Autumn walk

Andrea and I had a lovely walk in Thornley Woods this afternoon armed with a camera each and took some great pictures. We only saw one squirrel, but we made too much noise walking over the leaves and scared him off.

I love walking through crisp golden leaves, it's almost as good as snow

Andrea snapped me taking photos behind this tree

We were fine going down the various sets of rough steps, to the stream at the bottom, but when it came to climbing back up through the woods it was hard going. (Especially when a family at the top of the last flight of steps shouted for us to come up, so we felt we had to keep going even though my legs felt like jelly!!!

Elderberries

Holly Berries

The last of the Blackberries


The bark of this tree was amazing!

We both had rosy cheeks when we'd finished our walk

Andrea

Autumn in the garden

Early October was very damp with mist at nights but now we're into mid-October and it's bright, sunny days and very cold nights - we had to scrape the frost off the windscreen this morning! I've done a little bit of work in the garden. There is still plenty of colour and interest in the garden and plenty of jobs to be getting on with. I've done a bit of tidying up and pruning in the front garden and we dug up (with the aid of a circular saw !!) a root which had travelled at least six feet under the lawn from the big cherry tree - hopefully it won't decide to fall over in the next heavy winds!

Centre of one of the flowers on the baby Echinacea plant


Baby echinacea with purple hebe in the background

Slightly enlarged conifer bed at the left hand side of the garden

One of my little acers seems to have given up and died, there are a few leaves left alive but the rest have shrivelled, perhaps not enough water? so I've left it in its pot on the patio and will hope for the best. I decided to take the other one out of its' pot and plant it in the garden. We enlarged the small conifer bed slightly and managed to squeeze it in there. We also moved my little blue fir tree (which will probably grow to 30ft!! in a few years time), first up on to the back of the rockery, but it didn't look happy, then into the left hand border. (We had to use a pick axe to make the planting hole big enough due to stones and roots from the trees and the hedge) My new highly perfumed old fashioned 'Rosa Mary Rose' has got 5 buds, I didn't expect any this year and I'm waiting for the first flower to open up - if it doesn't open soon I will cut this bud and take it indoors to encourage it!

I've got a good crop of berries for the birds, they really brighten up the corner of the garden

I've taken out most of the bedding plants and put in lots of miniature daffodils and winter pansies. I dug up the carnations and have put them in the front garden with some of the lavender plants which were getting a bit leggy. I took cuttings of red and white geraniums and also repotted three of the best ones from the pots on the patio. They are all doing OK in the utility room, but the fuschia cuttings didn't take at all.

The right hand side of the garden. The patio roses are still producing nice flowers, but one of the dward conifers in the small bed has died.