A reminder of summer

I was scrolling through my photos and found this one of the long grass on the meadow.
Look at that sunshine!

Rotting Fruit

Rotting Fruit

Even chicken wire is nice on a warm day.

Rotting Fruit

Rotting Fruit

Rotting Fruit

Taking a break on the tree trunk.

Rotten Fruit

In the orchard just behind the meadow, there is a pear tree with gorgeous ripe yellow pears.
Some fruit is rotting on the ground and there, in the warm October sun, I found at least five Red Admiral butterflies feasting as well as wasps and flies. It really is worth not being too tidy as this provides valuable food at this time of year.

Road Works

An electricity company has dug a hole at the edge of the meadow (in the space where we usually park).  They dug another hole in the large triangle of grass at the top of the road, where I did my practise scything and where we found the Lady's Bedstraw in the summer.

I have taken advantage of the disturbance to plant some Anemone bulbs at the top of the road and I'm hoping that the Cornflowers, which are right next to the dug up parking space, will like the disturbed soil.  My other job this weekend has been to collect seed from the Vipers Bugloss, which is a biennial, to grow some plants on in case they don't propagate naturally on the meadow.  My plastic greenhouse is in pieces in the shed so I'll wrestle that out and hopefully remember how to put it together again.  There are also cuttings cuttings from my favourite sage to overwinter in it, and a couple of Penstemons as most of these died last winter.

Autumn Flowers

There have been light frosts on the meadow some mornings, but it is
still warm and sunny enough for flowers, including this daisy and clover.

Wildlife Artist - Bombus Terrestris

I have reproduced this painting of a Bumble Bee (Bombus Terrestris) with the permission of the artist, Odile Kidd. She is a very talented artist based in London who specialises in painting wildlife.   I love the way she has caught the primitive insect quality of the bee.  

October Dragonfly

The dragonflies were out yesterday as it was wonderfully sunny.
This chap must be a bit dozy because he happily came and sat on my hand.

Update

I dead-headed the Heleniums this weekend which included finally chopping down the spiderweb nursery (see post of 22 August).  I couldn't see evidence of any live spiders, so they must have all grown up and moved away.

Lots of dragonflies around this weekend, probably enjoying the unusual hot weather.  There was one really big one but none of them settled long enough for me to get a decent picture.