Ealing's swamp cypress ...

Today I'm loving a swamp Cypress - native of a mangrove swamp in the Florida Everglades, - that's made its home in Walpole Park. Who'd have thought? A swamp cypress? In Ealing?

Ealing's Swamp Cypress

Fabulous Foxes ...

On our last day in London I came down early to get ready for my final day at Fibre East. When I looked out into the garden I was amazed to see a vixen with two cubs chasing each other through the flowerbeds. They were so puppy-like. One of the cubs was a great deal more timorous than the other one, and immediately ran off to hide when my sleepy-eyed mug appeared at the window, but Mum and the braver brother didn't scamper. They stayed and partied until I let the WonderDog out for his morning comfort break.

TGI Friday ...

... and the last Friday of the school term at that.

Boy I'm glad we're almost done, but kind of sad all at the same time. It always feels the same as we trudge towards the last day of term. Back in God's Own Country we wound up for the school holidays at the end of June, so this business of plodding on to the middle of July is a bit of a faff in my book, and by now it feels like the end is long overdue.

Slinky 2: Bonny 0

Having been totally defeated by Slinky Paws in round 1 I was beginning to feel that I’d got the peanut situation back under control. There hadn't been a raid in at least a fortnight, which is pretty impressive around here.  I'd finally got the feeder safely anchored to the tree with lots and lots of wire. Parakeets had come and gone. Slinky Paws and his mates had swept through, and everything seemed to be going just fine. 

They're mine! All mine!

Fledgelings fleeing the nest ...

My goodness it's been a strange few days over here at Talk-a-Lot Towers. It feels like Emi, age 10, has grown up and moved out. He and Mr B were off for a fathers and sons' camping trip with the rest of the gang from school last weekend, and then, yesterday, he headed off on his school trip to York - not returning until Thursday night. He's an independent little soul, and I have no doubt that he's having a whale of a time, but the rhythm of life here at home has changed. A lot.

Home is upside down and such a mess that I'd prefer to be living elsewhere. We've had the builders in, and, as is always the case with building work, it's taking much longer than expected due to all manner of unforeseen hiccups and complications. So we're stuck with jumbled up, everything everywhere, and nothing-in-its-place living arrangements for at least another week <sob>.

Out in the garden - to which I escape at every opportunity - there are lots of sweet fledgelings, who, like Emi, are spreading their wings and exploring the world beyond their nests. Look at this adorable little robin who's still lacking his lovely red bib.  And I'm so happy that he's after the monster slugs who live in my garden and eat my lupins. Have you noticed how slugs love lupins?

Squirrel Nutkin goes a roving and a pillaging ...

The other morning I had a troupe of acrobats in my garden. They really ought to have been performing in a circus. 

As I poured my first coffee something caught my eye. I glanced out the window to see the peanut feeder arcing through the air as though it had been catapulted out of the laburnum tree. Slinky Paws and his missus sat high in the branches, watching me, watching them and wondering whether they could safely harvest their bounty on the grass.

Step into my office ...

I love, love, love the month of May - especially when the sun puts in an appearance. My kitchen door is thrown open, and I live on the terrace. How do you like my office? Please do step outside ...

I come out here on sunny days during the rest of the year - often wrapped up warm with coats and scarves against the elements. I leave the parasol in situ all year round - just on the off-chance,  although it's sometimes more of a rainy day umbrella. It feels fabulous to be able to take up my al fresco lifestyle every time the sun comes out and there's just a smidgeon of blue sky.

Ham House ...

They say it's haunted ... very, very haunted ... .

Ham House, Richmond viewed from the Duchess's Garden

And I guess if a house's been standing since 1610, just playing the statistics there's got to have been one or two residents over that length of time who were reluctant to move on - especially when the setting's as splendid as this one. So if you're going to go looking for spooks and ghosts and things that go bump in the night ... then this house is probably a pretty good place to start.

Ode to the Costa Brava poppy ...

If there's one flower that really makes my heart sing it's the wild field poppy. Here on the Costa Brava there are millions of them, all over the shop, dancing in the breeze, and looking splendid in the warm spring sunshine. To me they represent pure joy.

Fantastic Mr Fox ...

I got a surprise this morning when I looked out the kitchen window. There, larger than life and full of vigour, sat Fantastic Mr Fox on my garden wall, and he carried on sitting there staring in at me for at least half an hour. I was transfixed ... watching him ... watching me. He wasn't in the least bit timid. In fact he looked like the Lord of the Manor, surveying his domain.

Knapweed ... or floral super-hero?

"Weeds are flowers too, once you get to know them."

said Winnie-the Pooh 

I'm completely in agreement with Pooh - especially at this time of the year when there's not a whole lot of colour around anywhere for us to enjoy. I saw this rather glorious cluster of knapweed this morning growing quietly beside the path I was following up the cliff. It called out loudly for me to stop and admire it ...

Happiness is ...

... having a Great Spotted Woodpecker as a neighbour. He totally floats my boat.

Isn't he amazing?

He's a timid soul, clutching the branches of the trees in a Gollum-like fashion, and peering carefully around them to make sure the coast is clear before he ventures out to help himself at the feeders.

A charm of goldfinches ...

Did you know that a gang of goldfinches are known as a charm? No, me neither, but I'm going to use it at every opportunity. It's just too charming not to ... .

I've got a few of these little chaps who come to feast on niger seeds just outside my kitchen window. And I'd hate to add up all the time in my day that gets lost admiring them. In the bad old days these little guys were under threat from the caged bird trade, but one of the RSPB's first campaigns, Save the Goldfinch, happily turned the tide, and now they're growing in numbers again.

All the best for the weekend,

Bonny x

Return of my furry nemesis ...

Last weekend I decided that it was time to dust off all my bird-feeding kit, get it all tanked up with birdie tucker and back in the trees. It's not been desperately cold or anything like that, but it just felt like it was time to get the winter-feeders back in action. And I have to admit that it's not an entirely altruistic activity: I get a huge kick out of seeing all the little critters who come to my back garden for dinner.

Still blooming through Halloween ...

We've come to stay with my parents in South Tyrone. My mum's a Halloween baby, and we're helping her celebrate with a birthday weekend to wrap up Emi's half term holidays. One of the many amazing things to impress us over here in Ireland is how her garden is blooming late into the autumn.

I am deeply envious. I garden on not-very-wonderful London clay, where I have to work really, really hard to get the good things to flourish. The weeds seem to do just fine for some unfathomable reason, but I struggle to produce all the wonderful colours that seem to appear almost effortlessly over here.

Fungus fetish ...

It's been a good autumn for Fungi down here in the not-always-so-sunny South West of England.

Yesterday morning I spent a happy hour out in the garden taking macro shots of all the fungal goodness nestling in the grass. Now I'd be lying if I pretended to know the names of these beauties - or, even more importantly, whether I can eat them without poisoning myself. So it's probably just as well that my interaction with them remained one that was channelled exclusively through the lens of my camera ...

Like the sunshine after rain ... a spiritual journey

Isn't it wonderful when the sun finally appears after the rain? We've had a succession of  grey, wet days, down here in Devon. We've hunkered down and nested indoors, but yesterday afternoon the sun came out, and all of sudden autumn turned into something glorious again.

Only a day ago the field of stubble over the hill was a maze of maize. There's a ramblers' right of way that runs right through it, and it felt a little bit like hiking through a jungle. What a difference a day makes ... .

Dahlias ... the stars of the autumn garden ...

I've fallen seriously in love with the dahlia. Sadly I don't have any growing in my own garden, but I'm beginning to feel very envious of all the other folk who do.

The other day, down at Forde Abbey in Dorset, I was very taken with all the colour and cheer that they brought to the perennial borders in the drizzle of a grey afternoon. It was a dreary day that had little to recommend it (other than the splendid company of the good friends with whom we were passing the time) but through all that dismal weather the dahlia stole the show and shone its colour through the gloom.

Beech hut ... Dorset style ...

And, nope, I haven't forgotten how to spell beach!

This beech hut is so named, not because of any close proximity to a beach, but because it's made of beech saplings, cleverly pleached and grown together to make the funkiest garden house I've ever seen. Apparently it was planted back in the 1930's.

Autumn's bounty ...

There's a lot to be said for starting your day with a stroll before breakfast. Here in Devon the farmers are ploughing the fields to plant their winter crops and the rich red earth looks as though it were chosen from a palette of perfect autumn tones to blend with the leaves.

And the very best bit of all this early morning shenanigans is picking an apple, fresh and crisp, straight from the tree. No other apple tastes anything like so good as one that's just been picked.