I managed to do a mow on 2. It took ages though as I kept having to empty the bottom of all the wet grass. Right at the end, the handle on the mower broke. The clips that hold it in place broke off, so it slides out with all the back and forth. I’ve put tape around it, which held well for the last stretch.

I did random weeding in Bed 8 and Bed 1 with big dandelions now gone from around the carrots. I also did a little weeding in the fern bed. There are different funghi on the logs (one of which has been pecked) and foxgloves have self-seeded all over, including in the folds of the ivy pieces (unless that’s just weeds?).

I cut down some finished sunflowers and saved a couple of small heads and put them in the cocnut that’s on the fence. While over there I found that I have an anise hyssop growing in one of the overgrown pots.

I could have done some more, but ultimately the smoke from the neighbouring bonfire sent me home.

Another mow on 3. Maybe I’ll manage to do a 2 tomorrow as it will be sunny again.

The hedgehog house covering is still pretty in tact. A bit of tape had moved somehow, so I just covered it with leaves again and threw a few more on from the apple tree.

I did another quarter of Bed 1, pulling up the done plants and digging up all the weeds. I pulled up the random carrot, but it was fairly stumpy and completely split on one side, so it’s gone to the compost bin.

There’s still an amount of colour in the bed, from the verbena, cosmos, calendula and rudbeckia. The far-side of the bed will be the next project.

I deadheaded all the cosmos and marigolds. The bumble bees are loving the cosmos. The sunflowers have still got a lot of seeds to offer. As they come done, I’ll remove them.   

It poured with rain yesterday, but the soil in Bed 1 was still wonderfully friable. I made a good start on clearing all the weeds and bad volunteers from the bed. I’ve done about half the bed. A few of the logs from the centre pile are very crumbly now, but there are going to be some good big ones that I’ll have to find somewhere to store before at least some of them eventually go to a new garden.

As part of the weeding I found another yellow flowered plant like the one by the apple tree. Turns out that it’s common fleabane. The fleabane in my borders is Mexican fleabane.

I unearthed three foxgloves and transferred them to the front bed, along with some flax seedheads.

The cosmos looks really good – lots of flowers. They’ve even managed to stay fairly upright having been staked last week.

I did some clearing up around the pond. Cutting back nettles and grass revealed a small log pile, so I’ve added more small logs to that. I took the last paddlestone off the toad hole right by the pond and re-covered that shelter with more logs. I’ve moved the paddlestone to the front ofthe pond and tried to glue it in place with molehill mud. Hopefully it’ll sit and settle.

The hornwort has sunk now, but the forget me not seems like it has started to expand again. I’ve taken out a little of the duckweed that’s growing very slowly.

I feel like the callicarpa has never really taken off – and there is no sign of berries this year. They like normal to acidic soil, so I took ⅔ bucket of oak leaves and chopped them up and mulched the plant. I dug them in a little, but didn’t want to disturb the roots.

I’ve finally mended the hedgehog house. I taped up the pecked holes, move some logs around and then covered house with the rest of the black bag of oak leaves. They were a bit wet and stuck together, so I’m hoping they might have some strength that way. I pinned some apple stick over the top as a vague deterrent for the birds who will no doubt pull the whole thing apart again. If I had some bendable chicken wire, that would be the answer.

I’ve put the last of the bark from the bag under the apple tree. What’s left in the bucket will have to go on the fern bed when the weeding is done, as a lot of that has disappeared. Happily, the weaker ferns (Dryopteris erythrosora) have started to grow again and the second in particular is showing new copper-coloured growth.

Another job that’s been on my list for ages: planting the allium bulbs from the front bed. I made a start on putting them into Bed 3 before the rain finally started later than forecast.

I did a mow on 3 and was very wet. I travel with a bucket to empty the bottom of the mower when it’s like this.

I cleared Bed 5 of the cucumbers and the wigwams. I uncovered a few little cucumbers, none of which were saving. I’ve left the nasturtiums to keep flowering.

The sunflowers in Bed 11 have gone now, so just nasturtiums and marigolds remain.

Bed 6 was the next to be cleared out and I took out weeds, candytuft and finished sunflowers. The garlic now has more room to grow in the spring.

The anise hyssop in Bed 6 are fairly healthy looking plants. The ones I had left in pots forever at home and then at the plot were still alive, but  completely pot bound. They do have small leaves coming at the base of the stalks though.    I managed to rip them apart to put some into Bed 6 and 3 into a big white pot.

I had a good variety of birds: goldfinch, long-tailed tit, dunnock, robin, great tit and magpie.

We picked all the apples off the tree this morning, not least to stop the destructive pecking from the birds.

Although the compost gourd hadn’t started to die off, the stalks were just starting to yellow, so I took the opportunity to clear the plant off the heap. They’re now in the grow house to ripen off a bit more, as some of the stalks were weeping a bit.

I finished off clearing the tomatoes, diggung up the roots and weeding around the marigolds. The soil was absolutely perfect for weeding, so I made sure I went back in the afternoon to do more. I cleared the weeds and sweetcorn stalks from Bed 11 and cleared the weeds from the empty half of Bed 7.   

It was very windy today and when I turned up at the plot I could see from a distance that the tomatoes must be done – they looked quite bare and yellow. I saved a few red Romas and then picked a couple of handfuls of green Red Alerts and Romas, before cutting up the plants for the council bin.

I uncovered this hairy caterpillar among the leaves – a pale tussock moth caterpillar.

The lupin by the pond is having a great second life. The little antirrhinum has also flowered too – not exactly the ground cover plant I was aiming for.