A flower or two on Rhododendron mucronulatum which will be out in two months anyway. A secondary flower or the start of an early flowering?

Another Schima in flower which may be another Schima khasiana. It was planted as Schima wallichii but we all know the muddle in Schima identification.

A couple of tail end flowers on Schima superba nearby.

Every so often you suddenly spot a shrub which you may have passed by a thousand times but taken no notice of until now when it is covered in fruits. It was planted in the early 1990s and has become a suckering multi stemmed shrub of around 6-8ft in height with a similar or smaller spread. It is clearly deciduous and this suggests it may be Ilex verticellata although it is not as I recollect plants in the nursery. If this identification is correct then what we had thought was our Ilex verticellata (but Tom Hudson thought was Ilex centrochinensis or now Ilex corallina) by the camellia foliage piece definitely is not and Tom was probably right. We of course missed this plant on our ilex hunt with Tom in July. Again we will need Susyn Andrews’ help with our ilex identification.

2019 – CHW
A garden tour in the drizzle for a group of 10 VIP Americans who were interested and enjoyed a bit of un-PC banter. We did not dare talk about Trump but I got the feeling that they might well be voting his way next year. I hope some will revisit us in the spring.Vitex agnus castus only just out in flower. The Americans enjoyed the story about the true meaning of the name for the ‘chaste tree’ (see the plant care article on the Burncoose website for more slightly sordid but amusing details).

The old quince has just as much fruit on it as usual. Where the quinces are in groups of four they are smaller but, odd individuals on their own, are as large as apples. Sadly old Mrs Kendall who used to come to collect these each year to make her own quince jam is no longer with us. I DETEST the smell of quinces! Perhaps I should report an allergy or is this a ‘ME TOO’ moment?

Rhododendron ‘Yellow Hammer’ with its autumn flowering which is rather good this year. As good as the spring flowering I think.

Arbutus unedo full of flower nearby but all the strawberry fruits have already been eaten by the pheasants. This is one of the few plants which normally flowers and fruits at the same time.

The elderly Cornus controversa by Donkey Shoe has produced loads of seedlings on the bare ground where we cleared away an elderly oak and camellia last autumn. Jaimie has potted up a few before we strimmed the area but there are plenty more for Asia here if she has not plundered them already?

Rhododendron concatenans putting on a very good autumn show now. Again as good as what we expect in the spring and, hopefully, not instead of.

2018 – CHW
Surprising how things have picked up and grown on after having been killed off (we thought) by The Beast.One fine clump of new Echium pininana seedlings set to produce flower spikes next year.

Hardly an old leaf survived the blasting but here is Garrya elliptica ‘James Roof’ in fine fettle with flower tassels developing.

Euphorbia mellifera looked dead but with a chop back it has now regrown and is nearly the same size it was a year ago. Remarkable resilience!

Daphne bholua ‘Jacqueline Postill’ was leafless and appeared dead in March. Now very healthy!

2017 – CHW
The first camellia of the autumn is out! I have been looking but had missed this young plant which was only planted out in the spring. Camellia sasanqua ‘Variegata’ is variegated in both leaf and flower. Rather attractive I think anyway although my father hated all variegated plants.