clematis orientalis, traffic lights, planting

The seeds of this clematis are often more impressive than the the bell-shaped yellow flowers.

Late afternoon in the town, and the changing messages of the traffic lights are reflected by the wet tarmac so that the lights and their reflections seem to be conversing with one another.

In the Grove, a solitary gardener, the sun low in the western sky, has the pleasant job, this afternoon, of planting new saplings. "Five oaks and a beech" he tells me. He saws posts in to suitable sizes (to stand about a meter above the ground) and bangs two in on either side of each tree. Also buried with each tree root is a length of hose, of which the top stands just proud of the ground, to allow economic watering precisely where it is needed, when the dry weather comes.