Plant Virginia Creeper for dependable Autumn colour

I have had rather a busy week and struggled this morning to find something topical to write about.

About five minutes ago I popped out to get a breath of fresh air in the extremely warm Autumn sunshine - it was there it hit me.

I bought a small Parthenocissus tricuspidata Veitchii in April 2007 at about 75cm in height. My idea was to cover over the end wall of our Gite which is covered in rather a drab grey rendering.

I couldn't have begun to imagine it two and a half years later absolutely smothering the wall.

The leaves are well advanced into their Autumn colours and it is quite literally on fire.

The wall faces due North-West but the stems have moved onto the South-West and North-East facing and don't seem to have lost any vigour on the cooler/darker side.

It's easy to describe this Virginia Creeper (Boston Ivy) as the Jordan of the plant world. Brash, rampant and exotically colourful and I would defy anyone not to fall in love with this plant as it changes colour into the shortening days.