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?