Bleeding onto the earth ...

Forgive the melodrama. When I saw this bush from a distance, it did indeed look as if the red blooms had bled onto the dead bracken beneath, though the more mundane truth is that the recent rain and wind has had an effect on many of the rhododendrons that were so glorious before. 

I had to choose between two photos from this afternoon's brief walk in Benmore Gardens - the extra is of a tree positively dripping with marvellous lichen, for which the gardens are famous. There's a lichen trail laid out with little signs at the moment, and they point out that there is so much of it because of the very clean air. I suspect it's because we walk in such an unpolluted environment that I react quite badly to the fumes of the city these days - and it just takes a passing tractor, as this afternoon, to reduce me to fits of coughing.

The brevity of the walk, incidentally, was brought on by my having spent too long at the computer yesterday: I really need to buy another chair before I dislocate my hip altogether ...