The Aftermath..

"No one would have crossed the ocean if he could have gotten off the ship in the storm"

Quote by Charles Kettering-  a prominent American inventor, engineer and businessman

It was with some trepidation that we visited the garden the morning after the Storm called St Jude.  Winds of 90mph had been recorded along the south coast. We were keen to download our weather station and see what had been dealt to us.More later.

First though a quick visual assessment was made.  One broken pane of greenhouse glass,  one crab-apple tree snapped clean in half, the buddleia bent double,  sunflowers flattened, watering cans everywhere and most of the grapes having been ripped off of the vine.  Nothing in fact too serious in that an hour or two tidying up could not put right.

The sunflowers

Watering cans everywhere!

The snapped Crab-apple tree

The damaged buddleia

The weather station had recorded two strong gusts of wind that night.  One at about midnight showed about 35mph and another stronger gust at about 1am on the Monday morning showed about 42-45mph. Pressure had dipped overnight from 1000 to 975 and then slowly climbed up again as the storm passed by us.

Elsewhere the good news is that a hedgehog has moved into one of the boxes put out especially for them to overwinter in..  The animal is best left undisturbed now so please avoid the temptation in opening the lid!

The Aeolian Wind Organ was in fine form and notes danced across the pipes as the wind blew across them.  It is hoped to record them before long and put a link on the blog.

Finally a little bit of autumn colour as the fungi now make an appearance.  Just near the garden gate is this delightful clump of mushrooms

Summer is hanging on....

 "One touch of nature makes the whole world kin ......"

So spoke Ulysses to Achilles
Shakespeare from Troilus and Cressida.
 

Fitting words for this time of year as Autumn is clearly upon us now but summer is still hanging on

A few pictures from around the garden this morning.

This charming geranium 'Rozanne' has been flowering since May!

At one of the class plots- the 'pizza plot' - the pumpkin is still growing!

The ever growing pumpkin

The grapevine still looks healthy and the leaves are still very green and have not started to turn.  Many of the grapes are ripening off but it is unlikely  there will be enough to make a business venture worthwhile!

This weekend the garden group set about tidying a few areas up and targeting the greenhouse in particular.  The vines and creepers inside had all but died off and the tomatoes would certainly produce no more fruit. A good clean tidy greenhouse over the winter is very desirable. All that remains now are the  pitcher plants, the sundew, the venus fly trap, the Clog plant and the Antler plant succulents. Decaying vegetation is not good in a greenhouse!

General view in the tidy greenhouse

The pitcher plant is doing very well.

The Antler plants and the flowering sundew

The group will  save the sundew seeds and try to propagate some new plants for next year.  A little homework will be required for this venture!

We are hoping that groundwork will start very soon on the Jurassic Garden. The next big job in the garden is to examine and turn the many compost bins.  We expect to see a lot of spiders and slugs!

NOTICE:  It is intended to have a carol service in the school garden on Saturday December 7th.  It should be a splendid event with a few pleasant surprises thrown in. Updates and timings about this event will be posted here.