog is about six things from the garden and I shall be linking in with others over at Jim's.

1.  With only a little watering Blue Aster frikartii Monch is making quite a show, and is the first of the Asters to flower this year. I've been dead heading them to keep them as fresh looking as possible.

Blue Aster frikartii Monch

2. Sisyrinchium E K Balls was in a shallow dish arrangement but got overwhelmed when ants decided the pot would make a great nursery for them to lay their eggs in.  Some plants in the garden have 'farms of blackfly' where it is the ants who are the farmers and milk the ants for honeydew. We had a large number of ladybirds early in the year, but there are very few now, so it is up to me to squidge the farms on things like flower stems where they are an eyesore, Back to the Sisyrinchium, the green growths were almost rootless, but I salvaged what I could and placed a few clusters in the gravel garden.  They seem to have put down roots and have just started to flower despite the heat and drought.

3. Miscanthus nepalensis is starting to unfurl its plumes and for the first time I have seen it expand its silky tassels into quite fluffy plumes as the spikelets expand. Further along is a smaller clump which I grew from seed gathered from this plant the same year I bought it. If anyone is interested in having seed, let me know and I shall gather some for you as soon as it is ripe.

4. It would have taken far too much water to keep the Rhubarb in good condition, which is a shame as this year I have had the best growth which took place following all the heavy rain we had earlier in the year  Let's hope it survives: next year, I shall pick sticks far earlier, I think so far I took just two pickings.

5. One of the other little succulents I bought from Piccolo Plants was this cute little Crassula x rupestris f. marnieriana ‘Hottentot’.  I've often admired this succulent and I was delighted to pick up my first plant. This is one which will come into the conservatory for the winter, or even before if we start to get too much rain. 

6. In my post about our recent holiday taking in a trio of gardens, I mentioned how the wild carrot appealed to me, even though it was along a walk in a dried up motorway service station. Earlier this year I was sent a few seedlings of an Ammi from Ben in Kent, and I had three which survived. This is the one growing in the conservatory border.

The foliage is beautifully dissected and a few weeks ago I was admiring the other couple of plants even before the flowers were fully open.

I'm not sure of the cultivar, but I am hoping to keep seed. I've had a group on face book called The Gardening Bubble look at this, and I believe it to be Ammi visnaga, but hey why don't I ask Ben?

Scilla hughii experiment in propagation from bulbils

First bought on a visit to Broadleigh Gardens in 2024, the bulb having been moved a couple of times, flowered very well in the front garden this year.

I wanted to move it back to somewhere in the back garden where I spend most of my time, so decided to dig it up and provisionally plant it in a ceramic plant pot until all the snowdrops are up, and I can situate it reasonable well. It had shown no sign of making offsets or having naturally divided as my Scilla Peruviana have done.

Having lifted the bulb in early May, after flowering, whilst the leaves were still green, but definitely showing signs of moving towards the end of the season, I saw clustered amongst and still attached a number of these small bulbils,( is that the name for these, other suggestions would be appreciated)  and not at all similar to the formation by division on S. Peruviana. With no information that I could find on line, I decided to remove three of these little bulbils but leave the remaining ones there.

The main bulb was replanted into a ceramic pot similar to the one I grew it in the first year, and planted the small bulbils into a much smaller terracotta pot in similar gritty soil.  All summer during the hot dry conditions I wondered if the three small bulbils had survived.  The pot had been placed where it got the morning sun but was spared the temperatures and heating effect of the strong afternoon sun these past few weeks. It will be interesting to follow the growth of the little bulbils and measure the time to first flowering. 

Small greening bulbils of Scilla hughii

Being curious today, I checked the pot and the bulbils appeared to have grown a little in size, taken on a more more resilient looking outer having turned green with small roots of their own.  Further investigation of the large bulb this week showed new roots just starting to be formed but no sign of the several other bulbils I had left behind.  I am unsure whether they have just rotted away or just decayed.  The bulb was repotted as carefully as possible, and the tips of the new growth are just emerging and it appears that there may be two crowns, so the bulb may divide itself next year. The advice is to grow the bulb with its shoulder above the soil. 

August 2026 new growth emerging from repotted Scilla Hughii