Fire!

Sadly next door's shed caught fire at the end of August and I experienced a bit of collateral damage. Worst affected was the cold frame (all that work!) and one side of the shed. On the plant front, the Olive is now completely bald on one side and the surrounding roses and apple tree have taken a bit of a battering. As to their long term chances I can only hope that they channel their inner Australian and come back stronger next year. I think for those planted in the ground this should be ok but I am concerned about the Olive and Quince as they are in pots and I have no way of knowing just how damaged or otherwise the roots may be as a result of the heat from the fire. At least terracotta likes to be baked, hopefully it has taken the brunt of it. My dad gave me the olive as a very small tree (maybe 30cm high) when I moved into my first house and Dad died nearly 20 years ago now. As is so often the way with plants, it's a tree with a lot of sentimental attachments and I have my fingers very strongly crossed for its survival.

For a while I didn't want to go to the top of the garden as it just made me sad, but as the autumn has rolled in and I've been out to chop and tidy and mooch my mojo has returned. My plan is to use some of the insurance money to replace the shed next year and get a potting shed. This will need an additional contribution from me but if I'm going to make the effort to empty the shed I may as well try and achieve a dream! I had hoped that the cold frame would take the place of a greenhouse for bringing on seedlings etc but I got mixed results last spring. The seedlings began well but the slugs and snails soon found their way in and made short work of my sprouts, squash and courgettes. My strategy definitely needed refining. A mute point now as the frame is burnt to a crisp on one side and the lid damaged beyond repair. At the moment it is acting as storage space for excess plastic pots but is not weatherproof. I was so proud of having built it from the Harrod Horticultural pack - ah well, we all know what pride goes before eh!!

The autumn has been exceptionally golden this year it seems and the garden has been full of colour. The Cosmos 'Sensation' came through very late on, not flowering until Sept but fizzing all through October and only giving up the ghost as the first proper frost hit at the beginning of November. A potting shed might give me the opportunity of bringing them on earlier but then again the timings might just be a result of me not organising seed sowing properly!

I look at the garden now, with the trees beginning to really establish and it just makes me smile. How wonderful plants are to be able to change a bare and fairly barren space into something with colour, form, variety and habitat. For so much of the time now I despair of our ability to make a positive impact with re to climate change and the future of our planet and then I look at the garden and hope returns.

Right, enough navel gazing - time to plant!