Callicarpa Week

Callicarpa bodinieri is actually looking even more impressive in Week 2008/40 than in the preceding weeks when its berries were ripening, because its leaves have turned mauve as well, enhancing the berries, which look like purple beads on rough leather in some kind of exaggerated costume jewellery. White Symphoricarpos berries are on the bushes now, but are not so big as I remember from earlier years. As the first autumn storm lashes the house, it seems supremely odd to discover that Heptacodium miconioides is beginning to cover itself with small daisy-line white flowers. Hydrangea paniculata has also been impressive until the arrival of the storms mutilates its petals. We give a big welcome in this week to the rest of the aster clan. Aster laevis has already been in flower for a week, and now it is the turn of purplish Aster novae-angliae to impress at shin height.