The first serious frosts are forecast this weekend, so we have been busy these last few days. Bringing in the last of the tender perennials and putting trays of young plants grown from seed into the polytunnel to protect from winter wet. The frames are full to bursting with spring bulbs and all the things that need cossetting. Just this morning the gunnera were cut down and covered before the freeze withers their foliage. This last job of the season is a pleasure, crafting their winter hats, upturning their huge leaves, one overlapping the next, to protect the primordial crowns from whatever winter brings.

With the turn in the weather, the last of the autumn colour is being driven from the woods and hedgerows and, in the garden, we see the very last flowers. The final asters, speckled now and dimmed, a few brave kniphofias challenging the season and nerines holding still in their month-long reign of colour. But really this is it. The turning point from one season to the next.