An update: after weeks of drought we've had days of torrential rain - yes, believe it or not this was yesterday ......
And the jungle is slowly creaking into bloom...
Though, unfortunately, with the rain have come the slugs, munching on the tender lupin leaves and stripping half the buds before they even have a chance to open. I studied the excellent book, "Fifty Ways to Kill a Slug", by Sarah Ford, which gave the family a lot of laughs, the remedies including sawdust, cat hair, grapefruit and running over the slugs with your car. Sadly none of them have worked so far. Then I read somewhere else that melon rind can be a decoy. I tried it one evening - the next morning the melon rind had gone and not a slug in sight. Perhaps one of our furry friends had made off with both. But it only works with canteloupe. Watermelon is no good. Visiting family brought one the size of the Dam Busters bomb and assiduously pared off the peel but the brutes weren't interested, so now I have a bucket of watermelon peelings for the compost heap. Oh and the canteloupe has to be sweet and ripe, so now I'm waiting for another one to mature, as it were.
Meanwhile the hardy hydrangea is starting to bloom, though a little less than in previous years. Perhaps it's getting tired. I know the feeling.
After last year's tragedy, I've gone all out to keep the deer away from the lily buds - Bobbex spray, Irish spring soap suspended on sticks (but might the respective revolting aromas cancel each other out?) nets, the works and so far there have been some good results ...
..but I'm not holding my breath. On the other hand, the window boxes on the garden shed are, for some reason, an optimum growth environment - even though a few slugs still manage to shin up there. (Sarah recommends copious application of Vaseline but you'd need a shipping container of it).
And peeping from around the corner ....
Yes! Jack's just getting into gear.
So it could be worse. Not so much a losing battle against the predators but a sort of precarious stalemate.