Last of the summer wine

Here we are, mid-October, and the butterflies are still with us. This was one of about four or five Red Admirals basking on the buddleia in the early afternoon sunshine at RHS Wisley today.

The place was busy - mostly with middle-class parents pushing prams with enough kit to tackle the Paris-Dakar rally, or trying to ignore little Tabatha and Oliver as they smudged their Boden separates while chucking stones at the ducks. OK, I know I'm turning in to a grumpy old man, but Wisley just isn't what it was. It's still a brilliant place but these days they have signs in the hot house asking people not to throw coins in to the lily pool because they fracture the leaves. Why do some people have the urge to chuck coins in to anything that looks like an ornamental pond or fountain? Can anyone tell me?

Thank you to those who dropped by and said nice things about the dandelion clock yesterday. I know that a morning dew can coat it that way but, not being a mornings person, I plucked it, sprayed it (before) with a garden hose on the mist setting, then taped it to a step ladder behind the sun, and photographed it using my spanking new not-to-open-before-Christmas tripod. Well I wasn't going to leave it in the lawn. It's a weed! Yesterday's jewel is today's compost.