In a delicious lingering of September sunshine I enjoy a blissful moment sitting among the flower heads of my pot displays, surrounded by the hum of insect happiness. Time to review summer’s meadow making.

September Flowers

Everything is poised and still, holding its breath in the way that only happens in early autumn. It’s a dream time.
From ‘Landskipping‘ by Anna Pavord.

A pair of large Red Admiral butterflies are eagerly visiting the heads of Echinacea flowers hunting a last drink of nectar. A Painted Lady butterfly joins the feast. Cabbage Whites chase each other in the sunlight. Hoverflies pause mid air as if trying to decide which flower to visit.  Spider’s webs glisten in the sunlight. Nature’s final fling – a harvest thanksgiving. Memories to carry into winter’s cold, along with our summer photos.

Summer memories

Our front garden in June was ‘a prodigal of joy’ – the sweet disorder of a cottage garden where the gardener tries to be the referee!

Summer is a prodigal of joy. The grass
Swarms with delighted insects as I pass,
And crowds of grasshoppers at every stride
Jump out all ways with happiness their guide;……..
…..each thing, however small,
Sharing joy’s bounty that belongs to all.
And here I gather, by the world forgot,
Harvests of comfort from their happy mood,
Feeling God’s blessing dwells in every spot
And nothing lives but owes him gratitude.

John Clare

A call to for us all to join nature’s harvest celebration with deep gratitude to our so generous Creator who gives us all this bounty. 

Meadow Making

What was an untidy Council verge has now become my small front experimental hay meadow patch. Two years ago I cleared this patch and sowed a local Sussex mix of wild flowers and meadow grasses.

Earlier this year I have been watching with interest as it changes through its second season. After the early bulbs, the now dominant Yellow Rattle (The ‘Meadow Maker’), followed by Oxeye daisies, Yellow Hawksbit, Bird’s Foot Trefoil, Yarrow, Sorrel and more. A collection of various traditional meadow grasses and wildflowers whose Old English names are full of memories of the past, like Sweet Vernal Grass, Lady’s Bedstraw, Ragged Robin, Sheep’s Bit Scabious and Self-heal. The meadow is now cut down for its autumn/winter rest.

My other posts on meadows : Our Lost Wildflower Meadows, Creating a Wildflower Meadow, The Meadow Maker’s.

In our secluded back garden for the past few days we have been hosting a Chiff Chaff. I suspect it is getting ready to migrate across the Channel back to Africa. I will be looking forward to hearing one singing back here in March – the sound of spring.

The gardener is always looking forward

Here, as summer’s display comes to an end, winter/spring’s indoor garden is getting ready in small pots of Schizanthus, Nemesias, Primula malacoides , Primula kewensis, Lachenalia, Veltheimia, Tropaeolum tricolor and more.

Rosemary Verey of Barnsley House in Gloucestershire had this quotation on a plaque in her garden:

As no man be very  miserable that is master of a garden here,
   so will no man ever be happy who is not sure of a garden hereafter.
   Where the first Adam fell, the second (Jesus) rose.”

Like many gardeners I could not be without a garden. Happily, I need never be. As a believer in Jesus I can be sure of a Paradise ‘garden hereafter’ where the Tree of Life flourishes and where:

“the leaves of the tree are for the healing of the nations” (Revelation 22)
What a wonderful prospect!