This is my last pelargonium flowerstalk of this year, they have been flowering from May and they will last for another week, maybe two. They are not frost resistand. We have had extreme Autumn weather with high temperatures, 10 to 15 C° higher than normal for this time of the year, that is why they are in bloom for so long. I did water them well when it was so hot in Summer, that helped of course. I’ll try to keep them till next year by putting them in my unheathed greenhouse. If we get a soft Winter they will manage.
What is not to love about begonia’s ? They are one of the easiest plants I know. They come in all kinds of colours and shapes of flowers and leafs. It’s a bulb you plant frostfree in early Spring, once the frosts are gone you can put them outside in a shady place, they can manage a bit of sun but then you have to water them more. In Autumn after the first frost you remove them out of the ground or pot they are in, remove the soil around the bulb and put them in a newspaper in a cool frostfree place and the next year you get them out in early Spring ( you’ll notice they already have some new shoots !) and you start all over again. You can repeat this for many decades, they will always perform, always.
We had a heathwave lately, and my garden didn’t like it, nor did I. In fact I hated it, we had temperatures we never had before and the drought is awfull !!. We got a nice bit of rain yesterday but not nearly enough, besides not every part of my country got rain, and it is the same in other European countries and all over the world as we can see on the news. I have never longed for Winter but now I do !! Streams became pools and then there are the fires all over Europe and in the rest of the world. It is just scary !!!!
I’ll show you some pictures of my garden. We were able to use a waterhose to spray the garden and I did, but the sun was just too hot.
MY BIG RHODODENDRON RUINED it is supposed to be an evergreenTHIS WAS MY GOLDENRODMY GERANIUM MICRORHIZZUM . but once we get colder and wetter weather it will grow green again, this one is really tough
It looks like Autumn now, not only in my garden but everywhere. The temperatures are still high but less than before, still too hot for me.
It has been hot lately and dry, so the garden doesn’t look good at the moment, there are a lot of dry leaves of plants and of tree’s, it looks like autumn at the moment. But I found a few nice flowers who still looked good.
MALVA
This annual malva is so heath resistant, on a hot day the leafs are hanging vertically on the plant and you think it is going to die, but the next morning it surprises you and it looks fresh again with normal leafs. I was amazed !
ALBIZIA JULIBRISSIN or Persian silk tree
This tree is also heath resistant, it is a bee magnet, the whole tree is buzzing during the day. In the evening the leafs close up. It is filled with beautiful pink and white flowers , but with the heath they fade faster than usual. It is not a huge tree, ideal for smaller gardens.
BEGONIA
This begonia is a bulb plant, I bought a few of these several years ago, I put them in a pot in Spring and they bloom all Summer long, in Autumn I take the bulbs out of their pot and put them in an old newspaper and in a frost free but cold room. In Spring I put them again in new soil in pots. They thrive in the shade but they need moist soil. An old lady told me she had the same begonia’s for over 50 years !!! And each year they were covered in flowers.
HIBISCUS syriacus
This is a flower on one of my hibiscus bushes, they too fade sooner now that it is so hot but it is an easy bush, they come in many different colours and they are a real asset in your garden. They are winterdardy in Western-Europe but not in colder area’s.
FUCHSIA
This is one of my fuchsia plants, most of them like living in the shade in a pot, in moist soil. This one is in the sun, as you can see but I put it there to make this picture.
GWENNIESGARDENWORLD 
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