Innholdsfortegnelse for 23-Oct-2021 i Amateur Gardening

“Compost, both peat and peat-free, is set to go up in price next year (see News, page 6). This is not good news for AG readers, but it has been on the cards for some time. Truth is that compost has been underpriced for a long time, and cheap multi-deals have been used by garden centres and DIY centres as an inducement to get people in store. However, rising costs of growing media ingredients have reached a point where producers have no choice but to pass some of that on and we will have to pay extra. Perhaps this will encourage more people to create their own compost, which is much better for the environment.” Contact us: Subscriptions: 0330 333 1113 Editorial: 0330 3903732 Email: amateurgardening@futurenet.com Advertising: 0330 3906566…

COMPOST expert Steve Harper, CEO of peat-free specialist Southern Trident, predicts industry-wide price hikes, with the cost of a 50-litre bag of peat-free or peat compost tipped to soar from around £6 to as much as £9 in 2022. Cheap multibuy offers are at risk of disappearing as prices skyrocket. Turbulence in supply chains Steve explained that the peat-free ingredient coir, a by-product of the coconut industry that’s commonly imported from Sri Lanka and India, had gone up in price by 20 to 25 per cent – a problem that has been widely attributed to the soaring cost of global shipping. Wood-fibre and bark, Steve said, had risen by 20 to 30 per cent, as manufacturers compete for these peat-free ingredients with the booming construction industry, as well as biomass…

THE response from the many AG readers I met at the September 2021 Chelsea Flower Show just bowled me over. It was a real privilege to meet so many of you from Jersey (Francis Ozouf in his nineties), from Cornwall, and from pretty well every point on the compass in the UK and beyond. Several asked about my podcast signature tune – it was composed by the late Tony Bremner as a cantata, setting words from my book Shrubs for Everyone to music. Meeting face to face was so helpful, when you told me all about your garden, how long you had been gardening, and what was being grown; some were newcomers with a season or two of growing your own, while others were experienced home gardeners. Now, sitting here…

I HAVE just started doing talks again, and one of my most popular is entitled ‘The Living Jigsaw’. In it, I talk about gardening without using chemicals, not surprisingly, but there’s one bit of my talk that gives me a lump in my throat every time I get to it. It describes my years as a nursing cadet in Leamington Spa in 1967 and 1968. We ‘lived in’ at the nurses’ home and the rules were very strict. No men – not even my brother, who looks like a short-haired version of me – and there was a strict 10.30pm curfew. The door was locked at 10.31pm, and if you had to ring the bell then the wrath of Sister Foxhall was given full vent. On summer evenings, I got…

Q I have several stands of white Japanese anemones in my garden, but also one clump of pink. Is there any possibility they might cross-pollinate as I much prefer the pink ones? Myrna Smith, Harrogate, N. Yorkshire A Japanese anemones do cross-pollinate and hybridise readily, especially when there are plants of the same species growing nearby. I can’t find anything definitive to say whether different species cross-pollinate, but given that many of our most well-known garden varieties are offspring of A. x hybrida (a long-established cross) then I would say it is quite likely! However, I wonder if they set much seed. I have a lot of these plants in my garden (mostly pink, I’d love a few more white) and I think almost all of the young plants I…

IN AG 9 October I looked at how to propagate bulbs using the chipping and twin-scaling techniques, and this week I will look at two other methods – scoring and scooping. There are hundreds of flowering bulbs to choose from to add colour to pots and borders throughout the year, but varieties come and go and you will struggle to find replacements or additions for older or less popular ones. Many bulbs, such as hyacinths, are slow to multiply by natural means and although they tend to get larger each year, they produce very few bulblets if left to their own devices. There are ways to propagate the bulbs yourself at home and a keen gardener can certainly try it out, but it involves injuring the bulb to encourage it…

I’VE been so impressed with the Chelsea Flower Show’s one-off autumn slot that it’s made me wonder whether other seasonal fixtures should be tried at different times. Chocolate-wrapped Easter celebrations could move to winter, when summer diets are ditched for concealing woolly jumpers. And what about shuffling Christmas to February, so last-minute shoppers like me have more time? All l know is that Chelsea in autumn worked a treat – although it could be even better. While it was set in the season of mellow fruitfulness, the Main Avenue gardens held a surprising lack of berries and autumn colour, largely because most designers had chosen their plants before the spring show had been cancelled. This meant that they were stuck with their choices. If the gardens were designed as oneoff,…

THE success of your garden stands or falls on the state of your soil and in autumn, after a hard summer of growing, it is time to give it some TLC. If your soil is heavy and clay-based, this is the ideal moment to dig in lots of organic matter (rotted compost or manure) and grit to open it up, improve drainage and help prevent waterlogging and flooding this winter. Digging in well-rotted organic matter will also benefit thin, chalky soil as it gives it more heft, improving its ability to retain water and hold on to any fertilisers you add over the coming months. It is also a good idea to test your soil now to find out which areas require extra attention. If plants in one patch haven’t…

Planting time Prepare the ground for a new rose AUTUMN is a great time for planting roses and you can buy them bare-root from November onwards. Bare-root plants are young ones that are lifted from the ground and sold as they are, with the roots bare of soil and not contained in a pot. It is an economical way of adding to your stock and they will quickly get established and grow well when the weather warms up in spring. Roses are voracious feeders, so a few weeks before you plant them enrich their soil with lots of well-rotted compost and manure. They are also prone to replant disease, when they fail to thrive in ground where roses have been growing previously. You can get around this problem by replacing…

THIS week’s free seeds from Mr Fothergill’s are Lupin ‘Pixie Delight’. Hardy annuals, they can be sown now and will produce short spires of white, pink and blue flowers next summer. You can also start them next spring, though those sown now will have a head start and perform more strongly. They grow to just 16in (40cm), making them ideal plants to sow towards the front of borders. Seeds do best in cultivated soil where they don’t have to compete with weeds. To prepare your seedbed, remove stones, weeds and debris then break up the larger clods of earth. Rake the soil one way and then the other until you have created a fine tilth that has the consistency of crumble topping and dampen it. Sow the seeds thinly, scattering…

WE’RE used to thinking of fungi negatively in gardening – but that really must stop. There are good and bad fungi, separated by a mighty chasm. Yes, mildew, blight and scab are unwelcome, but how about plonking some home-grown chestnut, button, oyster or shiitake mushrooms on your kitchen chopping board? That will impress the domestic god or goddess in your household! More options and materials Autumn is the natural time to think about growing mushrooms, with moist soil and chillier temperatures stimulating their production. But home-growing comes in kit form today, allowing us to force mushrooms into growth at any time. “Autumn is the time to think about growing them” To get scientific for a moment, while nuisance fungi are parasitic (in other words, they feed on living material), the…

IN the bleak depths of winter, a colourful show of pot plants brightens the spirits. Whether it’s troughs of dwarf irises around the front door or large pots of bright-red dogwood on the patio, containers of winter plants inject much-needed colour – and they can be planted now. Flowers are usually the stars of the show and many provide vital nectar for winter-foraging wildlife. Some – such as the buff-tailed bumblebee – are increasingly seen during the colder months, as a result of climate change. Even butterflies (including the red admiral) can sometimes be spotted hunting for food in the winter sun. They adore heather, such as ‘Katia’ (white) and ‘Furzey’ (pink), and will feed on hellebores, aconites and snowdrops, all of which can be grown in small pots. Pollinators…

Q Sweet peas are my favourite flowers, and I was delighted to receive some packets of seed for my birthday. Is it better to sow sweet peas in autumn or in spring? Connie Bedelia, Chipping Ongar, Essex A I think the best and longest-lasting plants arise from an October or early November sowing. They’ll show within three weeks and make well-formed plants with good root systems for planting out as soon as conditions allow in spring. Here in a milder region, I aim to plant in early March, but in colder areas April might be more realistic.Sweet peas are tough, and as long as they are well hardened off (placed outside to acclimatise to the weather before planting), they survive late frosts. It is certainly a mistake to leave them…

AS deciduous trees continue to lose their leaves and enter dormancy, the sap withdrawing to their deepest recesses for winter, we can start to take hardwood cuttings. This is the most reliable way of propagating trees and shrubs, though it can take up to a year to see results, and is used for a wide range of ornamental and edible plants. Roses, currant bushes, figs and many ornamental spring and summer-blooming trees and shrubs can all be grown from hardwood cuttings. It also works on evergreen shrubs including holly, skimmia, cotoneaster and privet, though these cuttings are best treated as if they are semi-ripe and grown in a pot of compost that has been sealed in a plastic bag and placed somewhere light and frost-free undercover. This is because evergreen…

ONE advantage of vegetables or bedding is that we can dispose of our mistakes at the end of each year. However, when we plant trees and shrubs it can take several years to know whether we chose wisely. If we haven’t made the right choice, we continue to stare at our errors year after year. Not that I’d discourage planting trees: there are a huge number of reasons we should do so, including climate change. But we ought to be very careful about which varieties we plant. It’s not so much that they may get too big – most are now available on dwarfing rootstocks, so they stay compact and need much less pruning. No, it’s planting the wrong variety that’s so dispiriting. You wait for a couple of years…

GROWN IN YOUR GARDEN, PATIO OR BALCONY FOR LESS THAN 1p PER lb FOR LIFE! You can now pick scrumptious Plums, Apples and Pears in abundance from your own Mini Fruit Tree Collection. Full-sized crops from 'professional standard' fruit trees grown in your garden or even pots on the patio. What’s more, you can expect to be picking your fresh, juicy fruit in the first year. A deliciously fragrant spring blossom precedes the fruits with 'Victoria' cropping from July, 'Conference' in September and 'Braeburn' in October. OFFER - TREE PLANTING KIT FOR ONE TREE Protect your investment in fruit trees, with our high quality, low cost tree planting kit. Comprising a treated and tanalised softwood support stake, 1.2m long x 3.2cm across, and a super-soft 38cm…

This week it’s: Red, black, white currants Facts about a flavoursome fruit collective THE old joke goes: ‘What’s black, white and red all over?’ Answer: A newspaper, of course! (For ‘red’ read ‘read’)! This leads me on, beautifully, to this week’s subject of black, white and red…currants. These soft fruits are the mainstay of many an allotment and kitchen garden. The beginner gardener might think that they are all the same kind of plant, just with different coloured berries – not a bit of it! Despite all being types of ribes (the genus name for the currant), the reds and whites grow and perform very differently to the blacks. Let’s take a look at some of the stories surrounding them. ■ All currants are members of the gooseberry family, Grossulariaceae. Differences…

Write to us: Letters, Amateur Gardening magazine, Future Publishing Limited, Unit 415, Winnersh Triangle, Eskdale Road, Winnersh, RG41 5TP (please include your address). Email us: amateurgardening@futurenet.com Preserving children I SAW this sweet little article in an old book and thought I’d share it with other AG readers. How to preserve children: Take…1 large lawn 2-3 small friendly dogs A large group of boisterous children A shallow stream Lots of sunshine A few pebbles A scattering of flowers Plenty of deep blue sky Recipe Mix the dogs and children together, watching constantly. Pour gently over a stream of pebbles. Sprinkle the flowers onto the lawn. Spread the deep blue sky all over and bake gently in the warm sunshine, basting frequently with cream. When golden brown, remove and leave to cool…