Chrome yellow Mahonia flowers through a wet window…
It’s time to catch up with the garden. October and November in South Wales have been very wet and often windy. While areas farther south in England suffered in the St Jude’s Day storms a week ago, our big gales came later, with torrential rain putting a damper on some early Bonfire Night parties over the weekend.
Heavy rain falling on a neighbour’s castor oil plant…
We haven’t had a frost yet and autumn seems reluctant to start. The ash leaves are still mostly green…
Green ash leaves in November…
Although the gales have been ripping off the leaves anyway, even if they aren’t ready…
Fallen leaves…
The continual wet weather means that weeds are flourishing in a neighbour’s roof gutters…
Willowherb in a roof gutter…
Grass and wood avens (I think) in the gutter…
At least some leaves are starting to show a bit of colour, but it’s not a good autumn at all…
Wet Liquidambar styraciflua leaves…
At last the top of the Liquidambar is going red…
There are much better images of my Liquidambar in my earlier blog posts here and here…
The Japanese maples are doing their best…
Cut-leaved Japanese maple Acer palmatum var. dissectum
Red cut-leaved Japanese maple Acer palmatum var. dissectum atropurpureum
The Japanese golden full moon maple Acer shirasawanum ‘Aureum’ isn’t looking so good…
I have stopped worrying about the moon maple as it often seems to look this way and always pulls through (see this blog post).
Wet leaves of Euonymus alatus (burning bush)…
Sunlight on wet smoke tree Cotinus coggygria Notcutt’s Variety…
Fuchsia in a pot…
Schizostylis coccinea looking the worse for wear after the storms…
The metallic Heuchera is soldiering on…
Thrown by the mild weather, the Japanese anemones are in full leaf again…
…after they were cut back for winter a few weeks ago…
Hopefully we will have the first frost soon – but not TOO cold, please…
The Squirrelbasket 
Stunning pictures Pat. Its always sad when winds leave so much damage to these lovely plants. However, they are tough and spring back to life when better weather arrives. Hopefully soon.
Still waiting for that better weather! Rain again today 😦
Best wishes…
Nature is certainly confused Pat. Fabulous photos (as always). Love the rain on your neighbours plant. We do have some fab colours here … and of course lots of debris on the paths from St Jude. We had our gutters cleared last week – amazing what was growing in there!
Thanks for the kind comments.
I must point out again that the gutters pictured are not ours – and none of us here can see our own gutters because of the way the houses are arranged. But we do have ours cleared out regularly…
At least the darker days mean I am getting more reading done. Currently enjoying The Apothecary’s Daughter by Charlotte Betts, set at the time of the plague in London (1665-1666). I don’t think you have mentioned that one? I can’t deny it is fundamentally a romance…
The Apothecary’s Daughter has been on my list for a while Pat. Do you add your reviews anywhere? Would be interested in knowing your thoughts.
No, strangely I don’t think I’m a good book reviewer. I used to do it as part of my journalistic job, which may be why I’m off doing it for pleasure now!
But so far my thoughts are that it is a great romantic but sometimes harrowing read (not as harrowing as The String Diaries!) – lots of people dying of plague.
I think I know which way the plot is going, but that’s a good thing, as the heroine doesn’t!
We’ll speak again 🙂
It’s definitely staying on my list!
Thanks Pat
Was browsing my Kindle last night Pat … and yes, you’ve probably guessed … I have The Apothecary’s Daughter already there!
Just finished reading it last night. Very satisfying…
Did you see there’s another book with exactly the same name, though? That one is 19th century and maybe worth a look as well…
Thanks for tweeting my two churches blog.
🙂
It’s Charlotte Betts that I have. Didn’t know there was another one …
Ah, you’ve captured the rainy season very well. It’s not much different here. I’ve got Schizostylis coccinea blooming, too. Such a bright and cheerful flower to be blooming in November!
Funnily enough the next day I saw a lady on the bus with a leggy Schizostylis coccinea plant in a carrier bag. I was dying to show off and say: “Where are you off to with that Schizostylis coccinea…”
Luckily the moment passed!
Best wishes 🙂
Lovely pictures, especially that Fuchsia against that blue pot. We were lucky with that St Jude’s Day storm; it didn’t intensify until it had passed through us and passed into Wiltshire. So not much damage was done.
Thanks for your comments. My camera finds it hard to cope with VERY bright colours.
Today the sun is shining and there are butterflies and bees in the garden. Still wet under foot though.
Glad the storm missed you, too…
Best wishes 🙂