"Forgive many things in others;

nothing in yourself"

Ansonius- a Roman poet and teacher 310-395AD

 It is a quiet time in the garden as the nights draw in and the days grow shorter but the past few weekends the garden group have been busy tidying up.  One job was to sort out the three large compost bins and make use of the good compost found.

Another important job was to relocate the ornamental banana plant.  It will not tolerate the cold so it had be carefully dug up and placed in a large container.  It has been stored in the summer house for the winter months.

The tetrapanax tree is flowering.  The leaves on the tree are huge and the flowers so small and delicate

Flowers on the tetrapanax tree

The huge leaves

Pansy plants have been placed in the baskets.  After just two days the pigeons had found them and were grazing the leaves.  Something had to be done!

Pigeon proofing the pansy plants!

In the greenhouse the living stones and succulents are thriving.  They do not need watering at this time of the year

Lithops- the living stones

The impressive fish-hook cactus

The moth trap was run on a few calm and warm evenings and this magnificent Cosmopolitan moth was trapped.  A relatively scarce migrant moth to the UK.  It was of course released unharmed along with the others.

Cosmopolitan moth

As the term came to a close the traditional carol service was held in the garden.  The garden group volunteers had floodlit the garden as in previous years. About 100 people turned up for the service and many commented on the excellent performance by the school choir. Prior to setting up the evening sky was spectcular

 Some photographs were taken of the garden with the flash

Tree ferns

Tetrapanax

Chain fern

The atmosphere was set for the carol service

 The large crowd attending the carol service

 Finally the garden group wish all a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

Happy Christmas one and all!