Innholdsfortegnelse for December 2021 i BBC Gardeners' World

Crop failure – or saviour? I was delighted to see sweetcorn smut featured (Gardeners’ Question Time, November issue). Known as huitlacoche in Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs, this fungus is a prized delicacy in Central America. It has an earthy flavour and can be used in place of mushrooms. Franka Winter, Donaghadee We say: As with all fungi, it is important to make sure that you positively identify the variety and check it is safe before eating. If it’s not something that you’ve grown, seek expert advice before consuming. A place of our own We acquired an allotment last winter on which we erected a shed. Neither of us had ever had one before, so we were excited. We completely agree with Alan’s philosophy (Tales from Titchmarsh, November issue) that…

Settle in this December, as Gardeners’ World delivers you an early Christmas present – three brand-new episodes on BBC2. The one-hour shows will go out on consecutive Fridays, with all-new and unseen footage. Featuring your favourite presenters and special guests, these will be a glorious celebration not just of winter, but also of gardening through all the seasons. Monty welcomes you back to Longmeadow for the first and last episodes, with Adam hosting you for the second. Adam visits the Winter Garden at Cambridge University Botanic Garden for inspiration to lift gardens this time of the year, using plants for fragrance and texture as well as colour, and Monty will be getting you in the mood for Christmas with the final, Christmas Eve festive episode. Carol Klein meets comedian Joe…

Since we published our 2 for 1 Entry Guide earlier this year, many gardens will have either closed for the winter months, have different opening hours over the festive period or have amended their booking systems. So do, please, always check before you travel, to avoid disappointment. To find the most up-to-date information for a specific garden, go to the website of the garden you’re planning to visit or contact the ticket office directly. Alternatively visit gardenersworld.com/2-for-1-gardens for more information. ■ Great savings You can still make great savings at some gardens. If you need a 2-for-1 Entry card you can still purchase a copy of the Gardens to Visit Card and Guide 2021 at magsdirect.co.uk/GW2for1CARD21 2 for 1 Entry Guide sponsored by…

Plastic is a tricky one. The only sustainable answer, at the moment, is to treasure the plastic you have, reuse it as much as possible and resist buying any single-use plastic. Growers should stop selling plants in flimsy plastic pots and use really strong ones that can be reused rather than so-called ‘recycled’ – charging accordingly. The uncomfortable truth is that there is little or no reliably successful recycling of plastic. No gardener – including me – ‘recycles’ their plastic. We just put it aside to be taken somewhere else by someone else. The latest studies show that burning black plastic is the least damaging way to dispose of it, which is a measure of how far we are from dealing with the problem of the mountains of plastic in…

Making a wreath is a great way to mark the start of the festive season. Decorations feel especially poignant this year as many of us were unable to celebrate last Christmas with our loved ones. All the decorations on the following pages are made from plants widely grown in gardens or available in garden centres and florists. See p51 for my step-by-step wreath guide and the QR code to watch my how-to video. A warm welcome This autumn-hued wreath features crab apples, beech and chestnut leaves, and wild carrot flowers, along with sprigs of eucalyptus to give off a wonderful scent. The foliage has been kept long and loose to give the wreath a natural, foraged look. YOU WILL NEED Shilpa Reddy left…

Parsnips and carrots For super-sweet root veg on Christmas Day, sow maincrop carrots from April to July and parsnips in April and May. Sowing small batches every few weeks helps to ensure a good harvest on the big day. Cover carrots with straw once the weather turns frosty. ■ Try growing ‘Rainbow Mix’ carrots for a vibrant Yuletide plateful! ■ If December is mild, lift parsnips and refrigerate for the sweetest flavour Brussels sprouts Love ’em or loathe ’em, these nutritious veggies are a traditional part of the Christmas feast. Sow seeds in modules in May and plant out in June. Cover with fine mesh to protect from pests. Pick the lowest sprouts first, leaving harvesting until Christmas morning as they don’t store well. ■ Sweet varieties like ‘Trafalgar’ are…

You’ll learn about: Dividing up your space Getting the balance of planting and hard landscaping right Making a simple design plan “If your garden doesn’t suit your needs, has become tired and no longer fills you with joy, then set about making it lift your spirits” Whether you have a blank canvas or already have borders in place, making changes can be daunting – but they can also be very rewarding. So if your garden doesn’t suit your needs, has become tired or too familiar and no longer fills you with joy, then set about making it lift your spirits. The last couple of years have taught us a lot about the value of our outdoor space and the benefits of fresh air and contact with nature when it comes…

VISIT gardenersworld.com/what-to-do-now for more advice on the best crops to sow and plant this month, and how to do it. Gardener’s Worldoffer GARLIC ‘SOLENT WIGHT’ BULBS Garlic ‘Solent Wight’ has exceptional flavour and bouquet, which it retains during cooking. This popular and reliable soft-neck variety is well suited to the British climate. H x S 60cm x 15cm 2 bulbs £5.99 SAVE £1 (KC2325) 6 bulbs £14.99 SAVE £5.98 (KC2355) Please add £4.99 P&P Call 0844 573 6054* Go to Thompson-Morgan.com/TM_GW73 Terms & Conditions: Items will be despatched from January 2022 onwards. Offer closes 14 January 2022. Please note your contract for supply of goods is with Thompson & Morgan Images for illustrations purposes only. Savings are based on multiples of the cheapest pack size. Regretfully we are unable to ship live plants…

As a subscriber to BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine, you can save 10%* throughout the year with our specially selected partners – perfect for saving £££s on gifts for your loved ones. Find your discount codes in the exclusive Subscriber Extras section of this issue, or log on to gardenersworld.com/secret-garden. Not yet a subscriber? Sign up – see our offer on p26 – to start shopping and saving today! Subscribe today to receive a gift bundle See p26 Discover more at gardenersworld.com/offers and sign up to our offers newsletter *Offers exclude delivery & some products; not valid with any other offer…

This month 122 Gardeners’ Question Time The BBC Radio 4 experts answer this month’s pick of readers’ queries, including: Choosing woodland plants for birds Making a wildflower meadow Sowing monkey puzzle tree seeds How mistletoe grows We all know of at least one Christmas tradition involving mistletoe (Viscum album), but aside from that custom this is a fascinating plant with unusual characteristics. It’s poisonous to us but an important food for many birds. A hemiparasite, it gets part of its food from the plant it’s growing on, but not all. To do this it attaches itself to its host (usually an apple, hawthorn, lime or poplar tree) by a haustorium, through which it extracts water and nutrients from the tree, while also using its green leaves to photosynthesise. Seed is…

Height x Spread 2m x 1.5m Fruits July-August Order code: 310175 MORE GREAT OFFERS for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine readers Mini orchard fruit tree collection Grow your own mini orchard right by your back doorstep with this collection of three self-fertile, compact fruit trees – ideal for smaller gardens or patios. You may even pick your first juicy fresh fruit in the first year, with an increase in crop year on year. The collection includes one each of apple ‘Braeburn’, plum ‘Victoria’ and pear ‘Conference’. 3 bare-root trees (1.2m tall) £24.97 SAVE £20 (300004) Also available to buy separately 5mx5m Oct 3mx3m Aug-Sep 3mx25m Oct Honeyberry ‘Morena’ ■ A honeysuckle relative with sweet, juicy summer fruits, rich in vitamins and antioxidants. H x S 90cm…

I was pleased to read in your letters (Have your say, October issue) about the benefits of growing your own food. There is a huge demand for allotment plots in my area. As soon as one is vacated, it is immediately filled. The plots have never looked so good, possibly due to the extra time people have had during lockdown. Many, if not most of the new applicants for plots are younger than usual and this is very pleasing. More and more people are realising the health benefits of tending a plot, being out in the open and in what is really a rural oasis in an urban environment. With pressure on land for building, I hope that local authorities, landowners and developers will recognise that, while allotment plots seem…

ROSE HONOURS BLACK GARDENER A new rose, bred by Harkness Roses, has been named after Wales’s first-recorded black gardener, John Ystumllyn, who was abducted from Africa in the 18th century. roses.co.uk PEAT-FREE ON THE RISE Almost three-quarters of gardeners are aware peat-based composts harm the environment, says Garden Organic – but 44 per cent still can’t buy peatfree locally. forpeatssake.org.uk WORM UP The Urban Worm Farm is giving away 1,000 packs of tiger worms to individuals, schools and community groups who build their own wormery from repurposed items. theurbanworm.co.uk/wormup CARBON RATE YOUR TOOLS A new online calculator, from battery-powered tool manufacturer EGO, allows gardeners to work out the carbon footprint of petrol-powered tools. challenge2025.eu/calculator AMNESTY CALL FOR PESTICIDES Campaigners are calling for a national amnesty for out-of-date pesticides so they’re…

E veryone has their own colour sensibility, their own preferences, their own taste. Who knows whether or not our common colour language actually equates to the same colours perceived. Let’s hope it does. We use a common language to talk about it and share an enthusiasm for using it, though every one of us has our own colour sense and our own way of applying it in our gardens. Colour plays a vital role in all our gardens, whether it is cunningly conceived or accidentally achieved, the first impression that we receive, be it in our own gardens or anyone else’s, is of colour. As our intellect gets to work and takes over, other aspects take on greater significance. Our brains may register form, pattern and stature, but perhaps colour…

Deanna & Rob Bailey “What got us through lockdown was having this garden to focus on” “The landscaping is really bold and helps to make the plants shine. They have planted it with an illustrator’s sense of colour and you feel cocooned in this garden”Kate Gould, garden designer and GOTY judge When Deanna and Rob Bailey moved into their terraced house in Greater Manchester, they initially spent all their money and effort on renovating the interior. Their tiny back garden was a boggy patch of lawn, mainly used to store the bins. But just before Covid hit, they decided to transform it into a lush tropical paradise. Despite being gardening novices, they used their skills as professional illustrators to design and create a high-impact outside space that quickly became a…

It’s deepest winter and the garden is dormant. Pretty much all growth above ground has stopped, although recent studies have found that below the soil growth has only slowed by around 50 per cent. Still, in the garden’s season of rest, when new, easily damaged growth is not forming, it’s the ideal time to carry out formative pruning of large shrubs and trees. The additional time off that many of us have in December and our need to get outside and make the most of what little daylight there is, create the perfect opportunity to start tackling these jobs. Trees and shrubs that flower on the previous season’s growth – forsythia being the classic example – should be left well alone. But for other plants, especially many fruit trees like…

To everything its season – and in December we long for cold weather. With climate change making our winters predominantly mild and wet – and at Longmeadow that means a bone-chilling, pervasive damp – days when ice forms a lid on the water, when twigs, troughs and pots are rimed with frost, and the ground is hard and dry, are a winter treat. It is not just good for us gardeners, but it also acts as a clean-up in the garden, killing many unwelcome fungi and plant-eating insects or at least curtailing their proliferation. In practical terms, it is important to protect tender plants – and often a simple wrapping of fleece is enough – and to ensure that greenhouses and cold frames are insulated or heated. But, above all,…

Spot the differences Can you spot the seven differences in the picture? Word wheel Make as many six-letter words as you can using letters from the wheel (excluding proper nouns, plurals acceptable), all containing the letter in the centre. Target: 9 Use all the letters in the wheel to spell out a traditional winter snack. Muddled plant labels Here are four plants famed for winter colour – but they’ve got a bit muddled. Can you match the correct genus and species to each picture? Step by step By changing one letter each time to make a new word, can you turn PEAR into TREE? PEAR TREE Unscramble the anagrams to spell out five conifers that make great Christmas trees Festive code-breaker Here are six festive foods. Unfortunately, the letters have…

In partnership with Delivered with your magazine Lookout for 14 packs of free seeds in 2022 starting with your February issue, through to June. Enjoy a garden full of colourful flowers and tasty crops with our choice mix, especially chosen by the GW Magazine team. FREE SEEDS worth over £31.50 May 6 packs of seed + your 2 for 1 Gardens to Visit guide 2022 PLUS you’ll receive: ■ Special magazine pages about your seeds, including foolproof step-by-step sowing and growing guides ■ Online content to help you get the best from your seeds Not yet a subscriber? Our seed sowing guides start with the January issue. Subscribe by 6 December to get involved – see p129. June SUCCESSFUL SOWING To discover more about this year’s calendar of seeds go…

“December, being the last month, cannot help but make us think of what is to come”Fennel Hudson STAR OF THE MONTH Cotinus coggygria We do not pause often enough to properly appreciate how much a good deciduous shrub can contribute to a winter border. They have neither leaf nor flower at this time of year, but that is no reason to dismiss them as dull and walk on searching for an evergreen. Look at this – in summer, cotinus has a very alluring purple leaf interspersed with puffy plumes of pale pink flowers, hence its common name of smoke bush. Those glories are long faded, but we are left with a skeleton that even the most jaded among you cannot fail to admire. Propagate by semi-ripe cuttings in summer. Prune…

Gardening still struggling to improve ethnic diversity Eighteen months after Black Lives Matter protests shone a light on the lack of diversity in gardening, campaigners say there’s still not enough evidence of genuine change. Designer Juliet Sargeant, who in 2016 became the first black designer to create a show garden at the RHS Chelsea Flower Show, says there’s “an emphasis on doing surveys and getting reports written” rather than taking action. “There’s a sense of impatience from people of colour,” she says. “It has felt as if there is not a lot of urgency.” Tayshan Hayden-Smith, who runs community gardening project Grow2Know in London, says there’s a feeling that gardening bodies are imposing solutions – rather than working side by side with under-represented groups. “These organisations hold the key to…

Make the most of the crisp weather and stroll off that Christmas pudding on Boxing Day at one of our favourite 2 for 1 Entry gardens for a memorable day out. Gibside, Tyne & Wear Enjoy walking trails for all abilities at this Georgian landscape garden, featuring man-made terraces and plenty of wildlife. Follow the winding river and turning valley for spectacular views. Warm up with hot chocolate and gingerbread biscuits or curl up in the second-hand bookshop. i Book at nationaltrust.org.uk/gibside, see p51 of 2 for 1 Entry Guide for discount details Open daily except 24 and 25 Dec, 10am-4pm Thorp Perrow, North Yorkshire With over 100 acres of glades, bays and avenues to explore, the arboretum offers clearly marked routes of various lengths and features one of the…

“Climate change is the biggest challenge that mankind has faced” Fourteen years ago, almost to the day, I sat at my computer to write an article for this magazine about sustainability in the garden. I confess I had not looked at it, or even remembered I had written it, until preparing for this piece. But the topic of sustainability in our gardens could not be hotter. So, I looked back and re-read it to see what had changed in the past decade and a half. The depressing truth is that the answer is – not much. A lot of talk, some minor action and we are still gardening as though our resources are limitless. Fourteen years ago, my tone was slightly defensive about climate change, knowing that perhaps 20 per…

Food and drink For the gardener who enjoys bringing home the harvest, we’ve food and drink gifts to whet appetites – and reduce waste Wildlife For those hoping to attract welcome visitors to their gardens and help them feel right at home Botanical craft Make memories last by making an artwork inspired by nature, marking a special event, a walk in the countryside or even just a glorious day in the garden. House plants Treats to keep crafty house plant lovers busy over the festive season. Out in the garden Greenfingered crafters will be itching to get back outdoors with these beautiful gifts to help them with gardening jobs. Skincare Gardeners looking to create natural skincare with their own botanicals will love these sets Subscribe to Gardeners’ World Magazine for…

A GREAT GIFT Treat yourself or loved ones to a magical day at Raymond Blanc’s Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons, including a garden tour, champagne reception and a two-Michelin-starred lunch. Set in the heart of rural Oxfordshire, Le Manoir aux Quat’Saisons is inspired by the plants that surround it. Pioneers of a sustainable approach, Raymond and his team are celebrated for bringing the outside in – the gardens and orchards inform not only the menus but also every element of the Le Manoir experience. To discover the distinctive combination of garden and gastronomy found only at Le Manoir, BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine readers are invited to two exciting events: ■ Explore the 11 gardens within the grounds with Le Manoir’s senior garden team, and unearth the secrets of nurturing the very…

With these specially grafted trees, you can grow up to eight different varieties of fruit from four trees. Each tree has two different varieties growing on the same tree, so they’re perfect if you love the idea of picking your own homegrown fruit but have limited space. Meticulously ‘double-grafted’ together onto dwarfing rootstock by skilled nurserymen, these fruit trees remain compact and are even happy growing in large patio pots. They are already trained into a V-shape, so they can be easily grown against a wall, too. Choose any two of… ■ Pear ‘Conference’/‘Concorde’ Both varieties have sweet, white flesh and are heavy croppers. Height x Spread 2.5m x 1.5m Fruits Sept-Oct ■ Plum ‘Victoria’/‘Czar’ The fruits of ’Victoria’ can be eaten straight from the tree. ‘Czar’ are perfect for…

Enjoy hellebores in your home Make a temporary indoor display with a Christmas rose, Helleborus niger. Varieties include ‘Christmas Carol’ and ‘Christmas Darling’, and can be found on most garden centre displays ready to flower. Remove the plant from its plastic pot and pop it into a more attractive terracotta or ceramic display pot of a similar size. Water well, then dress the top of the compost with moss from the garden, before placing it on a cool indoor windowsill. Unlike the tougher, later-flowering hybrids, these hellebores grow best in organic-rich soil, so keep their indoor display quite short, then plant them outdoors in a shaded spot in the garden. Enrich the soil with garden compost and add some lime, as hellebores don’t do well in acid soils. WATCH videos…

Most wildlife is hibernating now, while birds spend the precious few daylight hours searching for high-calorie food to keep warm at night. Watch your garden at dawn and dusk – you might see a blue or great tit, or a ‘chime’ of wrens using bird boxes as a winter roost. Tits tend to roost individually, while wrens roost together – the British Trust for Ornithology once noted an astonishing 63 wrens using the same box. Keep bird feeders topped up with energy-rich suet, sunflower hearts and peanuts, and add fresh water to bird baths, especially in freezing conditions. Birds with the cleanest feathers insulate themselves better at night, and are more streamlined, meaning they can fly more quickly from predators. You may spot… Goldcrest, Regulus regulus The goldcrest is the UK’s…

How to get maximum harvests in even the smallest space Create a kitchen garden that’s pretty and productive Discover the best ways to grow potatoes for a bumper harvest 10 of the best crops to start your growing year Get a head start on seed sowing with MONTY’s plan for your year NEW Growing Greener – ways to garden in a changing climate CAROL reveals how wet weather won’t stop a garden looking good…

There are certain books I pull down from my shelves each year at Christmas in order to put myself in the mood for the festivities. One of them is Charles Dickens’ The Pickwick Papers. Not to devour from cover to cover, you understand, but to read Chapter 28 “A good-humoured Christmas chapter”, which tells the story of the stagecoach journey to Dingley Dell and begins with the delightful phrase “As brisk as bees, if not altogether as light as fairies, did the four Pickwickians assemble on the morning of the twenty-second day of December, in the year of grace in which these, their faithfully-recorded adventures, were undertaken and accomplished.” Those few words are all it takes to transport me to the upper reaches of the Muggleton Telegraph – that Victorian…