I am thankful for the change in season. How about you all? Any similar stories of thankful respite from the heat?

Josh

There are also a few buds and/or flowers on "Darlow's Enigma", '"Secret Garden Musk Climber", 'Abraham Darby', 'Lady Hillingdon', 'Archduke Charles', "Bermuda Spice", "Sophie's Perpetual", 'Mme Dore', 'Mlle Blanche Lafitte', "Eugene de Beauharnais", 'Louis Philippe', 'Yellow Sweetheart, Climbing', 'Perle d'Or', 'Clotilde Soupert' and 'Marie Pavie'.

'Nouveau Monde' isn't blooming, of course, but is sending thick new shoots from its thickest main cane. 'Orfeo' has yet to bloom for me, but continues growing up the Callery pear. The few remaining roses in pots are likewise growing like it's Spring -- all the HTs are blooming or about to, and in this cool weather, I get to really enjoy long-lasting color development in 'Chateau de Clos Vougeot', 'Nigrette', and 'Night' (aka 'Lady Sackville').

I imagine we'll get our first light frost some night in the next week or two, though daytime temps will stay in the 50s and 60s probably through Thanksgiving. Stephen Scanniello recommended that, around Xmas, I tie some evergreen boughs to 'Jaune Desprez' as it continues its climb into the tree.

Now is the time I get to walk around the yard without having "chores" to do (for now). I'm thinking about companion perennials and Clematis to order for Spring, and making mental notes of "I need this to go there".

And, perhaps more importantly, I can start focusing on indoor improvements. Getting settled here is taking longer than I anticipated, but it has to get done before I start school again, or else it might not happen at all. I'm actually happy that my morning walk around the "garden" doesn't turn into hours of yardwork.

:-)

~Christopher

Ingrid

After our usual droughty hot summer, in the last week we have gotten something like 6" of rain. Summer wasn't as dry as some, but seemed disproportionately destructive. A nurserywoman I was talking to suggested that the very wet spring encouraged plants to make an amount of growth that they couldn't support through the drought. I lost two mature shrubs and had a Hick's yew go brown...Taxus baccata for me from now on, it can take anything.
Today we may actually get some sun. I have been thinking black thoughts lately and I think it has much to do with the lack of light, though even today is supposed to be partly cloudy at least; and the clouds I see out the window look menacing.
So the garden has been watered: how it will do from now on will depend on whether we get some sun and warmth after the rain. The roses are leafing out brilliantly. I'm working for fun in the shade garden, planting bulbs and terracing, and for necessity out in the horrible large garden, with its diseased roses and invading weeds. I don't know whether it's my advancing age, or the weather this year, but I've hardly been out there. Fortunately I now have a helper one morning a week, and her company has given me the strength to go out and attack the situation. I hope this winter will be easier than last year, when we had snow on the ground for most of the winter and a late, wet spring. We also can't find hay for amendment. I think that with the late spring the farmers used up all their supplies while waiting for the first cut, and then we've been buying up old hay for years and may have cleaned out the local supply. We were able to find just five bales (2000 kgs. in all). But the hay, though late in coming, was abundant enough this year, and I'm hoping that next year there will be some leftover bales once more.

I hope to have a more optimistic acount of the big garden to offer in a few weeks. Meanwhile, happy gardening to you all! I'm enjoying fall cleanup in the less compromised parts of the garden: all that organic matter getting fed back into the soil is inspiring as usual.

And we got six inches of rain.

Melissa

And bulbs are coming, long awaited from a summer order to be planted late in October. Then months of cold wet winter. But in February the signs of spring will begin through the rain. I already am anxious for next spring's garden and roses. The garden year ends in August for me as the roses have yielded most of its secrets by then and it's time to think about next year. September brings my annual tweaking and moving and ripping out. And now it's October again. How different the rhythms of resting and growth are here. I agree, the garden lives. But mine is going to sleep. Enjoy your southern sun and roses!

I am so glad to hear you received some long overdue rain! I must admit I was concerned about your roses. What a relief! Hopefully the wildfires stay at bay this year and your garden can enjoy a long respite from the scorching summers.

Melissa,

I too was thinking black thoughts, though mine were because of the oppressive heat and sun. Please post some photos when your garden is ready! Yours is one of my favorite gardens to dream about.

Harborrose,

Indeed, the South is due for more sun still! We are not due for our first freeze until November. Even then, I doubt we will get much of a winter. Our weather depends heavily on the El Niño cycles and it seems we are in an off year so we will have a mild winter. Hopefully the roses will receive enough chill to reinvigorate them next spring.

Poorbutroserich,

I suspect the teas will bloom until the first freeze and beyond if your temps stay mild enough. I have seen Teas blooms well beyond even when trees have dropped their leaves and are dormant.

Chris,

I wish I could concur about the morning walks but I must sheepishly admit that in my heat I have not even performed those. Most of my roses were left to their own devices while I hid inside from the 100 degree weather. Luckily they figured it out themselves and are well on their way to maturity. It WAS touch and go there for a bit with a couple plants, however.

Josh

Although I water regularly, I had several rose deaths this summer. I attribute that to the increasingly intense heat and lack of rain, of course. One rose death that took me by surprise was Souvenir de la Malmaison. She has been in the ground for several years and has always been very healthy, I thought. But, at the end of the summer, I noticed her cane started dying back and now I realize I will have to remove her. I'm pretty heartbroken; she was one of my mature beauties.

Things are beginning to look better out there in the garden but we still get heat until the end of October (90's sometimes). Sigh, I am thinking it will be increasingly difficult to garden in this climate as time goes on. Not a happy thought.

I wish had some encouragement for you, Jasper. The gardener adapts as best as s/he can. At least the will to grow things is a powerful vital impulse.

Melissa