Innholdsfortegnelse for 19-Sep-2020 i Amateur Gardening

“I’ve been thinking about what to plant for the new season. It’s a thrill to see the first crocus or daffofill rise from the soil – but what about trying something different? I’m going to take Anne Swithinbank’s advice (page 28) and plant Scilla ‘Pink Giant’, a pretty-looking perennial that works well around the bases of trees and shrubs. Are you going to try something different for next season? If so, please write to us and share it with AG readers.” Contact us: ■ Editorial: 0330 3903732 ■ Email: amateurgardening@futurenet.com ■ Advertising: 07817 629935…

AMATEUR GARDENING 2020 ROSE CARE SPECIAL ROSES are some of the most beloved plants in our gardens, and as the summer draws to a close we enter one of the key times for looking after them. Many roses will still be flowering, and will keep doing so until well into the autumn, but we should start thinking about the attention they need at the end of the flowering season, which can leave them diseaseridden and exhausted. For all their popularity, roses are prone to problems, and by this time of the year they may be looking rather sorry for themselves. Taking action now helps prepare them for winter and strengthens them to perform well next year. Kerry Austen, former head gardener at the Royal National Rose Society and now the…

Listen to Peter’s free podcast every Thursday. Search for ‘This Week In The Garden with Peter Seabrook’ on iTunes amateurgardening.com Daily blog and news GARDENING takes time: sow some tomatoes, and it is four months before you begin to taste the fruits of your labours. Should you make a mistake in choice of cultivar, it is a year before you start again, and then things may well have changed. This year, I have heard from several gardeners that their favourite tomato – ‘Gardener’s Delight’ – is not as good as it was. Some packets even yielded large beefsteak fruits instead of the cherry size they should be, the result of careless rogueing of mother stocks. “Any cultivars not true to type must be destroyed” Where what we call ‘open seeded’…

THE apple is our most commonly grown fruit, and just about every other garden has a tree or two – quite rightly, for apples are reliable croppers, long lived, and seldom failing, even when suffering from a host of minor problems. If you take no action, most apple trees will crop most years, with loads of perfect fruits, and as many again that are imperfect with blemishes, holes and scabby bits. However, these are not a write-off. True, they’ll be no use for storing, as only the most perfect can last for than a few weeks. All those fruits that are a bit scabby, partly damaged or just imperfect are hardly appealing. However, if you act quickly, they can still be useful in the kitchen. “Apples with blemishes are not…

Allium karataviense The pairing of metallic grey-green leaves and spheres of palest pink flowers looks particularly stunning when offset by a topping of slate or shingle. From Central Asia, the Kara Tau garlic blooms in May and June. H&S: 10in (25cm). Narcissus ‘Spoirot’ AGM The shorter, sturdier narcissi will perform well in containers and windowboxes. A hoop petticoat sort, ‘Spoirot’ bears blooms of fresh, pale greenish-yellow during February and March. Set the bulbs 2in (5cm) deep and apart. HxS: 8x2in (20x5cm). Muscari comosum ‘Plumosum’ Instead of neat bells, the feather grape hyacinth makes a mass of fluffy purple from April to May. Add groups of bulbs to windowboxes of neat evergreens, bugles and dwarf narcissus. HxS: 8x3in (20x8cm). Puschkinia scilloides var. libanotica AGM Striped squill really lights up a bowl…

FORGET the telly – stick a log on the fire bowl, call up a few friends, grab a glass of wine and get out in the garden. Provided the rain holds off, socially distanced evening soirées and al fresco dinner parties can be just as much fun in autumn as they have been in summer if you have space for a fire bowl. Basic types available There are hundreds of designs available, ranging in price from around £20 to several hundreds of pounds, but all are either bowl or brazier shaped. The bowl shape gives a slow-burning campfire, making it frugal on wood use, and it stops ashes falling onto the ground so clearing up after the fire is easier. Brazier or basket styles are more upright and compact. They…

amateurgardening.com Daily blog and news THE season of mists and mellow fruitfulness is also the season of the perennial – those border stalwarts that chug on delightfully, year upon year, providing a seasonal framework for annuals and biennials to fill out. Trees and shrubs are perennials, of course, but I’m concentrating on herbaceous perennials that bring so much colour and interest to the garden. I’ll also be looking at tender and exotic varieties, such as dahlias and canna lilies, in a future issue. Early autumn is a great time to think about lifting and dividing your perennials, and taking cuttings. The soil is warm from summer, and damp, so it is easier to work than at height of summer, and it is more welcoming to new plants and those that…

Hip to it: Keep a few hips to add colour to the garden, feed the birds, make rosehip syrup and provide seeds to grow for future rose bushes. ALTHOUGH roses can be bought in containers yearround for planting, bareroot plants are available between November and April, and this is the traditional way to plant them. Carried out by growers for generations, this method is called ‘bareroot’ because plants are bought without soil around their roots. Planted during the dormant season, except for when the ground is waterlogged or frozen, they will grow rapidly and strongly in spring. When planting, remember that roses do best in full sun and somewhere with good airflow. They require well-drained, fertile soil with a slightly acidic pH of 6.5, though they thrive in most healthy…

WE could all do with some cheering up as summer draws to a close. So what better way than to sow some early colour for next spring? This week’s free Mr Fothergill’s seeds are Viola ‘Comedy Mix’ – funny by name and jolly by nature. Compact plants with masses of colourful flowers in cheerful shades of purple, yellow and creamy white, they are happy growing in beds, as edging plants and in containers. Violas are hardy perennials, though they are usually grown as biennials or annuals, with an easy-going nature and jolly character. They are happy in sun and dappled shade, but ideally not where pansies or violas that suffered from the fungal leaf spot have been grown, as the spores may still remain in the soil. I prefer violas…

amateurgardening.com Daily blog and news I’M not very good at recognising birdsong, as sadly I’m not musical. Like my daughters and my father used to say, I couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket! I’ve also got limited hearing, and always have had, so I envy people who can say, ‘Listen to that bird.’ However, there’s one bird I can always identify and that is the green woodpecker (Picus viridis), because it cackles and sounds as though it’s going ‘hee, hee, hee’. Even if I can’t see it, I know when it’s around because the call goes on and on. In fact, one of its common names is the yaffle bird. The green woodpecker is the largest of our three native woodpeckers and it’s green, rather than black and white…

Primula veris AGM If you want to naturalise a wild species in grass, the semi-evergreen cowslip is a better option than the primrose because it holds its dainty heads of butter yellow flowers on taller stems. Plugs can be planted now. H: 1ft (30cm). ‘Footlight Parade’ A bewitching series of little polyanthus in shades of pink, orange and yellow, from raspberry to peach, apricot and citron. Shy seeders, so the seed is quite scarce – lift and divide every two-three years to ensure longevity. H: 4-8in (10-20cm). ‘Dawn Ansell’ This beautiful double primrose almost died out, but micropropagation cloning means we can still enjoy the white flowers, each surrounded by a ruffof mini leaves (a form known as Jack-in-the-green) from early to late spring. H: 5in (12cm). ‘Dark Rosaleen’ A…

Eremurus robustus AGM The tall spires of foxtail lily or giant desert candle will light the back of a sunny, well-drained border in June. Make a mound inside the planting home and cover the crown with 5in (13cm) of soil. HxS: 61⁄2x21⁄2ft (2mx75cm). Scilla ‘Pink Giant’ An easy-going squill whose starry, pale pink flowers open in February and March. Plant bulbs 3in (8cm) deep and 2in (5cm) apart, in sun. They will return in successive years, bulking up well. H&S: 6in (15cm). Triteleia laxa ‘Koningin Fabiola’ Known as Ithuriel’s spear or grass nut, this Californian native has loose umbels of purple-blue flowers in June. Plant corms to thread through a border and they will come back every year – in ever greater numbers! HxS: 2ftx2in (60x5cm). Tulipa orphanidea Whittallii Group…

What are good roses to grow on a wall? Q My mother lives on the north-west coast of Ireland and has a rather ugly long bare wall. I was thinking of buying her some climbing roses, but they would only be able to be planted in containers. What rose varieties would you recommend for climbing trellis, and what is the smallest depth and diameter the container would need to be? Is this a workable idea? Barry Williams, via email A I suggest that your mother grows Cants’ Patio climbing roses in large half-barrels or troughs. It’s vital that they are in full sun, otherwise their blooms will be sparse. Whichever container you choose, it should not be anything less than 18in (45cm) deep. Initially, make 1in (2cm) drainage holes in…

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@futurenet.com I HEARTILY agree with Alan Titchmarsh’s views about children being educated on all things green (AG News, 15 August). In the 1950s, when I was a child, myself and my like-minded friends were given a corner of the garden and six random, assorted seeds in a packet, plus a few simple instructions to follow. Mine contained fruit, vegetables, flowers and one herb – mint. There was a lot of healthy competing between us — who had the most colourful, who had the tallest, etc. We used what would normally be discarded, such as toilet roll inserts, newspaper, lolly sticks, margarine tubs and empty bean tins. It…

Going green: Organic, eco-aware and even vegan gardening is all the rage right now, and in next week’s AG I show how you can make these methods work for you. PERENNIALS don’t come cheap, with garden centres often charging more than £10 for a decent-sized plant. Smaller plants are cheaper, but these may take a few years to establish and perform as well as you’d like, so the best way of filling your garden with reliable repeat colour is to divide existing favourite plants. It is an easy and satisfying task, made all the more delightful by the fact that the end result should far outweigh the cost – which, basically, comes in at nothing! Dividing is also beneficial to the parent plant, keeping it compact, reviving it and giving…

I’M all for making gardening as easy as possible, and if you can achieve great results with minimum effort and without burning a hole in your pocket, then so much the better. Spring bulbs are a case in point. They are for sale everywhere at the moment, and are one of the easiest ways to add years of colour to the garden. We automatically think of daffodils and tulips, but they are the tip of the iceberg. Crocuses, camassia, alliums, chionodoxa and nectaroscordum are just a few worth considering. You can buy mixed bags of bulbs to create your own planting scheme, and many garden centres have ‘pick and mix’ bulb sections so you will be as happy as a kiddie in a sweetie shop! Bulbs do well in borders…

A SPRING visitor to our gardens, the whitethroat is a very agile, cheery bird with brown upper parts, greyish-white below and a patch of pure-white feathers on the throat, which give the bird its name. It reaches this country in April, the sexes generally travelling separately, but they are not here long before they meet, and by mid-May most whitethroats have paired. Their nest is a rather flimsy arrangement of a few interwoven grass stalks placed in hedgerow herbage or any other dense vegetation. For three years in succession a pair (presumably the same two birds) have nested in a Lonicera nitida bush in my garden, but I am obliged to curb my curiosity about what’s going on because know them to be of ‘touchy’ disposition and to resent human…

GROWING plump, crunchy apples to pick and eat straight offthe tree is the epitome of living your best life in the garden, so how do we ensure this dream becomes a reality? With so many enticing eating apple varieties maturing now, you might be tempted to plant some this winter, so let me help you. Aside from following my essentials checklist on the following page, what else is there to know? Choosing shape, size and site While very dwarfing rootstocks (such as M27) will sound tempting on smaller plots, I have found M26 easier to manage as the slightly greater vigour gives the trees more ‘pep’, and they can still be pruned to keep them compact. With flowers opening in May and bees essential for pollination, shelter is key (blooms…

Sun A. multifida Upward-facing white flowers sit above prettily divided foliage that springs from woody, steadily spreading roots. Happy planted in sun and in any reasonable soil, it will appreciate more moisture than A. coronaria. H: 1ft (30cm). A. blanda var. rosea ‘Radar’ Dark green, prettily divided leaves spring from steadily spreading, knobbly tubers and make a great team with the daisy-like flowers. With its magenta and white colouring, ‘Radar’ looks best grown as a specimen clump and is happy in most soils. H: 6in (15cm). A. coronaria Large, mainly single or semi-double flowers in a choice of vivid or pastel colours. ‘Mr Fokker’ (left) is deep blue; ‘The Bride’ is a faintly blushed white. Increases into clumps in gravel gardens; good for cutting, too. H: 8in (20cm). A. blanda…

How do I remove ground elder? QWe were given some lily of the valley from a friend, but some ground elder must have hitched a lift. When is the best time to lift the clump, clean offthe weed, and replant? Margaret Dennehey, Port Isaac, Cornwall AWe have the Romans to thank for ground elder; they carried it to our shores as a leafy veg, probably for soups. Growth arises from white, spaghetti-like rhizomes, and all it takes is a tiny section holding a node for it to break into growth. Several years ago, I made the same mistake while transplanting lily of the valley (Convallaria majalis) from my aunt’s old garden as a keepsake. This also grows from rhizomes, and the two intertwine. I was naïve to think I had…

This week it’s: THE International Day of Peace is held each year on 21 September. Started in 1981 by the United Nations, it provides a shared date for all humanity to commit to peace, and to help build a ‘culture of peace’. Whether it succeeds in promoting world harmony is, I suppose, debatable, but it gives us the ideal opportunity to look at the connections between plants, gardening and ‘peace’! ■ There aren’t many garden plants that have three consecutive ‘o’s in their name, but Echinacea Mooodz Peace has. Perennial echinaceas are not easy for nurseries to propagate, but one Dutch grower has solved this with micropropagation (tissue culture and test tubes). It calls the strain Mooodz, and the variety Peace has flowers of a lovely ‘peaceful’ shade of cream.…

amateurgardening.com Daily blog and news VISITORS to Casa Buckland are often breathless when they arrive at our door – and not just because of the beauty of my front garden recycle-box storage system. It’s due to the fear of being felled by the tottering trunk of an acacia tree which, like the Sword of Damocles, hangs over the garden path. If they don’t spot the prop that holds it up, our friends, the post woman and the delivery drivers all involuntarily quicken their stride as if passing below the blade of a very big and blunt guillotine. Although the tree isn’t long for this world, I love the way it frames the path and so for when – not if – it gives up the ghost, I have been working…