September Morn - Gardening in September Sunshine
I showered and dressed with more speed than normal as I was keen to get outside before the weather changed. A friend once told me soon after we moved here that if it’s not raining, GET OUTSIDE! This is because most of the time it rains in the High Peak, being known as one of the wettest places in the UK, so any dry weather has to be grabbed enthusiastically! (This hot dry summer being a notable exception.) So I took my second cup of tea out into the garden and sat on the bench looking across the wide green expanse of lawn to the hills beyond - and what a view it is. It still fills me with contentment every time I look at it - whatever the weather. There is just something about its contours which feeds the soul. It’s almost as if a protective shield has been put around us from the outside world, so that you can forget all the chaos that’s going on elsewhere and just feel safe and secure in the cocoon of nature which surrounds us here.
As I sat with my tea, writing my Gratitude Journal (easy on a day like today, but none the less meaningful), our new little Border Collie pup, Maggie, gambolled around the lawn and snuffled in the hedgerow behind me, exploring her new green empire, while Mildred and Tallulah, our two cats, wandered up the path with Mildred predictably coming to sit on the bench beside me. In the section of the journal which asked what I was looking forward to today, it was an easy answer: gardening.
I have been trying to get out gardening ever since we returned from our long summer break a few weeks ago. In our absence, with all the growth of a wet spring, followed by the hot summer, and then by heavy rainfall again, the place has got somewhat out of control and I was itching to get going on wrestling it back into a bit of order. Not too much of course. I’m a great believer in not over-primping a garden, especially one such as this which bleeds out into the countryside surrounding it. Nevertheless, certain things need reigning in a bit as we are blessed with very mature trees and shrubs and they’ve all gone a bit bonkers, clearly screaming ‘schools out’ to each other and getting a bit giddy while we’ve been away. Seemingly even plants need a summer holiday when they can run around going feral for six weeks! Still, all good things come to an end, and now the new term has started it’s time to get some discipline back into the proceedings. So, autumn tidy, here we come!
I started slowly by dead-heading and cutting back the roses, a task I relish. Roses are so resilient, though I sometimes forget this and don’t cut them as far back as I should. The firmer you are with them, the more they respond, producing bushier growth and more abundant blooms. It’s so satisfying seeing the yellowing, black spotted leaves fall to the ground as you rid the plant of all the bits which are bringing nothing to the party, simply draining it of energy for no reason. Cutting out dead or diseased matter is so incredibly satisfying, and so important for future healthy growth. I then tackled the cotoneaster after a brief stop for mid morning coffee on the front terrace to gaze at the view and breathe in the tranquillity (angle grinder was on a break too!). The spirit of place I feel here is so incredibly grounding as I think of all the people the people who have lived here over the past 350 years and benefited from the same views and the same sense of wellbeing which it engenders. We feel blessed to have found it and privileged to be the current custodians of such an historic home.
My next task after coffee and contemplation was tidying up the cotoneaster which adorns the big mullion window at the front of the house but needs to be cut back periodically to stop it encroaching too far onto the sitting room window and also into the terrace. A beautiful old wisteria dominates the other side of the front facade and I made a mental note that this too needs cutting back from the gutters and roofline but that’s not a job for me. Ladders and heights are not my thing. So for now, I contented myself with reluctantly cutting off some heavy over-hanging branches which were also blocking light through the windows and which could easily snap off in high winds if not better contained.
From here I turned my attention to the alchemilla mollis, aka Ladies Mantle. This is the teenager of the garden, growing like crazy in every corner of border and in every nook and cranny between the huge granite paving slabs of our terraces and paths, stubbornly refusing to be pulled up and loving every second of being so recalcitrant. No holds barred for this one as it colonises the whole place! Yet it is this very sense of abundance and unruliness which makes it so appealing, and so decorative. It’s profuse sprays of delicate acid yellowy-limey flowers make any little posy or flower arrangement sing, lending them not just the colour but the in-fill of romantic abandon. And who has never seen spherical drops of sparkling dew or rain caught in the heart of their fan-shaped leaves? It is a thing of such simple beauty and still makes my heart swell every time I see it. September, however, is a perfect time to cut down the faded flower stalks and browning leaves - and even as you do, you will see fresh new vegetation sprouting from under the canopy of the old. I tell you, this one never knows when enough’s enough!
Next came the lavenders and the business of chopping off the dead grey flower stems. If I had not been abroad as they faded I would have gathered them earlier to tie together into bundles and use indoors as dried flower arrangements in a pretty jug, or I could have made lavender bags out of their myriad little petals. This act itself would have allowed new growth to begin and I could have had a second rush of flowers but it is probably too late now in the season to expect that to happen. Some people actively hate the smell of lavender, but I for one really love it. I find it uplifting as a scent and its well-documented healing properties go beyond its sensory and visual pleasures. Its oil can be blended with other essential oils to make lovely room sprays, and on its own, it’s renowned for its calming properties of mind and body as well as for skin problems. It is one of only two essential oils which are considered to be ok to put - in tiny amounts - directly onto your skin to soothe redness, burns or blemishes or to apply to a skin infection. Tea tree oil is the only other one you can do this with and, combined with lavender, they have strong antiseptic properties. In the garden it is a reliable source of colour and a wonderful attraction for bees, butterflies and all manner of other insects and pollinators. What’s not to love, I say. And of course, as our English summers become increasingly hot and dry - even up here in the north this year - it is well-adapted to drought conditions, making it a winner in my gardening book.
I have a number of plants which really do need to go in the ground now to plump up the herbaceous border and bring some much needed autumn interest. The catch with this is that the whole border is overrun with ground elder. This invasive plant is not unattractive in itself with very pretty umbellifer flowers in the summer and edible leaves. I let it grow in the wilder parts of the garden without any issue, but in my one decent herbaceous border, I try to keep it under control. This is laborious work, carefully pulling out the underground network of root rhizomes and trying not to leave bits of them in the ground as they produce asexually and quickly grow into new plants. Ground elder roots are also edible and support much wildlife in the garden, but sometimes you just have to try and control it or it will smother everything else in the border. So I set to work in the patch which I’d identified for planting my new plants, but my energy was waning by now, as was the light, and I had to leave the job incomplete.
It was a joy to have our new little puppy, Maggie, a border collie like our previous beloved family dog, bouncing around the garden while I worked, though I had to keep abandoning tasks in one part of the garden to move to another to keep an eye on her. Not the most efficient way to work, but by the end of the day I had achieved a fair amount. The other tasks I tackled were a bit of weeding out of overgrowth of self-seeded marjoram on the kitchen terrace; a sweeping up of leaves and debris on paths and steps before applying an application of non-toxic product to help deplete the slimy green growth making everywhere really slippery and dangerous - as well as rather gloomy. I also tamed some honeysuckle growing in wild woody loops in a mixed hedge on the front terrace.
As ever with gardening, there is always something else that needs doing, but for today that was enough. It had been wonderful to be out there working in such sublime September conditions and to be able to look back with satisfaction on what I had achieved rather than dwell on all that I hadn’t. A garden is always work in progress, but the best bit as you tend your plants or turn over your soil is to revel in the sense of connection with the natural world, to breathe in the earthy, grounding scents and to listen to the song of nature all around you. No-one who has spent a day of mindful gardening like this can possibly have a shred of stress left in them. And that is surely the greatest gardening gift of all.
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