Rainy Days

As I write these notes ( 6 Nov) rain is hammering down outside, too wet even for me to be in the garden. At least the wet October and November weather has filled up the wildlife pond. Even with a good covering of water lily leaves, the amount of evaporation on a hot summer's day is amazing and the water level soon falls. We have decided to live with this unless any of the water plants are endangered by really low levels. This summer had enough thunder storms to keep things going, but the previous year we did have to top up with the hose. The trouble is that 5 hours of full-on hose did not seem to make much difference to anything but the water bill! Adding too much mineral-rich tap water can cause an algae bloom, resulting in nasty green water that is no good for the wildlife. Rising and falling water levels seem to be the only answer and the planting around the edges stops it looking unsightly.

Now that it is full again we can see it more clearly from the bungalow, which is nice as we still have water lilies in bloom. Our young dog Ted, in true Labrador style, loves it. He can not resist taking things in to see if they float and chasing the dragonflies. Strangely he only likes to paddle and when his football floated into the middle where he would have to swim for it, I had to put my waders on to get it back for him. We seem to have a wet dog most of the time, even when it was frosty a couple of mornings ago he still went in up to his chest.

I think we have only had two frosty days so far this autumn and the mild wet weather has not done much for the autumn colours. Some of our cultivated foreign trees have been good, but the beeches and oaks are really slow off the mark. We were married on the 7 November 24 years ago and there were no leaves left on the beeches when we went walking on our honeymoon. This year half of them are still green and more are on the trees than off. I am sure it must be all the mild weather we have been having and I am not sure what the consequences will be. As I sit and look down the ride and across into the sheep run the grass is so emerald green it could be spring. The sheep are not complaining though!

The wet weather has made it a good year for fungi in the garden with more of the striking red and white Fly Agaric coming up under the silver birch trees than ever. Although lovely to look at they are very poisonous and I was slightly worried that young Ted might eat them. He eats everything else! Even he was not that silly though. There were so many that a whole battalion of little men in pointed hats could have found seats there. We rarely get mushrooms in the garden although we get a lot of what I THINK are Penny Buns, Wood Blewits, and some that I think are called The Miller. They are all supposed to be very tasty but I only THINK that's what they are . The books usually say "similar to the poisonous so-and-so". It would be too late by the time I realised I was wrong and I would like to make my silver wedding anniversary - so they can grow undisturbed and I will stick to mushrooms!

Wendy Bathurst