Innholdsfortegnelse for 27-Jun-2020 i Amateur Gardening

“The Covid-19 outbreak has given many of the pubic the desire to grow their own food, and interest in renting allotments has skyrocketed. However, this interest has highlighted a 65% decline in allotments available (see Lesley Upton’s report on page 7). This is a national scandal, as it is not just about growing food – it is also about the benefits of allotments to the environment and to the health of those who garden in them. The reality is some local councils are not fulfilling their obligation to provide space. What do you think about this?” Contact us: Editorial: 07814 905439 Email: amateurgardening@ti-media.com Advertising: 07817 629935…

THE African roots of this week’s sun-loving annual daisy are there for all to see when you come to sow them. Although this Dimorphotheca – also known as Osteospermum – will grow happily in even thin soil, they do need a sunny spot to put on their best show. So sow them where they won’t be shaded by taller plants, trees or shrubs – towards the front of a sunny border would be ideal. The plants are hardy annuals and can be started directly in prepared soil that has been cleared of weeds, roots, stones and other debris. Rake the soil one way and then the other until it becomes fine and crumbly. Then dampen using a watering can fitted with a fine rose. Sow the large seeds thinly in…

BRITISH beekeepers are being asked to watch out for and report Asian hornets, which can wipe out hives and are colonising North France and the Channel Islands. These large insects, up to an inch long, hover under bee hives and pick off the bees as they fly in and out. One hornet can kill 50 a day, tearing it to bits and feeding the flesh to its grubs. A spokesman for the British Beekeepers Association said: “We are asking everyone to be vigilant in looking out for this alien species, the Asian Hornet, Vespa velutina. “This hornet could decimate our pollinators including our honey bees, it is important to have everyone actively looking for it.” Asian hornets are slightly smaller than our native hornets and have a brown thorax and…

MANY gardeners are quick to start sowing as soon as spring arrives, although the wiser often leave it a little later. Either way, by now our beds are full, so few consider doing much more sowing right now. Yet space will soon become available as early spuds are dug, garlic harvested and onions wither. Sometimes, as with the maturing onions, you can sow between the existing crop before it’s finished; otherwise, you can sow in pots and cells to plant out later as spaces appear. Most fast-to-mature crops like salad leaves and soft herbs, radishes, beetroots, turnips and baby carrots can be sown now. And given a warm late summer French beans and even mangetout and sugar snap peas can be sown. Indeed, perhaps one of the most overlooked opportunities…

This word search comprises words associated with poppies. They are listed below, and in the grid they may be read across, backwards, up, down or diagonally. Letters may be shared between words. Erroneous or duplicate words may appear in the grid, but there is only one correct solution. After the listed words are found, there are nine letters remaining; arrange these to make this week’s KEYWORD. POPPIES PAPAVER BLACK BLOTCH ANNUAL BLUE COLOURFUL FLANDERS ICELAND OPIUM ORANGE ORIENTAL PURPLE RED SEEDS SHIRLEY HOW TO ENTER: Enter this week’s keyword on the entry form, and send it to AG Word Search No 524, Amateur Gardening, Pinehurst 2, Pinehurst Road, Farnborough, Hampshire GU14 7BF, to arrive by Wednesday 8 July 2020. The first correct entry chosen at random will win our £30…

These extracts from Amateur Gardening come from issues ranging from 1899 to 1978 136 years of practical advice 1884 The World’s Oldest Gardening Magazine 2020 From 6 May 1899 The hardy hysteria Q Will you kindly inform me whether hysteria grows quickly, and if it is hardy and a perennial? M.R., London A We are not sufficiently well versed in medical science to be able to give authoritative advice on such a subject as ‘hysteria’. So far as our limited knowledge goes, this complaint develops, if not grows quickly, is quite hardy, and in some instances perennial in its duration. But wait! It has just flashed into the editorial minds that you probably meant ‘wisteria’ when you wrote ‘hysteria’, and so, in order to escape the pains and penalties of…

amateurgardening.com Daily blog and news ONE of the most common questions we get at this time of year is: “What do I do with spring bulbs when they die down?” Should you leave them where they are, lift them, cut the leaves or leave them to wither in an unattractive manner that makes the garden look scruffy for a few weeks? For a form of gardening that’s supposedly easy and versatile, bulbs can come with a lot of side issues! On these pages I’ll try to dispel some of the confusion around spring bulbs. I’ll also suggest which autumn-flowering varieties you can plant now to take your garden’s colour through to the first frosts of autumn. First, never cut off the leaves of bulb plants once they have finished flowering.…

WITH his grey head and wings, buff underparts with dark streaks, and chestnut back and wings spotted with black, the male kestrel is a most attractive gentleman, but his wife is less colourful – though both have long, black-barred tails. Because of their habit of hovering in mid-air, from where they spot their prey on the ground beneath, kestrels are known locally as ‘windhovers’. They are typical birds of prey, their yellow eye-rings and hooked beak giving them the characteristic fierce facial expression, but they are not such enemies of birds as is often stated. I have devoted much time to their study and found that about 85% of their food consists of small mammals and insects – and they are champion vole-catchers. Kestrels build no nest, being content to…

IT is very easy to take one’s eye off the gardening ball at this time of year when everything is going on and there is a temptation to prioritise, say, crops and new plantings. I was caught out by a small bottlebrush tree (Callistemon citrinus) that I love as it reminds us of holidays in Spain (which we won’t be getting this year). It had been thriving, or so I thought, in its pot but I noticed it was suddenly looking decidedly dejected. It’s once luxurious needle-like leaves were pale and browning, and on inspection it was dehydrated and rootbound. Its roots were filling the pot, so I had to scrape away a lot of the old compost to loosen it enough to remove the plant. Once out, I teased…

Next week: Focus on raspberries, harvest globe artichokes, dry and store herbs, thwart cabbage whitefly, grow prickly pear CALABRESE, also known as Italian or green broccoli, is an anomaly in the large brassica family, preferring to develop its harvest in summer rather than winter. Early sowings should be ready now. But how do we get the best from it? month from March until June; you can even store transplants in a fridge to plant out once a fortnight. Opting for early-maturing varieties (like ‘Green Magic’) and late-maturing kinds (like ‘Spiridon’) helps stretch the harvest window further. Generous spacing will also encourage side-shoots to form; I’ve found ‘Ironman’ especially keen to side-shoot. Successional success This form of Brassica oleracea belongs to the same species that gives us our stalwart winter brassicas,…

Site and soil Herbaceous border peonies thrive in a sunny spot in fertile soil with good drainage, and will appreciate being given extra water during dry seasons. They dislike acid conditions, will grow well on clay but hate waterlogged soil. Support Many of the old Victorian varieties, especially those that produce large double flowers (including the classic ‘Sarah Bernhardt’), have weak stems and need support; a wire frame is ideal for the job. Lifting and dividing In early autumn, dig up the entire plant and wash off the soil so you can see what you’re doing. Cut the crown into large pieces with a sharp, stout knife, making sure that each piece has four or five buds, then replant. You may get flowers next year, you may not, but after…

John will reply personally to all your gardening questions every week Contact John Negus by email address below Email: amateurgardening@ti-media.com What’s best for spring bulbs now? Q What should I do with the spring bulbs I lifted to make room for summer bedding? They have been dried in my greenhouse and are now ready to prepare for storage over the summer. Should bluebell and hyacinth bulbs be stored in the same way as tulips and daffodils? George Wilkie, via email A Ideally, transfer your tulips, daffodils, bluebells and hyacinth bulbs to a reserve bed in the garden until it is time to plant them in autumn where you wish them to flower. If that is impracticable, consign bulbs to large pots or 6-8in (15-20cm)-deep boxes of free-draining soil. Position containers…

THE protected environment of a greenhouse, which is so important for nurturing plants in winter and spring, can be a problem as the weather warms. Bright sunshine bearing on clear glass is magnified, and inside the greenhouse temperatures rocket on a hot, bright day. Trays of seedlings can be scorched, and even mature plants can wilt as roots fail to keep up the much-needed supply of moisture to the furiously transpiring greenery above ground. In general, sunlight is not a problem – plants thrive on it – but the heat it generates can be. Unfortunately, to keep the heat down, it’s usually necessary to shade out the sun. So the principle is to introduce as little shade as possible to maintain plant growth, but enough to keep the temperature below…

amateurgardening.com Daily blog and news AS I was once told: ‘The secret to a happy life, Tobias, is to find pleasure in the things you don’t like’. I was working in Germany when my boss gave me this pearl of wisdom, scooping fat from a blocked hotel drain. And they say Germans don’t do sarcasm! Years later, after a career enjoyably weeding, watering and battling the elements, I understand what Herr Degel meant and have even learnt to appreciate plants that, quite frankly, deserve an ASBO for their messiness. Enter stage right the trio of Torbay palms in our garden. When young, the tufts of spiky leaves added a tropical touch to the borders of our coastal garden. They still do, but now they top 16ft (5m) and are way…

Colour everywhere: See next week’s AG for top tips on how to keep your garden colourful right through summer and into autumn. IN an ideal world a garden contains something to catch the eye all year round, but sometimes things start to drop off when summer comes to an end. An easy way of creating seamless colour is to plant autumn-flowering bulbs – and this is your last chance to do so this year. There are bulbs for every situation and soil. Autumn crocuses and Sternbergia, plus cheerful yellow winter aconites look stunning naturalised in lawns and under trees. Borders can easily be brightened by brilliant dahlias, tall nerines with their clusters of trumpet-shaped blooms in shades of pink, and hardy Cyclamen coum that take over flowering duties in the…

Got a story? email ruth.hayes@ti-media.com ALLOTMENT land has declined by 65% from its peak between the 1940s and 1960s to 2016, according to a study by the Institute for Sustainable Food at the University of Sheffield. The most deprived urban areas have seen the biggest cuts in food-growing space, with eight times more allotment closures than the wealthiest areas. Research shows that 47% of the land once used as allotments has now been built on and 25% is other forms of urban green space. Academics analysed historic maps of Bristol, Glasgow, Leicester, Liverpool, Milton Keynes, Newcastle, Nottingham, Sheffield, Southampton and Swansea from the early 1900s to 2016. The study, published in the journal Landscape and Urban Planning, found that the lost land could have grown an average of 2,500 tonnes…

Listen to Peter’s free podcast every Thursday. Search for ‘This Week In The Garden with Peter Seabrook’ on iTunes IT is to be hoped that by the time you read this, we will have had a good rainfall. When writing, the lawn was brown, and even trees were wilting, and keeping vegetables growing meant hours on a hose. I did pick a really good crop of garden peas from the quarter-pallet size wooden container, just in time to sow another late crop of Garden Pea ‘Terrain’. This cultivar resists mildew disease and has proved an excellent autumn cropping introduction. A common question is on plants for shade, where both lack of light and drought are a challenge. There are several such patches in my garden, and growing in containers is…

amateurgardening.com Daily blog and news WE’RE all foragers when it comes to blackberries. There’s nothing like cooking the juicy berries with apple or, better still, eating them fresh from the bush. I picked blackberries with my grandmother and now my grandchildren do it with me. Our ancestors also foraged for this juicy fruit and blackberry seeds have been found in the stomach contents of a Neolithic man who was discovered in Essex. He lived between 10000 and 6000BC. The hunter-gatherer tradition is still alive in all of us, and perhaps it’s passed down. I think it sums up atavism – the posh word for reverting to something ancient or ancestral – to a tee. Every year we set off with one bag each and hope in our hearts, but sometimes…

This week it’s: Perusing the poppies Brilliant blooms that will brighten any garden THE poppies in my garden are some of my most eagerly awaited plants. Each year, around early June, the buds of the annual and perennial poppies (members of the Papaver genus) are fat and ready to burst open – and I can’t wait! These bold, yet seemingly delicate blooms in a wide range of bright colours are, for a few weeks, the most striking feature of the garden. The downside to poppies is that the flowers are rather short-lived but, happily, a succession of buds mean that the colour lasts quite well. And I wouldn’t be without them! As now is the peak-poppy-period, let’s look at some of their stories. Overpowering Orientals THE perennial Oriental poppies (forms…

Can I have parsley all year round? Q We use a lot of parsley in our cooking and aim to produce a good supply year-round. I’ve tried sowing in spring and again in summer, but it doesn’t always germinate and grow well. What are the secrets? Fee Montgomery, Pontefract, West Yorkshire A I’ve never had much luck sowing parsley direct to soil and have even tried the old trick of pouring hot water into the drill first, to no avail. There are easier ways of providing the varying temperature range that parsley needs for germination. I now sow thinly and evenly into a half-sized seed tray filled with seed or multi-purpose compost and firmed gently. The surface is watered using a fine rose on the can, so seed settles on…

Write to us: Letters, Amateur Gardening magazine, Pinehurst 2, Pinehurst Road, Farnborough Business Park, Farnborough, Hants GU14 7BF (please include your address). Email us: amateurgardening@ti-media.com IT has been a good year for wisterias this year, and I am delighted to share an image of my homemade bonsai of Wisteria floribunda ‘Yae-Kokuryu’ (syn. Wisteria Black Dragon). Having been inspired by wisteria-covered low walls at RHS Wisley, and a bonsai at RHS Chelsea Flower Show several years ago, I decided to create my own bonsai. After 10 years of training a young plant into the bonsai form, this has been the best year for blooming so far. The final result has been helped by allowing the bonsai to shelter in my temporary polytunnel from bad weather and curious birds once in bud.…