July in the garden

Now that I can understand and it did get sorted last year, unfortunately I had started moving things about in late spring when I came to a full stop, consequently I now have lots of flowers growing in a bed behind my pond that has lots of colour, unfortunately I'm sat indoors watching the rain and cannot see them from my window, lol. luckily I can see the roses, my everlasting sweetpeas and the pots on my patio. The ones I cannot see are Cosmos pink and white, Agapanthus, Day Lilies, Phlox a lovely mauve colour and hoping to see the white ones opening soon, they are the perenial ones, and Penstemons, I have sweetpeas growing up a tripod all saved seed from last year and every one has turned out blue, in fact I was so fed up looking at the border yesterday that I moved some geraniums out of pots and popped them in the border but shush cos him indoors was out at the time and I was bored, lol....

Is that the "postage stamp" in your avatar?
You don't need flowers to have colour - how about variegated or other colour foliage?
If you have a fence or shed you could paint them to add some colour - particularly if you're using the fence as a backdrop for plants.
Take a look at the plant selector RHS website https://www.rhs.org.uk/plants

Maybe the weather has got something to do with the lack of colour this year. It's not a bit like summer, and I know my plants are suffering because of it - very slow and lots of lanky growth.

Hardy Fuchsias are good for summer colour (I am biased !)

I hope the hedgehog isn't dead. They are rare these days.

Penstemons are very useful at this time of year, and so are potentillas.

Our fuchsias are very late indeed coming into flower this year Hywel. Only Dollar Princess is really in full swing.

No, Urbanite, that was my last garden. It was two thirds of an acre and just got too big for us ancient ones. The garden we have now is about 40ft square. As for painting the fences, only one of them belongs to us and Him Indoors doesn't want to do it. Nor do I! We'd never agree on colour anyway.
I haven't tried penstemons, Steragram, because we have a huge slug problem owing to the wilderness next door. Might be worth a try next year though. Potentillas I have but they aren't flowering much. I might try phlox as well.

Thanks folks.

I don't have a slug or snail problem with penstemons, if that's any help. I meant the shrub potentillas not the rockery ones, if those are what you meant. Worth a try anyway.

Hydrangeas are in bloom now. Clematis - take a look at Owdboggy's blog of a day or two ago.

What sort of soil do you have? North/South/East/West facing? Exposed/Sheltered etc.?

Heavy clay which is on top of an old brickworks. The rear of the garden faces north. With houses and fences on all sides the garden is quite sheltered. We do get sun, but unfortunately a neighbour has three huge trees which block the sun from the west. All I can say is that her house must be dark.

Try an Internet search for plants for North facing gardens - you'll find plenty of choice. I found this helpful list http://www.havennurseries.co.uk/PDF/No%20fail%20plants%20for%20shade.pdf