There are days where the air feels warm and the sun shines long and low.

And then there are the nights when I can hear the cold winds whipping down the valley and I get stuck on whether I have closed the greenhouse. On these nights I sleep with the dogs in bed.

The kitchen is full of quince and beech leaves. There are trays of beetroot in the oven, and I am dreaming of soups and stews. In the garden, the late warmth means the cosmos are still going strong, and a few sherbet fizz calendula have burst into late life. These are the accidental flowers, they just happen to be out in October. In my world, the season truly belongs to asters and dahlias…

The dahlias are on the move. They are not happy where they currently are; I think the ground is compacted underneath the top layer of soil. When we had the paths put in, it is where they tipped the hoggin, and then we put our wedding marquee there and I think this means the compost I add on the top stays just sitting there. Plus, the jewel coloured dahlias will form the backbone of the bright front garden.

Now I just need to work out a) which one is which and b) which ones I am going to keep.

And so today, I am spending the day documenting my ever increasing dahlia collection. I could just ask Philippa of Just Dahlias to identify each one (her knowledge of them is encyclopaedic and it is a great party trick) but that doesn't feel fair, so it will be me and my planting records.

Once I have labelled the ones I want to keep with a milk bottle label and a piece of wire, I can start to cut the flowers. I have a vase all ready for them, prepared with boughs of beech and fronds of golden bracken. It is time to be ruthless; any of them I don’t want to keep, are pulled out by the root and chopped up for the compost.

October is not the time for going small on cutting flowers; this is the year’s crescendo.