The Six on Saturday gang of bloggers share garden highlights every week. Here’s my offering for mid-July. View more at the Garden Ruminations blog where Jim hosts this delightful meme.

The first thing that caught my attention this Saturday morning was birdsong and roses. But almost immediately after that it was a hungry cat demanding breakfast.

After feeding this marvellous creature, the scent of roses and sound of birdsong were back on the list for this six. I can’t photograph scent or song, so here’s the aptly named ‘Lark Ascending’ rose.

As I sat down to write this a red kite swooped over the garden, followed by a flock of swifts. I’m enjoying paying more attention to the birds, learning their songs, and messing around making a game about how the sound of the dawn chorus is changing. The latest iteration focuses on the city of Bath, and goes back in time to before the first humans settled here, and forward to an imagined ‘Solar Punk’ future, where we make a nature-friendly city and the dawn chorus is rich again. Its free to play, and the aim of the game is to cherish the chorus.

Play at https://bird-times.lovable.app/

I’m still not entirely sure what I’m doing with this game, but it has helped me learn about birdsong and the impact of humans on avian biodiversity, as well as how to make apps. But app-making is not really a garden thing so lets get back to the flowers and fruits, and the hydrangea by the bird bath, which has just begun flowering. We’ve moved this one from the front garden to it’s current position. Variety unknown.

We recently bought some Dahlegria, which I thought were just normal dahlias until I checked the label. They are flowering nicely, and I hope they’ll do well in the pots before maybe going in a border next year. Adding a few dark splashes of burgundy foliage around the garden seems to be working to add a bit of interest to the space.

Sweetpeas! We have more of those grown from seed coming up – both annuals and perennial. I’ve potted on those that grew from Mandy’s seeds, and will pick another bunch of the annuals today.

The elderberries are beginning to ripen. The pigeons are waiting impatiently.

The wisteria on the pergola has put on a second flush of flowers, and the summer screenings are set to continue. I also enjoyed this natural show at dawn earlier this week, where the dawn sunlight cast some wonderful shadows onto the screen.

A couple of commenters on last week’s blog noted that our neighbours might not enjoy late night screenings, so I’d like to clarify that the screen is in a tucked away location. We’ve checked our sound and light levels and confirmed with both neighbours that we’re not disturbing them.

While I’m on corrections and clarifications, I think my plant ID was wrong last week. I could blame google but I also could have double checked what it told me more carefully. This is NOT an Obedient Plant in our pond. It’s a purple loosestrife.

Many thanks to those kind commenters who gently suggested it was a disobedient plant ID. 🙂

So, that’s more than six, as usual, and I rambled around the garden and beyond.

Have a lovely week,

Jen xx