Innholdsfortegnelse for 20-May-2017 i Amateur Gardening

DARLING, I have something important to tell you,” I announced. Kath, my wife, was rummaging amongst our modest fern collection behind the garage, chopping back old foliage as the fresh new fronds unfurled. Not a good idea really as she’d recently undergone knee replacement surgery, but the ferns were looking great and Kath was managing the precision dismemberment without crutches – a major step forward in her recovery. “ “Pass me the yellow trug.” “I’m retiring from Amateur Gardening.” At this point I considered ducking, fully expecting the yellow trug to come hurtling back out of the fern bed. But all I got was: “Oh, when?” “This week.” “What will we live on?” “Well, I have my company pension, and I thought I could do a little gardening round or…

AT this time of year, when you can almost hear the garden growing by the day, it can be easy to neglect indoor plants. However, late spring and summer are times of peak growth for houseplants as well as those in the garden, so the level of care required also increases. They will need regular liquid feeding, especially when in flower, and weekly watering. Keep their leaves clean to maximise their absorption of light to boost photosynthesis, but also move them out of direct sunlight as it can scorch delicate new growth and blooms. Be alert for pests too. Houseplants fall prey to a wide range of menaces, including aphids, glasshouse red spider mites, mealybugs and scale insects. Most of these can be treated with an indoor plant pesticide. However,…

LIKE many gardeners, I try to keep to a budget, and hate waste. So when the time came to thin out the stock seedlings I sowed in March, I decided not to throw them all on the compost heap. Instead, I lifted them carefully using a trowel, and popped the strongest-looking plants into a plastic bag to prevent them drying out, before potting them up into individual small pots of seed and cuttings compost. Luckily, the seeds had germinated into strong little plants with robust root systems, and hopefully they will romp away in their own containers. Thinning seedlings sown in situ is an important job at this time of year. Seeds are usually sown too close together, leaving little room to grow well. Good spacing means better airflow around…

1Dwarfing rootstocks will keep fruit tree size down, but apples like this ‘Discovery’ on the more vigorous MM106 rootstock have the strength to keep going in a pot for more years. 2 Where trees have grown to fill pots of a size still just about light enough to move, remove some of the old compost and pack fresh around their roots in the dormant season. 3 Rhubarb is a hungry plant and needs copious watering, plus splitting regularly to maintain a size suitable for container growing.…

Cover the tray with a lid or a layer of clingfilm. Place it somewhere light and warm, and seeds will germinate in 2-4 weeks. 1 Sieve some fresh seed and cuttings compost into a clean seed tray. Water it with fresh tap water and let it drain well. 2 Nemesia seeds are small, and easier to sow if mixed with horticultural sand. Mix them carefully in your palm. 3 Sprinkle the sand-and-seeds mix as thinly as possible over the surface of the dampened compost. 4 Label the tray and scatter a thin layer of sieved compost or vermiculite over the top.…

I DON’T know who came up with the term ‘harden’ but I think toughen up would have been a much better one, but essentially I’m referring to the process of getting indoor veg seedlings safely outside. You see, they’ve got used to an easy life indoors but the likes of sweetcorn, courgettes, runner beans and outdoor tomatoes, all of which benefit from indoor germination, ultimately need to go outside in your garden. Moving them out suddenly without toughening them up results in disaster. Indoor-grown leaves have yet to develop their waxy coating (known as a ‘cuticle’) so will scorch and brown in the full strength of outdoor sun and wind. Hardening off is a like getting a base tan to deter sunburn – see opposite for my techniqiues. TopTip Open…

 20-21 May: Devon Chilli Fiesta, RHS Garden Rosemoor, Torrington, Devon EX38 8PH. ? 0203 1765 830, ??rhs.org.uk/gardens/rosemoor  20-21 May: Cactus and Succulent Society Exhibition, RHS Garden Hyde Hall, Creephedge Lane, Rettenden Common, Chelmsford CM3 8ET. ? 0203 1765 830, ??rhs.org.uk/gardens/hyde-hall  21 May: Cantax House, Lacock, Wiltshire, SN15. Queen Anne former vicarage garden of colour, pattern and scent straddling the Bide Brook. Designed and maintained by sculptor owner, has both common and unusual plants including a hornbeam spire, yew castle and other topiary, old orchard wildflower garden and sculpture. Open 2pm-6pm for NGS and Amnesty International. ??deborahvanderbeek.com  21, 28 & 29 May: Yonder Hill, Shepherds Lane, Colaton Raleigh, Sidmouth, Devon EX10 0LP. Blazing herbaceous borders buzzing with insects, woods alive with birdsong and delicious scents. Woodland tunnels, wild flower meadow and…

Pot on each section of plant into fresh compost. Mix in a slow-release feed and water well – they’ll be ready to plant out in the autumn. 1 Remove your hosta from its pot: if it’s jammed in tight turn the pot upside down and gently knock the side of the pot on a potting bench to loosen the plant. 2 Using brute force, push two hand forks into the heart of the plant with their handles back to back. Lever the forks and the roots of the plant should tear apart. 3 If you struggle with the forks resort to cutting the plant into pieces with an old kitchen knife – but watch your fingers. 4 As you pull the plant apart it’s important to try to make sure…

L. periclymenum ‘Graham Thomas’ Quite possibly the best of all honeysuckle specimens, this deciduous climber has creamy-yellow flowers, whose delicious scent lingers on the air all summer. These are followed by handsome red berries. L. x tellmanniana This lesser-known honeysuckle is a cheery climber, producing bright amber-orange flowers from red buds between May and July. It is particularly effective when used in a bold, exotic planting scheme – for instance behind angelica and hollyhock ‘Nigra’. L. x brownii ‘Dropmore Scarlet’ Not big on scent, the unusual Dropmore earns its place thanks to the scarlet trumpet flowers that coat this semievergreen honeysuckle from July to September. The blue-green leaves are lovely, too. Can be susceptible to aphids. L. periclymenum ‘Serotina’ The joyous raspberry-cream flowers of the late Dutch honeysuckle will fill…

Social media users Gardening social media app GardenTags says it contains inspiration from over 140 countries, with 300,000 images of plants uploaded. Garden centres Gardeners splashed their cash at Easter, with garden centres sales almost double that of 2016, reports trade mag Horticulture Week. britain’s trees Around 300 trees are felled a week due to safety fears. A Daily Mail report claimed that it’s often seen as cheaper to axe than maintain trees. Tender plants Late frosts across much of the UK and snow in Scotland in the run up to the first May bank holiday hit tender plants and fruit in gardens.…

Clematis ‘Taiga’ An astonishing double clematis with flowers like fireworks – every purple petal is tipped in green or white. Modest in height; easy to prune. Thorncroft Clematis & 01953 850407. Salvia ‘Crystal Blue’ This hardy perennial has ‘May Night’ in its background, but its mass of flowers on upright stems come in a fresh light blue. Hardy’s Cottage Garden Plants & 01256 896533. Pelargonium ‘Rushmoor Amazon’ A mix of familiar zonal pelargoniums and a tuberous, yellow-flowered species, resulting in 2-3in (5-7cm) pale yellow flowers in an open head. Fibrex Nurseries & 01789 720788. Mulberry ‘Charlotte Russe’ Tasting like a cross between a strawberry and a raspberry, with a hint of blackberry, dwarf suckering plants carry luscious fruits (May- Sept). Suttons & 0844 326 2200. Strawberry ‘Just Add Cream’ Combining…

Best for windowboxes ‘Frank Headley’ At 16in (40cm) tall, this bushy, salmonpink variety has silver and green leaves. Blooms appear from April to September and it also works well as general summer bedding and as a pot plant. It’s fast growing, too. Best for focal points ‘Pink Capricorn’ This variety not only looks superb, thanks to its mauve-pink flowers, but its lemon-rose-scented leaves smell divine when given a quick rub. It grows to 2ft (60cm) and will benefit from some form of support. Best for small pots ‘Dwarf Stellar Helen Christine’ Is there a more vivid pink out there? We’re not sure there is, but the striking flowers contrast nicely with the deepest green leaves. It’ll reach only 5in (12cm) high, so put it on the table in the conservatory…

 A closer look at... Why grow it Almost 4,000 different clematis have been named over the years since ‘Jackmanii’, still a favourite, was discovered in 1858, and it’s not often that a new variety is so universally admired and enjoyed. However Clematis Amber (‘Wit141205’) is special – so special that it won the title of RHS Chelsea Flower Show Plant of the Year for 2016. But just what is it that makes it so superior? Amber is the first double-flowered, yellow clematis, but it’s not one of those big and blowsy, large-flowered summer doubles that suddenly disappoints you with single flowers. Amber flowers in May and June, all the flowers are daintily double and they come in a highly attractive soft amber yellow with pink tints at the shoulders. Of…

IF I had to pick the single most exciting horticultural product of the last 25 years, I’d choose the seed-packet meadow, often called the ‘schematic meadow’. At first glance these modern flowery meads look like wildflowers but are in fact a world apart, as instead of native blooms that grow only in impoverished soils, these mixtures of ornamental annuals grow anywhere and bloom for months. I first started experimenting with ‘schematic meadows’ in the early 1990’s, blending nicotiana and white cosmos with the airy filigree of love-ina- mist running through. “Shake the box to move finer seeds up” Although colourful, early trials didn’t work. The love-in-a-mist proved to be a prima donna, only coming up on its own instead of teaming-up and tying together the other flowers. These days, mixtures…

AS Tuesday mornings go, it didn’t have the best start. I went into the garden and found that my glorious crown imperials (Fritillaria imperialis) had been pretty much shredded. The culprits were tucked away among the flower petals – several bright scarlet lily beetles. Despite their beauty, lily beetles are voracious pests that will strip lilies and fritillaries of their leaves and flowers. Not only is this unattractive, but attacks early in the season will weaken the bulbs, and plants may not flower as well the following year. Lily beetles have become increasingly widespread over the past three decades. Small colonies can be dispatched by hand, but serious infestations need treating with a pesticide such as Defenders Bug Killer, Resolva Bug Killer or Bug Clear Ultra. Late spring and early…

TALLER perennials will be getting to a height where they need support. This is especially important if your garden is exposed and wind-battered. I took a few moments this week to tie up my alliums, which were starting to flop over. I secured the stems using twine tied in a figure-of-eight, which allows the plant to move in the wind without the tie chafing the stem and causing damage. If plants have already been damaged, remove the flower head cleanly, and then support any flopping foliage to prevent it smothering other plants. TopTip Secure plants to their supports as early as possible in the season, making sure supports are firmly anchored in the ground. Check hardwood cuttings are OK Last autumn I took hardwood cuttings from a blackcurrant bush, and…

1 After carefully lifting the seedlings and checking their roots are intact, place them in a plastic bag to avoid dehydration before potting. 2 Fill a pot with seed compost, water and drain. Make a hole to take the seedling’s roots, and place a seedling into it. 3 Carefully firm the compost around the roots. Make sure the roots are covered, and that the stem is undamaged. 4Place the seedlings in a cold frame or unheated greenhouse. Grow on until they are large enough to plant out.…

THE broad beans I planted last October survived the winter, and grew well throughout the spring, despite several weeks without any rain of note. They flowered well, and look robust, though I was concerned by the fact that several plants developed dark brown splodges on their leaves. It was chocolate spot, a disease caused by a variant of the fungus Botrytis called Botrytis fabae. This only affects broad beans, and is a relative of Botrytis grey mould. Chocolate spot flourishes in cool and damp conditions, and where plants may be too close together. It presents itself as small, brown spots on all parts of the bean plant, that expand rapidly and turn darker. In the worst cases, leaves may shrivel, flowers fail, and the plant collapse. There are no fungicides…

ORCHIDS are popular indoor plants and I love the challenge of keeping them healthy and coaxing them back into bloom. They flower well when potbound but after a while, bark-based compost begins to break down, roots threaten to burst out of their pots and so you have to repot. Cymbidiums are beautiful, with their long narrow leaves making them rather refined orchids. Ours flowered well last winter but one is trying to shoulder its way out of the pot. Spring is the best time for repotting cymbidiums, just as new growths starts. The first job is to find a pot an extra 1-2in (2.5-5cm) wider all round than the old one and deep enough to sink the roots to a practical level. Plastic pots are better than clay, as clay…

1 Move your young veg into a cold frame or equivalent during the day bringing them back in at night. After a week leave them in the frame day and night for a further week. 2 Now they can be planted outside full time. On a windy plot you can give protection to large-leaved crops by erecting a windbreak of horticultural fleece using canes. 3 You can improvise a cold frame with a large cardboard box. Just line it with bubblewrap or blankets and top it with clear polythene. Then follow the same routine above.…

IF YOU’VE not tackled slugs and snails in your garden yet it’s time to take action. May is when a new generation of slug and snails hatch and are on the hunt for food. An adult slug can eat up to 40 times its weight in a day, so your newly planted bedding plants and perennials are just what they’re after. Did you know that garden snails are hermaphrodites? They have both male and female sexual organs, but although they can produce eggs themselves they still mate. This makes them very effective at producing eggs. A single garden snail can produce over 400 youngsters a year, so we really do need to act now. The trick is not to heap piles of slug pellets all around the garden. It’s only…

ARE you looking at pots of faded tulips? It’s a known fact that tulips are never as good the second year, so you might be wondering what to do with them now. Should they be kept? Definitely yes. Move your pots out of site and leave the foliage to turn yellow. In October remove the bulbs from their pots and replant them in an informal border. I have one bed where I plant the old tulip bulbs and the display might be higgledy-piggledy but it’s a happy one. As for the now faded daffodils, deadhead them and leave the foliage uncut until it’s completely yellow. This might be a pain if they are grown in grass, but it is a necessary evil. The lilies are growing in my borders at…

Do I need to harden plants off? QI have grown a range of bedding and young veg plants under glass. Some of my neighbours plant theirs straight out while others insist on hardening plants off first. Do I need to bother? Douglas Kennet, Ipswich A Hardening off is carried out to prepare a plant for outdoor conditions, having previously been nurtured under protection of a greenhouse, frame or indoors. Plants are often described in books or catalogues as half-hardy or hardy, offering guidance on the level of protection that will be required to successfully grow the plant without cold weather damage in the early spring. It’s difficult to find a good definition of hardiness. Most gardeners would say it’s a plant’s ability to tolerate periods of freezing and thawing, without…

BBC Radio 2 Feel Good Gardens Five gardens illustrating how plants can enrich and indulge the five senses. On 22 May, Breakfast Show host Chris Evans will broadcast live from his Taste garden (top right), from 6.30-9.30am. 40 Sunbury Road Celebrating AG’s very own Peter Seabrook’s 40 years as garden columnist at The Sun, the 40 Sunbury Road exhibit will feature a suburban back garden with a patio, decking, hanging baskets, containers, wildlife area, shed and greenhouse – plus the very best new patio plants. Delight in the Dark Which plants are best for shade, especially dry shade, is one of our top readers’ queries. The British Ecological Society’s exhibit in the Discovery Zone reveals how plants adapt to shade, and will help you choose the right varieties. Calm in…

MOST gardeners will have a hosepipe, usually long enough to suit their garden. But often the hose will be piled in a unsightly, tangled heap in the corner, or snaked around the borders and simply left where it was last used. Store your hose on a proper hanger or reel and it’ll be kink-free and ready to spring into action when you next need it – which means you’re likely to use it more often. Hose storage systems can be as simple as a plain static wall hanger where you pull in the hose and hang it yourself, or can feature drum reels and various means of storing your watering tools as well. All hose holders – and hoses themselves come to that – will last a lot longer if…

1 Box blight: A fungal disease causing leaves to turn brown and fall. Stems can develop black streaks and dieback. Remove and destroy affected plants. Cut away affected material, though the infection may have progressed further than is visible. Quarantine new boxes for three weeks before planting to make sure they are disease-free. 2 Box tree moth: Box moths are brown and white, and their spiny green caterpillars protect themselves by spinning dense silk webbing. Remove caterpillars by hand, or use pyrethrum insecticide such as Defenders Bug Clear. It will need to be sprayed hard to penetrate the cocoons. Nematodes and pheromone traps are also effective.…

1 Take cuttings in the morning when the plant is ‘turgid’ – full of water. Cut a shoot around 4in (10cm) long. 2 Remove lower leaves and pinch out the fleshy tip of the cutting, to help reduce the amount of water lost. 3 Dip the cut end in rooting powder or gel, tapping off any excess. Buy fresh rooting compounds each year. 4 Insert the cuttings into a 3in (7cm) pot of seed and cuttings compost mixed with perlite, to help drainage. 5 Water the compost but not the leaves. Do not cover the cuttings, place somewhere warm and bright to root. 6 When the cuttings strike, grow them on. Harden them off and plant out when frosts have finished.…

Listen to Peter's free podcast every Thursday. Search for 'This Week In The Garden with Peter Seabrook' on iTunes THE commercial world is quick to react to increased popularity for specific plants which, for a variety of reasons, suddenly become fashionable. The current trend for containers, as a result of shrinking garden size and spread of hard landscaping – plus renewed interest in home fruit growing – is bringing a range of compact cultivars. Good examples include the hanging basket Blackberry ‘Black Cascade’ (Marshalls), first year fruiting Blackberry ‘Reubens’ (Pomona), Cherry ‘Cinderella’ (D.T. Brown), Mulberry ‘Charlotte Russe’ (Suttons), Pear ‘Little Sweety’ (Suttons), Raspberry ‘Ruby Beauty’ (T&M), Raspberry ‘Yummy’ (Suttons – on sale from July) and Sibley’s Apricot. “Both have plenty of flower buds developing” Generally speaking I like to grow…

THIS week’s free seeds from Mr Fothergill’s are for a delightful bedding plant that will brighten up borders and containers through the summer. Nemesia ‘Blue Gem’ is a clumping, dwarf variety that is covered in intense blue, violet-shaped flowers. It is a half-hardy annual that likes sun and partial shade, and can be planted towards the front of borders, in containers and also as ground cover. You have two options for sowing – undercover, as I demonstrate below, and in situ. If sowing straight into the garden, clear the soil of weeds and debris first, rake it to a fine tilth, and dampen it with a watering can fitted with a fine rose. Although it should be warm enough outside to sow directly, I am erring on the side of…

YOU can succeed really well with pumpkins and squash if you remember one crucial thing: these plants love warm soil – every bit as much as melons and far more than marrows and courgettes. Put them in cold soil and they sulk, seldom flower well or set many fruits. Put them in a sunny warm corner in soil pre-warmed with a black plastic sheet or cloches and the plants romp away, spreading afar and cropping heavily. That’s the secret. Sure, it helps to prepare the soil, incorporating loads of well-rotted manure, compost, blood, fish & bonemeal, and so on. And for a really sizeable crop it is useful to pour on the water once the fruits are swelling. But to ensure success, not failure, make sure the soil is warm.…

IF your garden has plenty of bushes and trees you could be getting visits about now from blackcaps. Migratory individuals are starting to arrive with the intention of breeding before heading off again in the autumn. According to the RSPB there are around 1.2 million breeding pairs in the UK between spring and autumn. Sixty years ago we knew these birds arrived in the UK in spring and left again in September to spend the winter in southern Europe or north Africa. There were hardly any records of blackcaps being in Britain in the winter. Since the 1960s, however, the numbers staying here all year round have risen dramatically. It’s no longer a rare sight to see blackcaps in a garden in January. Why the change? Well, researchers pretty much…

Top tip: Make a note never to leave rakes in the garden with the tines on the ground. Accidently tread on the tines and the handle may well hit you in the face. Ouch! Anyone with an area of moist shade in their garden will appreciate the assets of hostas. These elegant plants are kings of the shady border thanks to their wonderful foliage. My favourites include Hosta ‘Blue Hawaii’ for its giant blue leaves and the small leaved and very cute ‘Blue Mouse ears’. It’s a little late now to divide hostas planted in the garden but if, like me, you have lots in pots it’s a good time to give them a new lease of life by dividing them. Leave them for another summer in a tight pot…

M any gardeners still refer to them as geraniums – and that’s okay – but technically these tender plants that hail mostly from South africa are known as pelargoniums. True geraniums are the hardy perennials like ‘Rozanne’, so beloved of cottage garden schemes. If you live in the southern half of the UK, where the risk of frost has now passed, then this is a good week to start planting them out. Use them in tubs and troughs, or hanging baskets and borders, where they’re especially good at plugging gaps and adding colour between perennials and shrubs. Give it another couple of weeks or so if you live north of the Midlands, when the threat of any potential late frosts has passed. When and how to feed Pelargoniums are many…

Hozelock AC1 Water Timer £42.99 RRP 0121 313 1122 hozelock.com for retailers Water timer computers are a great way to automatically water your plants and mean you don’t have to remember to turn the tap off – so will save water too. This one has 13 preset two to 120 minutes and frequency from once a week to four times a day. Requires two C-type batteries. set programs that allow watering duration from Gardena Soaker Hose 15m £29.99 + £3.50 delivery 0208 829 8850 worldofgardena.co.uk A soaker hose helps, avoid wasteful run-off. Ready to use, including a valve for adjusting flow rate and pressure, this one can be connected to another 50ft (15m) hose to make up to 100ft (30m) in length. Couple it to a timer for early morning…

Write to: Jenny Bagshaw, Amateur Gardening, Westover House, West Quay Road, Poole, Dorset BH15 1JG or email: amateurgardening@timeinc.com Star letter WE wanted to thank you for your feature ‘How to construct a wildlife pond’ (AG 18 February). We had already started work on a pond ourselves but, thanks to the good advice and inspiring pictures in the article, we tweaked the design. We’ve added a section of log edging and a viewing platform made from a couple of small boulders for the grandchildren. And we’ve ensured that other parts of the liner are hidden with moss harvested from our borders and stitched onto weed matting. Within a few days we noticed birds bathing and drinking from the pond, and we hope the frogs aren’t far behind. Amy & Brian Kelly,…