I didn't hear a nightingale sing in Berkeley Square when I sat down to have my lunch today. But it was nice to commune with nature albeit briefly in the heart of London.

When I was a boy this Oak was a sapling no taller than me. Now it's higher than the house!

Autumn colours on a grey day: Stag's Horn Sumach. [see also 26th. October]

 After a slow start with the drought the Nasturtiums on the allotment quickly ramped up when the rains came in September. In fact Nasturtiums are very drought tolerant -indeed thrive on parched soils- but they need some moisture to get going.

 I see salad vegetables growing on the other plots with limited success but Nasturtiums are great. The young leaves are delicious raw, the flowers are edible and the seeds can be pickled (when still green) as "poor man's capers". By this time of the year the leaves are getting a bit tough but I picked a couple of handfuls of the younger ones to make Nasturtium soup. Delicious! However you take them they have a tangy, peppery taste.

 The first frosts will kill them though hopefully there have been enough flowers in their late growth spurt to self seed. I still have some seeds saved from last year if needs be. I will probably scythe a section next week because I want to try some Field Beans which are hardy enough to sow in autumn. The rest I will leave to mulch themselves as a 'green manure'. 

 We've reached that point in the year when it's time to sweep/rake up all the soggy, scrunchy leaves that are accumulating. A garden tidy is quite satisfying but that's not the main point of the exercise. Leaves on beds can stay where they are to mulch the soil. Leaves on paths and grass can be gathered up to make a pile of lovely, crumbly leafmould a year or two hence.

The bright red flowers of Japanese Quince were the subject of an entry earlier this year [11th. April]. There was one growing in the front garden when my parents bought the house and it persists to this day even though subsumed into a privet hedge. The spring flowers beget autumn fruits.  

Autumn colours: Fig Trees take on a yellow glow as the leaves turn.