Six On Saturday – 22 August 2026

Early start today as we’re having a party/house gig here later on today. So inevitably I have spent a large amount of time in the last week getting the garden ready for this. The garden is looking better than it has all summer thanks to two days of torrential rains, and me spending about 400 hours (maybe not that many) pulling out the dreaded horse tail from seemingly every crack and crevice in the garden. So here are my six for this week. Please head over to our host Jim’s blog and join in with us for Six On Saturday – six things from your garden this week.

I’m going to cheat right off the bat with more than one photo but they are the same flower/species. But there is a reason for posting both. This sunflower with the bee hanging nonchalantly from a petal is a contribution to the garden from our wild birds. We have been feeding with fat balls all summer (as per RSPB recommendations) and for the first time ever this has resulted in 3 sunflowers just appearing in the margin between the path and the lawn!! One is in full flower now, the other two are a week or so behind I think. The third photo is of the sunflower I deliberately planted. It is tiny and malnourished by comparison!!

Next up is Cosmos. A plant I am very rarely without in my garden. I only have a two displays this year but they’re having a second wind having given up the ghost in the last heatwave.

I planted some Zinnia months and months ago and forgot to thin them out – but they’ve decided to flower anyway.

I had to use the plant identifier in my Mac photo app – it informs me this is called Snowberry. It’s been a bit meh all summer but now has huge white berries and delicate pink flowers. It’s sharing its space with some hypericum which has raised itself to my hit list this week (remember the rose shenanigans – that’s a distant memory now). My new goal is to eradicate the hypericum as it seems to share traits with the horse tail – I’ve found it everywhere in the garden and it’s a bugger to get out. So the two seed sowing culprits will be losing their accommodation as soon as as the summer is over!

Next up is a new addition to the garden – snapdragons! They haven’t fared well in the heat but I’m hoping they have a late season rally in the cooler weather we’re enjoying right now.

Last up is another new plant – we bought a honeysuckle in spring and it hasn’t been happy all summer, until a few weeks ago when it seemed to have a growth spurt and decided to live after all. So obviously I bought another one!! The flowering plant is the newest one, the original you can just spot in the background. I’m hoping to train them around the balustrade if I can.

That’s my Six. Thanks to our host Jim – please visit his site and from there you can find all the participants in our weekly garden round robin.