Fab Fall Weather & Archer Day Deux

Garden stuff up top & dear Archer the Dog Guide at the end of this post. 17C today - still a bit wet for planting - will endeavour to finish up bulbs and odds and ends tomorrow. Here are a few of the sights I found around the garden.

Some hosta make the most brilliant seed pods - others, absolutely nothing. Love the shiny black seeds in the old tattered casings.

The Japanese Maple is at its peak. Planted it to screen out the street from the dining room. This variety starts out red in the spring, changes to green and then is this wonderful orange red. Just spectacular.

And, of course once you start taking photos, you just can't stop.

This is the Hamamelis with some old Agastache blooms. Not the best photo by a long run, but certainly reminds me why I like those French country blue and yellow patterns.

What a wonderful understory shrub the Witch Hazel is: It takes shade; blooms in March with snow all about; has a lovely scent before there's anything that smells like plants; and in the fall it is a carnival of colour.

So hard to capture the Oak Leaf Hydrangea - still not perfect, but a pretty good representation of what it looked like today.

No garden is complete without plants that remind you of Dr. Seuss....these little bits of green will be have shocking orange red flowers next year.

No laughing, this is the stupendous colour of the Gymnocladus dioicus, Kentucky Coffeetree - a tree whose name is currently bigger than it is. I grew it from seed two years ago - yes, this is why it's in today's Rogues Gallery.

Place all bets - will this Alcea bloom in its 1st year......

Yeah, Erodium!

Great colour this year for the gooseneck loosestrife - nothing like record rainfall to make this look like a big fat fancy plant.

Now, for those of you who want to stop at plants - go no further....for those of you who want to learn more about Dog Guide Archer....continue on, this was day deux.

Well, as I've told my friends we have the perfect dog for the sight impaired marathon runner. This little cutie wastes no time sleeping. 3+ walks so far today - next 60 minute walk to come. This a.m. don't know if I was more disappointed with Archer who roared back into the house after dispatching a squirrel from the yard and then pooping in the house - or the elegant man in the PJ's who was sitting right next to the dog and said, "Barbara, you better come here quickly I think he's going to poo." First not nice words of the day. Felt sorry immediately for dog, not man in PJ's.

We put on our work pinnie and headed over to the Oakville Humane Society for our Oakville temporary license - free because he's a guest of Oakville as a foster dog.

One of the things I didn't realize, but makes perfect sense is that Dog Guides cannot piddle on their appointed route - so everything must be done before and after the walk. Good on our Archer, because he hasn't peed at all on his walks. Not bad for a 4 month old puppy.

Here he is late afternoon - he's been on a panty run. Never had a retriever before. Very odd to find your undies in the living room. Also, he has this very odd habit when I take a bath of putting his front paws on my knees and back paws on the edge of the tub. At which point I said to him, "Well Archer, now what?"