What is this? A single flower that has just appeared in the kitchen garden, not something I planted. I can't recall ever having seen such a flower before. No doubt there are apps that will tell me but where's the fun in that?

 

 The weather is still warm enough for bees to forage and they seek out what flowers there are. Rosemary (Rosmarinus officinalis) is generally described as spring flowering but a late - or early? - flush of flowers often appears in autumn and even through the winter .

 

 Ivy in flower- the last abundant source of pollen and nectar as summer turns to autumn.

 Autumn (and spring) is the time to transplant when most plants are semi-dormant. The key is to get as much of the root as possible. Globe Thistle grows well at the music school; I wanted to fill a gap in one of the borders so I separated this specimen from a cluster. 

 Autumn is the season of seeds, whether by self-seeding or seed collecting.

 Always a fleeting pleasure when sunlight catches Cyclamen hederifolium in a woodland setting. One of the few plants that flowers in a shady spot in late summer/early autumn. 

 

 A bit of weeding, except I noticed that the 'weeds' in a courtyard area at the music school were self-seeded Verbena bonariensis. So I teased them out from the cracks as carefully as I could to preserve the roots where possible. This yielded twenty or so young plants which I potted up - about a hundred pounds' worth at current prices- reusing old pots, compost made on site and rainwater from the water butt. Hyperlocal and sustainable!

 

 An annual task at the music school- cutting the Yew hedges (approx. 70m in various locations). Yew is tough and springy, not as amenable to topiary as a Privet hedge. Nonetheless can be shaped in the classic squarish section softened with rounded edges.

 It is sometimes said that it is illegal to cut a hedge in the UK between 1st. March and 31st. August. Not so but it is a criminal offence to disturb nesting birds during that period; a hedge is very likely contain a nest or two.

 There is no contradiction between the law and good horticultural practice. Early autumn is the ideal time to trim a hedge: growth is becoming dormant and fresh cuts will not be exposed to frost.

 

Sedums are stalwarts of herbaceous borders in late summer/early autumn.