Summer Treasures

A monarch butterfly feasting on nectar from a white dahlia.

Summer in my our garden is a bit of a mixture. Nothing is really designed, it all just gets chucked in the ground all together. Flowers in together with the veges. Herbs anywhere they will fit. Cuttings growing next to strawberries.

A blue hydrangea which I've grown from a cutting. The original shrub is out in the front garden. It belonged to my grandmother.

Lavender. Bought on the garden-shopping trip with my Mum to populate this garden when we moved in.

Carrot flowers. I like to let a few go to seed because they are so pretty and ethereal. Plus, I might just get free carrots!

Sweet William Dianthus, going to seed.

The white dahlia that belongs to the butterfly. I dug this up from the back vege patch. Suspect it may also have belonged to my Nana,

Not raspberries. Blackberries! And definitely too sour to eat just yet.

Nasturtiums growing wild over the compost heap. I couldn't get rid of these if I tried.

Marigolds planted this season in the back vege garden. A good companion plant to help keep the veges happy.

This magenta dahlia is about neck high, growing next to the chook house door. It was given to me by my Mum (thanks Mum!) and came to her from my Nana... so it's done a bit of a round-trip.

More carrot flower. Check out the gorgeous colours of the fly sitting on the white.

Sunshine thinks she is the prettiest flower of all...

Except she is quite obviously filthy. A dust bathe will do that for you.

I think she's gonna moult again this autumn; her tail feathers are looking quite worn out.

She's lost one of her leg bracelets. The yellow one came off during the first greasing treatment with vaseline. Sunshine is named as such because when the first four chooks arrived she had a sister, another Silver Spangled Hamburg. Gemini died just after New Year 2013 at the age of 2 (or maybe older). She had blue and black rings, while Sunshine had blue and yellow rings. Gemini = black ring = starry night sky. Sunshine = yellow = opposite of Gemini.