This might as well be the summer of 2012 singing this blog’s title, not Joe Strummer of the Clash.

March 2012 – and we had virtually a whole month of clear blue skies and temperatures well into the 70s (Fahrenheit). (Summer arrives early).

April 2012 – and the heavens opened. The wettest April on record. (Summer departs)

May 2012 –  still wet for the first two and a half weeks but a lovely hot, dry week to end the month  (summer returns again).

June 2012 – very wet (summer departs again).

July 2012   - mainly wet and changeable but 5 days of hot sun mid month (summer returns again) before the jetstream wiggles south again – and wind rain and flash floods make a comeback as summer disappears again – or does it?

August 2012  - Starts wet and windy, but I hear that we are due a little summery weather in the next week…. Will summer return again (briefly)?

As I’ve mentioned in a few recent blogs, hospital appointment going to plan, I should have a few days of free time from the end of this week – and will endeavour to blog a little more on what I have seen recently.

For now though it’s fair to say that this week has been relatively mild, a little drizzly (though not nearly as wet as everywhere west and north of us in the UK who have suffered quite a bit again this week I hear) with periods of quite nice warm sun – not too bad at all really.

Anna took a very brief trip down to Kent to see her sister, brother-in-law and nieces and saw a few swifts, very high in the sky, all migrating SE it seems.

As for me, the last swifts I have seen this year (as I write (I’m sure I’ll see one or two on my week off)) were half a dozen or so over our old house “Swift Half” 9 miles away from a new gaff – all seemed like they were hawking but also migrating at the same time.

We have had our rear garden re-fenced over the past fortnight. It’s a very large garden, which is not flat at all (at any point) and the previous owner (and neighbours) had let the borders completely overgrow  with half a century of shrub and honeysuckle growth. This has not been a small job!

The garden now looks a lot neater – and more like “our garden” rather than the old lady’s garden who we bought the house from.

I can now begin to appreciate the lie of our land, our borders, where I can plant trees, shrubs and bee-friendly flowers. Where I can site the pond etc….

We may have left it too late this year to really start soft-landscaping the back garden – but we now can at least see what needs to be done….

I’ve kept my eyes at least half open on my meanderings around the SE of England over the past week or so – the damselflies and dragonflies are out in force now – common darters and demoiselles especially around Reading and the Thames.

Midges seem to be everywhere at dusk these days also – its really pretty mild at present considering we are now in August.

Moths seem to be enjoying these warm nights also – I identified a “Canary-shouldered thorn” moth in my old neighbour’s moth trap last weekend (a beautiful moth) and there are plenty of Willow beauties, Scalloped Oaks and Brimstone moths coming to our windows or outside light at night at present.

I attempted to set my moth trap up again last weekend – but realised the fluorescent bulb had broken – so I will need to procure another to see what moffs we have in our garden at present.

(I naturally expect our moff count to go up and up with each new plant we stick in the ground here – its fair to say that the fencers have taken down almost all of our summer growth, which we expected, but of course this will have depleted our wildlife a lot this year….)

Talking of our plants (or at least those that remain) – we now have seven good sunflowers up and flowering, the tallest being about 8 and a half foot high.

The honey bees and bumblebees (mainly buff-tailed but also tree bees, white-tailed and red-tailed) do love our sunflowers – and if one looks at the sticky flower heads at night with a torch, one can see each flower head covered in earwigs!

The hundreds of cornflowers we’ve grown are also attracting their fair share of hoverflies and honey bees – which also seem to enjoy all the white clover that’s come up in our large patch of “meadow lawn” (unmown lawn which has come up in heal-all, buttercups, dandelions and white cover (as well as long ryes).

I even managed to catch a glimpse of one of our local wee bats this week  - hunting very low (almost within cat claw striking distance – certainly well below my head height). I know the primary school opposite us surveyed for bats before commencing their extension last summer (I’ve seen the results) so I know our bats (there are occasionally  two) are pipistrelles but I know not whether they are common or soprano pips. (I wont know unless I buy myself an Ultrasonic bat detector!)

Bats have been thin on the ground (if you see what I mean) this year – because of scarcity of prey I guess – so have butterflies ( we have had a few meadow browns this week, a few large whites, a speckled wood or two and one gatekeeper and I saw my first peacock of the year only two days ago – weeks and weeks later than normal).

I do hope summer does stay for a little longer during my time off work and I’ll endeavour to get outside and make the most of my time off (health permitting).