Tag: Summer Wine

Angela’s Photoshoot

Beneath oppressively leaden skies on an unseasonably warm morning we carried out some tidying of the garden.

Enjoying the sounds of gentle birdsong in the trees; raucous geese honking overhead, and the

clinking and scraping of Jackie’s tools as she trimmed the grass and weeded brickwork, I concentrated on sweeping fallen beach leaves and dead heading in the rose garden and elsewhere.

The bonus of the weather conditions was the diffused light in which to photograph

Summer Wine (too high to reach with secateurs); crisp, pink, Just Joey; constantly blooming white Winchester Cathedral; and the seemingly everlasting Crown Princess Margareta.

Early this afternoon Joseph and Angela visited. Our sister-in-law, a superb Chinese cook, came laden with authentic cooking including some ingredients not available in this country. She brought paper plates so washing up would be negligible; non-alcoholic beers and rosé wine. By the evening she had finished the preparation and served starters of prawn crackers, spring rolls of flavours never experienced here, prawns in garlic, and runner beans with an intriguing taste. Later, came a complex curry and steamed rice to which more prawns could be added to taste. Lemon cheesecake and strawberries were to follow. I finished the Fleurie, while the others drank non-alcoholic beers or rosé wine.

Before settling down to the cooking, Jackie and I accompanied Angela on a

photo tour of the garden.

In addition to her favourites from this collection, I printed her copies of a number of my photographs including this one of

Joe and me from about 1963, and another of

Mum and her five children from 2011.

Elizabeth joined us later.

We have plenty of left overs for another day.

Logistical Problems

Garden maintenance – mostly clearing up and dead heading – began early this morning for us both.

No doubt attracted by the redolent scent of roses released by the warm sunshine, bees buzzed and butterflies flittered around me as I wielded the secateurs.

Bees and Red Admirals both tried the fading Festive Jewel;

both also favoured verbena bonariensis,

as did Comma and Small White butterflies.

Worker bees were mostly partial to Summer Wine.

A little later we drove to Milford Pharmacy for a repeat prescription; to Tesco for E10 unleaded petrol; to Ferndene Farm shop for three bags of compost and various vegetables; and to the forest for a preprandial drive.

Heather beamed bright on the verges of Burley Road, while

a group of ponies were already sheltering under the trees at the corner of Burley Lawn, doing their best to switch off each other’s flies, by the head to tail method.

This presented some logistical problems arising from a certain size difference.

Later this afternoon I posted https://derrickjknight.com/2021/09/03/a-knights-tale-26-town-halls-trams-and-trolley-buses/

This evening we dined on oven fish and chips, onion rings, and peas, with which Jackie finished the Pinot Grigio and I drank more of the Comte Tolosan Rouge.

Happy Planting

Jackie spent most of this pleasantly sunny day on general garden maintenance, including spraying about half of the

Back Drive weeds with herbicide.

My contribution was dead heading, hand weeding, and clearing debris, in one long and one short bursts.

Here are some blooms of For Your Eyes Only, before and after dead heading.

I managed to disturb hoverflies like these on Summer Wine and bees like this on a white climber, but they didn’t take it personally.

I was serenaded by the trickling of the water fountain in the Rose Garden, and by small birds

like this tiny goldfinch perched atop the Weeping Birch. You may need enlargement of this image.

Happy plantings include these different yellow/orang dahlias; the juxtaposition of clematis, petunias, and verbena bonariensis against the kitchen wall; and the sprays of gaura (no, not Laura, WP) bursting from the Ali Baba pot.

This final set of images each bears a title in the gallery.

This afternoon I posted ‘A Knight’s Tale (8: From The Good Life To Refugee Status)’

Elizabeth came to dinner and we received a Red Chilli takeaway meal. My main choice was Tiger Prawn Vindaloo; Elizabeth’s was Bengal Chilli Chicken; and Jackie’s Saag Chicken. We shared special fried rice, a plain paratha, chana masala, saag bhaji, saag dal, and a mixed vegetable curry. Jackie drank more of the Carricante; Elizabeth and I drank more of the Fleurie.

Early Morning Light

We began work in the garden early, because we knew it would be a hot day. In addition to all her general labours, Jackie spent much time scrubbing surfaces, such as the slippery decking, and pigeon poo on chairs and benches. My task was a certain amount of dead heading and feeding of the compost bin, but mostly, taking advantage of the diffused light before the sun had risen too high.

This deep red climbing rose was inherited from our predecessors in a sorry, straggly, state, yet now thrives under the Head Gardener’s loving care.

This New Dawn, a present from Poppy and Tess, is now beginning to scale the gazebo.

This recent purchase is a climber called Brownie, which was bred by Nola M. Simpson in New Zealand before 2009.

The first of these clematises is accompanied by a bottle brush plant and a Chilean lantern tree; the second by a Rosa Glauca.

The bottle brush plant glimpsed above is the red one now coming into bloom; the climber Wedding Day spans the Brick Path.

Most hanging baskets have now been planted up.

Several hebes are flourishing. Jackie is very pleased with this sculptural eryngium.

A variety of day lilies abound.

Readers will be aware that we have one honey-scented cordyline Australis. We didn’t know ourselves that we have three more on the west side of the garden which we have not noticed flowering before.

Pale pink Penny Lane and bright red Super Elfin have happily settled on the Gothic Arch.

Peach Abundance flowers in the Oval Bed just outside the Rose Garden, among whose residents are

an unknown deep pink climber; red Roserie de l’Hay; red and white striped Rosa Gallica and yellow Laura Ford; poppies and foxgloves; pink and yellow Summer Wine; bright red Gloriana; and golden Crown Princess Margareta.

This afternoon we spent an hour with Mum, who was in good spirits, in the garden of Woodpeckers.

Afterwards I watched a memorable Wimbledon tennis match between Angelique Kerber and Sara Sorribes Tomo.

This evening we dined on more of Jackie’s delicious beef and onion pie with flavoursome Jersey Royal potatoes; crunchy carrots; tender runner beans, and meaty gravy, with which she drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Cotes du Rhone.

Still Going Strong

This morning I cut the grass and produced a few photographs.

Individual titles appear on the galleries.

This afternoon I almost finished reading Point Counter Point by Aldous Huxley which I will feature tomorrow.

Tonight’s dinner consisted of sag bhaji and mild prawn curry starter from Forest Tandoori followed by the main event in the form of Jackie’s spicy lamb jalfrezi and aromatic pilau rice, with which she drank Hoegaarden and I finished the Shiraz.

Is It Really Autumn?

We began early this morning watering, dead heading, clearing debris and adding to the compost bins before attending Milford on Sea GP Surgery for flu jab appointments. A large number of patients were vaccinated smoothly at one minute intervals. We queued 2 metres apart for no time at all and were directed to our colour-coded injection chamber. All was extremely efficient except for the jam of jabbed individuals swapping details of their experience and other age-related ailments causing something of a bottle-neck at the rear exit. This was a bit of a slalom with no opportunity for the correct social distancing; however, everyone wore masks, and we were back in the car after five minutes, giving us time for a brief drive in our rather Saturday-crowded environment.

Seasonal confusion was first evidenced in our own garden with windburn to Japanese maples and Summer Wine pouring down the entrance arch to the Rose Garden. More was displayed in

Sandy Down with pink roses,

rhododendrons,

and cyclamen lining the verges; and

the leaves of a silver birch beginning to display the Midas touch.

This afternoon after some more chopping and composting of refuse I wandered around the garden with my camera.

Dahlias and begonias, some sharing beds, are in no doubt that it is their season.

Nasturtiums, gauras, and diascias are still going strong.

Small White butterflies and hard working bees are not conceding that their time is over.

Clematises, like this lost label purple one and Dr Ruppel, sharing the Gothic arch with red Super Elfin and pale pink Penny Lane roses, linger on,

as does a rather ragged Shropshire Lad, swaying in the Rose Garden to

a white symphony of begonias, nicotiana sylvestris, and Hawkshead fuchsias.

The eucalyptus still suspends filled hanging baskets flanked by pelargoniums and rudbeckias. Is it really autumn?

This evening we dined on poached smoked haddock; Jackie’s piquant cauliflower cheese; creamy mashed potatoes; firm carrots; and tender runner beans, with which we both drank Awatere Valley Sauvignon Blanc 2019 – a crisp, aromatic, white wine from New Zealand.

Shifting Light

This morning my gardening occupations combined dead heading and making photographs.

These roses Summer Wine and Altissimo, both coming again, were too high for me to reach with hand secateurs, and I couldn’t be bothered to fetch the steps.

Bigifying will probably be necessary to appreciate these bees on bidens, on Japanese anemones, and coming to land on crocosmia. Just click on any image to access the gallery and enlarge further with clicks on the ‘view full size’ box underneath and again if required. The bees swarming the Japanese anemones must be welcoming the plants’ early blooming.

Crocosmia blend well with other plants such as these bell-like alliums and the Japanese maple with its fingers singed by recent violent winds.

From beside this latter crocosmia I was able, through the maple, to view the petunias and pelargoniums featured alongside the kitchen wall.

We haven’t identified all the clematises in the garden. The first of this triptych above, for example, is a Lidl unnamed purchase; we do know that it is Niobe who shares the arch with the fuchsia, Chequerboard; the Head Gardener was determined to track down ‘clematis viticella purpurea plena elegans’, which took her some time, because when we arrived seven years ago this then weakly specimen was ailing in the rubble jungle that we eventually turned into the Rose Garden – it was fostered out in another bed until we returned it to its native soil, and has taken three years to reach the top of its supporting beam.

One of these yellow evening primrose blooms has survived the night well; this phantom hydrangea is also a survivor – it is the plant after which the eponymous path is named – first planted on one side of the Phantom Path it was really rather poorly for its first two years, until Aaron moved it into Margery’s Bed where it has enjoyed more light. We hope it will soon be in the shape in which we bought it.

Hemerocallis still thrive and we also have stargazer lilies in the main garden.

Four hours later, in mid afternoon I set out once more with my camera, giving me shifted lighting conditions.

A bee did its best to weigh down a verbena bonariensis.

Niobe could now sunbathe, and the clematis at the barrier between the garden and the back drive enjoyed light and shade;

the freckled lilies kept out of the direct sunlight;

sweet peas and hollyhocks could take it stronger.

My lens found the white flowers the best beneficiaries: sweet scented petunias, powerfully aromatic phlox, a clutch of dahlias, different Japanese anemones and the phantom hydrangea sheltered in shade this morning.

This evening we dined on prawn fish cakes, peas, and fresh crispy bread and butter with which Jackie drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Carles from a second bottle.

Nugget, You’ve Got Mail

This morning while Jackie applied herself to unearthing food for Nugget, I occupied myself with dead-heading roses. The two photographs above are a day’s relief for eyes which struggled with yesterday’s “Where’s Nugget?”.

Hearing Jackie clearly speaking Avian I thought at first she had been addressing her little robin, but in fact it was “those ruddy randy pigeons”.

Here are two examples of the Head Gardener’s happy planting. We have pink Japanese anemones fronting similarly hued phlox in the first picture and a melange of begonias, pelargoniums, fuchsias, more of the anemones in the patio bed.

Lwbut has requested close ups of the Japanese anemones. There you go, Bob.

There is evidence from their webs that we are breeding vegan spiders – either that or they are currently constantly being disappointed.

Bees are busy with cosmoses, and sampling various vintages of Summer Wine.

Clematis has granted her presence to the Rose Garden arbour.

Although we have flotillas of Small White butterflies fluttering throughout the garden, we have very few other species, but we do have humming bird moths in phlox.

This afternoon Nugget received his first piece of snail mail.

This card, when opened, plays a recording of a robin’s song. The words inside, in Auntie Becky’s handwriting, state that she chose the card for the words – i.e. the birdsong.

Jackie and I spent a considerable amount of time getting our heads round how to record stuff on her camera. We managed it. I uploaded it into my computer and WordPress wouldn’t support the file format. I was, of course, my usual phlegmatic self on discovering this.

With the late afternoon growing duller and cooler, my chauffeuse drove us on a short trip into the forest.

A colourful range of heathers and bracken beginning to brown spread carpets across the moorland beside Holmsley Passage.

We thought it best to allow this beefy bovine free passage on the Burley road.

We spotted these rather splendid mushrooms along Bisterne Close.

Jackie produced a lovely lamb’s liver casserole with creamy mashed potatoes, crunchy cauliflower and carrots with tender green beans for our dinner this evening. She drank Hoegaarden and I drank more of the Malbec.

“Turncoat”

The air this morning when we set about further post-storm garden recovery work hung humid and eerily still.

Concentrating on the patio area and the sweet peas corner of the kitchen wall, Jackie trimmed the Lathyrus odoratus and extricated the strangled tomato plant. From less than polite expressions of intense disappointment yesterday when discovering broken geranium stems, her exclamations have been the more optimistic “ah, another cutting”. The greenhouse is going to be pretty full this winter.

Naturally Nugget kept her company.

Where’s Nugget? An easier puzzle today.

Elsewhere pelargoniums, petunias, rudbeckias, and hoverflies sharing a poppy enjoyed the early sunshine.

My task was dead-heading roses in the Rose Garden where

heavy bees clambered over the tiny blooms of the verbena bonarensis;

Lady Emma Hamilton laid her head on the block;

Jacqueline du Pré played on;

a hoverfly flew to the Blue Moon;

Crown Princess Margareta bustled voluminously;

Summer Wine was drunk with joy;

and Absolutely Fabulous certainly was.

Eventually leaden skies and heavy rain brought us inside. When Jackie heard that Nugget, whom she had missed, had come to join me, she uttered “turncoat”.

By mid-afternoon the skies had cleared and the weather brightened. We drove to Ringwood for Jackie to buy some new garments from M & Co. and returned home via the forest.

At first we progressed north along Avon Way and turned right into sun-dappled Sky Lane.

A severed string of ponies spanning the road at Ibsley left space for one passing vehicle or a young neophyte equestrian to thread a way through.

Several donkey families were stationed outside Hyde School. One couple seemed to be waiting to register their foal in advance of its reaching the age of admission;

another little one enjoyed a scratch on the road junction. An alarming driver turning the corner blasted his horn at the unperturbed animal which took no notice. I might have heard it borrowing Catherine Tate’s line: “Do I look bothered?” as, peeking over its flanks, it nonchalantly nibbled its hide.

The loud blast of a foghorn behind me alerted me to an agitated mother ushering her infant across the road at quite a rate.

As we returned through Ibsley the ponies, now on the move, tails twitching, like sensible walkers faced the oncoming traffic.

This evening Elizabeth visited because her phones weren’t working and she needed to phone Mum, which she did from my mobile which was coincidentally being charged up. Naturally, beginning with drinks on the patio, she stayed for dinner which consisted of Jackie’s tasty tender beef and mushroom pie; crunchy cauliflower, carrots, and cabbage; and new potatoes. The Culinary Queen drank Hoegaarden while my sister and I drank Casillero del Diablo reserva Shiraz 2017.

If You Weren’t The Head Gardener

CLICKING ON ANY IMAGE IN A GROUP WILL ACCESS ITS GALLERY, INDIVIDUAL EXAMPLES OF WHICH CAN BE VIEWED FULL SIZE BY SCROLLING DOWN AND CHECKING BOX AT BOTTOM RIGHT

Jackie has spent quite a bit of time in the last three days clearing up after the storm. This has involved sweeping up leaves and broken plants; tying up some of the taller flowers;  generally clearing the paths; and continuing to water the baskets and other containers. Before the rain she carried out most of the required dead-heading. The roses in particular have benefited from the generous precipitation from the heavily laden clouds, so a little more pruning was required. I continued with that this afternoon.

These general path views demonstrate that much has been recovered.

Madame Alfred Carriere has swooned over the bright red petunias in the nearby urn. She will need to wait for Aaron’s attention on Sunday. The full size gallery version of the first picture above contains a bee wallowing in Summer Wine.

Dahlias have largely survived, supported by the Head Gardener’s ties. Those mingling with gladioli Priscilla hold a great attraction for bees.

Tall, slender, verbenas bonarensis, were a particular worry for Jackie as they bent double in the high winds. They have, however, largely perked up, and remain strong enough to bear bees swaying in the gentle breeze.

Many more blooms are appearing in the Rose Garden. Here we have For Your Eyes Only, Absolutely Fabulous, and Just Joey.

Rudbeckia is in its golden prime.

The patio borders are mostly unscathed, as are

the hanging baskets, such as those along the kitchen wall, and large pots like the one at the South end of the garden.

All in all, if you weren’t the head gardener, you might think there had been no storm.

I am happy to report that, of the Two Historic Houses, Elizabeth made the choice that would have been ours, put in an offer, and had it accepted – on the Swedish house. She returned home here this evening and the three of us dined on Jackie’s splendid, hot, chilli con carne and wild rice. Elizabeth and I finished the Cabernet Sauvignon. Jackie had consumed her Hoegaarden on the patio beforehand.