mid-October 2022

Green alkanet, self-seeded in a pot, it survived the drought and heatwave and now it is enormous. I try not to have green alkanet in my pots (it self-seeds all over my garden) but this one got away. It will die back after flowering which might not be until Spring now. Another pot of forget-me-not bottom right.

I'd not grown red campion before but it was in some wildflower seeds I sowed and my goodness did the bees love it! I didn't know that or would have grown it before. I also didn't know it self-seeds like mad so I have it in a lot of pots now getting ready for Spring.

the drought was so severe even teasels were dying, these seedlings in pots survived and are now thriving after rain and my watering, they are enormous

This nipplewort started off as a seedling I thought was nipplewort but wanted to confirm, also I'm not sure if bees like it but by the time of all these flowers the bees were gone. It has turned into a magnificent plant. A couple of red campion flowers to the upper right, nasturtium leaves at the top.

Rocky with Oxford ragwort, verbascum flower spike with seedheads and verbena bonariensis to the left

Rocky with a pot of borage to the left

Rocky at rest, he's usually running around like mad but he does like to photobomb my photos so jumped up on the table when he saw I was snapping pics

scabious survived but it was smothered at the back of the flower bed and I didn't really water the pot much during the drought but I love scabious so must look after it better

the sea holly had a surprising revival, not sure these will fully bloom, sea holly are rather fickle for me although I love them and keep attempting to grow them

water figwort as rescued from another garden, it's survived, curious to see if it blooms next year

self-seeded calendula, best calendula flowers I've ever had and I wasn't even trying

I've had masses of shoo-fly plants sprouting from my home-made compost. I let them grow, maybe too much but they have produced some nice flowers the bees liked when they were still around.

my pelargoniums are looking great now but they had been rather sad looking during the drought and heatwave and had not bloomed, I hope they manage to flower next year