In Orkney Autumn has arrived with a bit of a bang, rain and grey skies aplenty and today, just for good measure, we’ve got gales and the threat of ferry cancellations, rinse and repeat for tomorrow. Despite the downturn the garden will last for a few weeks yet – some plants are literally just getting into their stride. It’s fair to say though that this month marks the start of the gardens swan song. There are other things to look forward to now, in the wider landscape skeins of Pink-footed geese are already being seen, heading South after summering in Iceland and Greenland. Next will come the musical yap of Barnacle geese, settling in to graze stubble and pasture, our harbingers of Winter. The night sky with its uncountable pin pricks of light, absent for the Summer unless you got up at silly o-clock, is visible again.
Back to the garden, this weeks Six on Saturday is a half dozen September favourites.
First up is a fairly new plant for this garden, Rudbeckia ‘goldsturm‘. Grown from seed a few years ago they’re now dotted everywhere, they’re perfect for this neck of the woods – tough as old boots and rarely needing a support. One of those “why didn’t we grow it years ago” plants. This one is just unfurling, yet to show the dark central cone that gives it the alternative name of Black eyed Susan.
A favourite that we have grown here since we started a garden is Sedum ‘matrona‘. A member of the stonecrop family that sports soft pink flowers on ruby-purple stems, a magnet for butterflies and pollinators. Gardening lore says sedums shouldn’t really do well here but plants don’t read books and so far, despite our autumn and winter wet, it’s thriving, a little bit floppy though if we don’t split it every year.
Jacqui is a live and let live gardener, generally leaving annuals and biennials to self sow and do their own thing. One of our favourite pop up anywhere plants is a Toadflax – linaria purpurea ‘canon went‘, It’s actually a perennial but at home it’s treated like an annual, leave it be and let it pop up where it wants. It flowers here for much of the year but in autumn, as everything starts to die back, it comes into its own, becoming a stand alone plant that now takes centre stage.
Next is an Anemone, this one is bressingham glow. As with the sedum it’s another one that could be a bit dodgy here due to our very wet winters but as with the other anemone’s we grow, so far so good.
Next comes Astrantia claret, as with the linaria it’s not strictly an autumn plant, it flowers here in early summer, gets cut back after flowering and then reliably flowers again through late August and September. Unlike the sedums and anemones we grow this is truly a plant for Orkney, a lover of damp soils and cool summers.
Last but not least comes Crocosmia, a genus that’s an autumn mainstay for this garden. We grow ten or so varieties in various shades of yellow, red and orange, and for here, where trees will go from green to scorched brown and then to bare branches in almost the blink of an eye, the crocosmias, along with the rudbeckias, give us our autumn colour. This one is columbus.
For more Six on Saturdays, from gardens worldwide, pop over to Jims blog
🙌🏼 fantastical 🤩🍃💚💕
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Thank you 🙏
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You must have a fairly good drainage to get those plants through the winter. and your photography is stunning. I too have the same approach with Linaria Canon Went, and leave as many flowers late into the year as the smaller bumble bees are still feasting on them up and until they hybernate.
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The first thing we did, before even starting a garden, was to hire a mini-digger and dig a horseshoe shaped ditch right around the garden to catch water running off the hill behind us.
The upside of being at the bottom of the hill is that although our soil is pretty thin, it’s almost like silt, eroded soil that will have washed down from the hill over the years.
The second thing we did was plant a shelter belt 🙂
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Your anemone is very similar to my Pamina. And the Astrantia is very much the same colour as mine. In fact I can probably match your weather too! I am envious of the Rudbeckia as that was another failure, though I tried ‘Little Goldstar’ which was supposed to be hardy, but didn’t return in the spring. And that is a fab photo of the bud unfurling.
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In winter I would think your weather would be very similar to ours, with more than your fair share of rain and winds but I wonder if our relative lack of frosts allows us to get some of our more dodgy plants through the winter, when we lived down in yorkshire in a south facing garden on free draining soil, every year without fail we would lose allegedly hardy plants to the cold.
The bud unfurling was a favourite. It had to be used 🙂
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Rarely any frost here. But wet. And lots of slimy assassins. In my Yorkshire garden I don’t remember ever seeing any of those.
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Very similar to us, I thought you would have colder winters, we also have the slimy assassins!
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Your opening paragraph reads like a love poem to Hoy – and I chortled at the idea of ‘silly o-clock’ 🙂
Do you get the wild version of Linaria purpurea as well as this cultivated variety?
I shall have to look out for a double anemone like yours, as I only have the single pink or white ones. Mine gamely survive in the most inhospitable parts of the garden, but I like yours better!
Lovely photos, as ever, Gary, and sorry, my Norfolk willow friend says he purposefully doesn’t have a website because he prefers the under-the-radar anonymity of only selling at fairs.
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Hi Penny
An Ode to Hoy! Anytime between 11pm and 6 am should officially carry the title silly o/clock, parliament should be petitioned.
I was on the shore yesterday doing nothing much, just watching waves burst on the rocks – a howling gale, you could barely stand up – bliss, J was in her element, splitting plants and making new plans for the garden (and dodging showers), we really do love this place.
We’ve got the wild version here, for some reason it doesn’t do as well, we get very few seedlings off it. The joint favourite anemone here is ‘dreaming swan’, one of those flowers that looks just as good from the back as it does from the front, todays blog, once I get round to adding pics, is about a wander with the camera last week, on the next garden blog I’ll be sure to post a dreaming swan pic.
Your friend sounds like a very wise & content man.
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Hi Gary, Yes really Autumnal here too, cold nights and mornings and warm in the day if a rather nasty little wind doesn’t decide to blow! And the sea is much colder, boo! Meant to be getting warm again next week, honestly not knowing whether I’m coming or going! I love Geese and we get pink and barnacle and those awful Canada geese which we’d like to send right back! Sorry Penny! The sound of their wings at dawn or dusk is so magical. Get them over the house sometimes, depending on where they are roosting. That claret crocosmia is a beauty! My salvia is still in bloom and still attracting the occasional hummingbird hawk moths, which is amazing. I looked up what the caterpillars eat and it’s Ladies and Sedge Bedstraw, so I’m going to try and grow some next year. But disaster has struck my Sedums! I thought they were pretty well drought resistant but no, a horrible powdery mildew has attacked them and prevented them flowering properly. I thought they’d take over from the buddleia as butterfly/bee food, so am peed off. Thank goodness for the salvia, fuschia and hibiscus marching steadily on. Other stuff doesn’t like these fluctuating temperatures. The drought has placed them under stress too. But, as I’m writing this, a HBHM is buzzing round the salvia. How lovely is that.😍 Have a good week. xx
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Hi Margot, a very breezy weekend here, next weeks looks a bit more settled and drier.
I’ve seen the grand total of one Canada goose in the 13 years we’ve been here, probably an escapee rather than a wild bird, long may that continue (apologies to Penny). Up here the Barnacles are pretty much unique to the island of South Walls, our smaller neighbour that is conveniently linked to Hoy by a causeway, they feed on the island during the day but roost on the small uninhabited island of Switha, to be underneath them as the leave their feeding grounds and cross the small body of water to Switha is magical.
We had the same issue with Sedums in Yorkshire, and with Joe Pye Weeds, even in a normal year both would suffer with mildew due to our free draining sandy soil. I tried to grow Ladies bedstraw in the meadow, all disappeared in the second year, I have some more coming on as plugs, will try them again, fingers crossed.
Envious of the Hawk moths, a rare sight in this neck of the woods.
Have a good week x
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Interesting about your problems with Sedum. Yes my soil is very gritty/free draining like yours was and, of course, I thought the plants would love a drought so didn’t get watered at all! My bad. It was also very humid as well at times, and mildew loves humidity. Still so little rain here, depressing. Cheers x
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Wow, stunning displays! My favorite, I guess, is the ‘Columbus’ Crocosmia. I can imagine the hummingbirds here would truly love it! Also, the delicate, exquisite Astrantia ‘Claret.’ Amazing. But all the beauties you’ve shared here are special–including the familiar ones I grow in my garden. Your photos are incredible. ❤ Happy autumn!
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Columbus is a new addition to the garden, literally just planted last week, hopefully it will acclimatise to this neck of the woods. Claret is definitely a favourite here Beth, one of those plants that you can pop in anywhere. Happy Autumn to you (and to the hummingbirds!)
Wild and wet here at the moment, definitely not hummingbird weather 💨🍃
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I’ve just found your lovely blog, Gary. Makes me want to move there too. 👍
Gorgeous Sedum. In fact the others look great too. A wonderful selection from your September garden.
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Thank you Pádraig. If you get the chance Orkney is well worth the visit.
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