Turning over an old leaf…

Fallen leaves from the backyard - sycamore on the left and field maple on the right...

Sycamore or maple? I have always had trouble identifying these trees, but hadn’t thought of tackling my ignorance until I read a recent Lucy Corrander blog post – as she also seems to have the same problem.

So bad is my confusion that

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Shrub of the month: Viburnum tinus

Viburnum tinus hedge alongside a Cardiff street...

Please don’t be fooled by the title – I don’t expect this to be a regular series! But I must say the stand-out shrub I have seen flowering in street-side gardens these last couple of weeks has been this one.

It’s Viburnum tinus, an evergreen with laurel-like leaves and lovely white flowers. What a useful plant to have in the garden at this dull time of year!

I always recognise it as something popular in dark old Victorian gardens, but I had to look it up to remember what it was called. Viburnum is simply the Latin name for the wayfaring tree (a name which always sounds very Tolkienesque to me). That’s another member of the same plant family, Viburnum lantana, which has similar flowers but very different leaves and berries from Viburnum tinus.

The picture was taken with my phone’s camera and this little post also serves to introduce my new image gallery of iPhone snapshots…

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Tintern journey starts at the Old Station…

Railway carriages at the Old Station, Tintern

My last post was about the Circle of Legends at the Old Station in Tintern, Monmouthshire, but now we come to the Old Station itself.

This is an easily overlooked attraction, but

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Figures in a Monmouthshire landscape

The Circle of Legends in Tintern, Monmouthshire

Back in the summer I was totally smitten by this circle of six ancient wood-carved figures in a forest clearing in Tintern, Monmouthshire.

The figures themselves, sculpted from oak (or in one case sweet chestnut), are not ancient, but the people they represent are historical and mythical characters at the heart of this part of the country.

They were

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Three treasures of November

This picture of my Liquidambar was taken using my iPhone camera after rain - not a bad shot, really...

This year the grey November is lit up by three of my favourite plants, all coinciding in time thanks to the mixed-up weather we have these days.

Don’t ask me

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Last scraps of summer colour…

Fallen Fuchsia flower...

My garden is an autumn mess, but I took these pictures a fortnight ago, in mid October, while there were still one or two scraps of summer colour remaining.

Now many of these flowers are gone. Soon

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