Innholdsfortegnelse for January 1, 2016 i The Gardener Magazine

FOOD GARDEN SOW WINTER CROPS IN TRAYS OR SEEDBEDS Broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, celery, kohlrabi, oriental veggies TAKE CUTTINGS OF WOODY HERBS Bay leaves, lavenders and rosemary FEED • Litchis, pawpaws and pineapples. • All deciduous fruit trees, and renew the mulch around their root areas. • Lemon trees, and water them regularly. WINDING DOWN • Harvest the seed of coriander, dill, fennel, caraway and anise. • Harvest excess veggies and start freezing and bottling them. • Harvest and freeze fresh, chopped herbs in a little water in ice-cube trays. • Raise marrows off the ground onto bricks or hessian to prevent them from rotting. ORNAMENTAL GARDEN TIME TO PLANT Verbenas – they grow in poor soil, love the heat, don’t need much water and will supply colour until…

FOOD GARDEN PLANT Plant the seed of sugar snap peas in a circle to grow them up a cane tepee. Also plant a patch of peppery leaves by alternating rows of tatsoi, rocket, radishes and pak choi. GROWING INDOORS • Sprouting is a fast and fun way to grow healthy edibles on a windowsill. Sprout some mung beans, chickpeas, lentils and alfafa to use in salads and stir-fries. • Sow a mix of salad greens, radishes, baby spinach and beets thickly in a window box. Snip off the germinating young stems and leaves to use on sandwiches or in your daily smoothie. MORE TO DO • Cut down the last tomatoes and bring the unripe fruit indoors, or hang the uprooted plant with fruits still attached somewhere under a roof…

KITCHEN GARDEN SOW Beetroot, cabbage, carrots, chillies, eggplants, flat leaf parsley, lettuce, nasturtiums, parsley, peas, radishes, rocket, runner beans, spinach and Swiss chard, sweet peppers, tomatoes MORE TO DO • Sow courgette seed in 10 cm pots and keep them in a sunny and protected place. Start courgettes off as early as possible to prevent fungal diseases that are prevalent in the summer-rainfall season. • Start planting seed potatoes. ORNAMENTAL GARDEN FLOWERS AND SCENT If you dream about a patio surrounded by bowers of sweetly scented flowers pleasing to the eye and gently shading you from the sun, but yours are looking like a bare afterthought attached to the house, you can add a softening effect with all the different jasmines flowering now. Go for Jasminum polyanthum (Chinese jasmine), Jasminum…

FOOD GARDEN SOW Sweet peppers, and do follow-up planting of your favourite vegetables. PLANT THE BERRIES Fruiting plants like blueberries, gooseberries and raspberries are common in nurseries now. Plant them in containers or in the veggie garden, feed them with 3:1:5 SR fertiliser and water well. 5 TIPS AGAINST PESTS • Keep leafy veggies healthy with frequent feeding and watering to strengthen them against pests. • Only spray against a specific pest when there is an outbreak, and use the right product. • When using an insecticide, make sure you don’t harvest a crop before it is safe to do so. • Use lots of companion plants as they can help prevent pests and disease. • Remove weeds continuously, as they are often host plants for pests. ORNAMENTAL GARDEN SOW…

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There are so many elements of the summer garden that stand out. Lawns are generally looking their best, flower borders are in full bloom, trees and shrubs are lush and leafy, and pots and containers are generally flourishing. The list is seemingly endless. Here are a few aspects of the summer garden that depict the many faces of the holiday season. FLOWER BORDERS Colourful flowers in the garden always make a dramatic impact. The summer garden is filled with a myriad of such blooms born on a huge range of different plant types. Summer-flowering herbaceous borders are growing in stature as gardeners realise just how effective they are. Besides using perennial plants as the mainstay of such mixed plantings, low-growing shrubs, roses and a smattering of annuals add to the…

FOOD GARDEN SOW Broad beans, leeks, lettuce, onions, peas, radishes, spinach (Swiss chard), turnips, all the cabbage types, Asian greens SOW COOL SEASON HERBS Chives and garlic chives, calendula, rocket STRAWBERRY FIELDS Start preparing a bed for strawberries by digging in well-rotted kraal manure, compost, a dusting of flowers of sulphur (they like acidity) and general fertiliser. FEED Brassicas and beans fortnightly with a water-soluble fertiliser rich in nitrogen to strengthen them before winter. MORE TO DO After digging up spent veggies, sow green manure crops in beds that will be left empty in winter: mustard, buckwheat, clover, linseed, lupins, lucerne and borage. Dig them into the soil when they are flowering. They improve the soil structure and increase the fertility of it for a next round of summer crops.…

FOOD GARDEN FEED All lemon trees this month with 3:1:5 or 8:1:5 fertiliser. Additional foliar feeding with a water-soluble fertiliser for young trees and those growing in pots is beneficial. Correct yellowing leaves with a micro-element mixture. • You can still plant a last crop of garlic. • Start pruning vines and peach, plum and apricot trees at the end of June, and spray them with lime sulphur. Don’t use last year’s supply as it will have lost its potency. Buy fresh stock and use it only on plants that have become completely dormant. • Plant new grapevines and cut them back to two buds to encourage strong shoot re-growth in spring. • Fertilise pawpaws with 3:1:5 fertiliser. Water well before and after. • Keep mango trees dry until the…

FOOD GARDEN SOW Artichokes (globe), bush beans, climbing beans, beetroot, brinjals, cabbages, carrots, celery, chillies, cucumbers, lettuce, mealies (sweetcorn), melon (sweet and watermelon), peas, potatoes, pumpkin, radishes, rhubarb, spinach and Swiss chard, squash, sweet peppers, sweet potatoes, tomatoes DO IT AGAIN Plant seed potatoes for home-grown roast potatoes at Christmas lunch! PEST WATCH • As soon as about 80% of the blossoms on fruit trees have dropped, you should start spraying against fruit fly. • Fruits that are growing too closely together can be thinned out. HERBAL GREYS Some of the best herbs have silver, grey, or greyish-green leaves, which make them handy for added contrasts of colour in the veggie and flower garden. These herbs mostly have a strong flavour for cooking and are also able to repel pests…

FOOD GARDEN SUCCESSION SOWING Bush beans, climbing beans, beetroot, cucumbers, lettuce, mealies/sweetcorn, pumpkin, spinach and Swiss chard, squashes, tomatoes PLANT Chillies – there is a wide variety available, some annual and others perennial, and they are very ornamental in the veggie patch or in pots amongst other herbs. ORNAMENTAL GARDEN PRIME TIME Hydrangeas are in flower now. Add more of these beauties to your shade garden and on the southern side of the house. PLANT HEAT-BEATING FLOWERS Celosias, vincas, portulacas, marigolds FEED • Feed citrus trees with a general fertiliser. • Feed hibiscus shrubs with 3:1:5 SR fertiliser and water well. LAWN • Mow more regularly than usual, with the blades set high, to keep the lawn looking its best. • Fertilise two weeks before Christmas with fast-working nitrogen to…

FOOD GARDEN PLANT NOW Chillies – Plant seedlings of different varieties, many of which are available at nurseries. Cherry tomatoes – Sow seed or plant seedlings of this quick-growing crop before winter arrives. Seed potatoes – If planted now, there will be a harvest in early winter. Loose-leaf lettuce varieties – Shade young seedlings under 30% shade net to protect them against the heat. SOW Veggie leaves – Mix together some quick-germinating herb and vegetable seed like carrots, beetroot, radishes, chives and lettuce and sow them in window boxes or pots for snipping off to use as healthy microgreens for summer salads. Cape gooseberries – Sow the seed in trays. Annual herbs – Sow basil, parsley, coriander and watercress to replace tired crops. MORE TO DO • Harvest daily if…

FOOD GARDEN SOW Kale, onions, parsnips, peas PLANT SEEDLINGS OF Broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbages, cauliflower, lettuce REMEMBER TO • Plant garlic cloves. • Plant strawberry runners. • Divide and replant chives. MORE TO DO • Protect newly planted vegetables with bird netting, and also start getting together the materials needed to protect edibles from early frost, like frost cover. • Sow nasturtium seed between brassicas (members of the cabbage family) to attract aphids away from them. If there is already an infestation on young plants, drench them with an organic insecticide. • Keep feeding all the leafy winter crops. ORNAMENTAL GARDEN BEAUTY OF THE MONTH Hypoestes aristata (ribbon bush) is a handy gap-filler for sun or light, dry shade. This indigenous plant has a reputation for being one of…

FOOD GARDEN DIVIDE AND REPLANT Thick clumps of rhubarb. PLANT Asparagus crowns. If you can’t find any, sow the seed and keep them in a protected and warm place until they have germinated. PINCH OUT The growing tips of broad beans to encourage pods and to minimise aphid attacks. ORNAMENTAL GARDEN LIME THE FLOWERS You can break up heavy clay soil by digging in a dressing of agricultural lime. Ailing lavenders and clematis will also benefit from a small dose of lime in winter, and adding a light dose to irises and stocks will promote flowering in spring. GOOD BUGS • If you care for butterflies, bees, birds and friendly little insects, you have to plant at least one Buddleja auriculata (weeping sage). This large, beautiful and quick-growing indigenous shrub…

FOOD GARDEN SUSTAINABLE HARVEST You can sow anything, but there are ways to prolong your summer harvest: sow leafy vegetables every two weeks, legumes every three weeks, root vegetables every four weeks and fruit-producing veggies every 6-12 weeks. FEED Litchis, pecan nuts and mangoes with 3:1:5 fertiliser. REMEMBER TO Propagate sweet potatoes with tubers or cuttings. PEST WATCH • Watch out for American bollworms and looper worms on vegetables and fruit, and spray where necessary. • Spray fruit trees against codling moth and fruit fly. • Put out snail bait amongst strawberries, and mulch with straw to prevent ripening fruit from touching the soil. ORNAMENTAL GARDEN SOW IN OVERDRIVE Asters, celosias, cosmos, marigolds, morning glories, nasturtiums, petunias, salvias, sunflowers, torenias, zinnias PRUNE • Clip off spent flowers and growth tips…

The black bird-berry is a highly valued evergreen shrub or small tree for bird-friendly gardens. Native to coastal forest margins from Knysna in the southern Cape through the Eastern Cape to northern KwaZulu-Natal, it also occurs inland in Swaziland, Mpumalanga and Limpopo, and extends to southern Mozambique and Zimbabwe. Usually reaching 2-3 m high, or exceptionally up to 6-7 m high in old specimens, it has a spread of 2-3 m and a pleasing rounded habit with leathery, shiny leaves. These are complemented by dense clusters of bright yellow, star-shaped flowers that are followed by striking, juicy berries. The developing berries are initially green, shade to yellow and then to red, and finally mature to black. The multi-coloured berry clusters provide a striking contrast against the dark green leaves. It…

Growing plants is about the easiest thing in the world. You plant a seed or a cutting, give it water and sunlight, and nature takes care of the rest. You don’t need to know anything about the plant itself for it to grow and to enjoy gardening, but a little bit of technical knowledge can make the process a lot more fun and infinitely more rewarding. So, what actually makes our bonsai trees grow? Plants grow through a very complex combination of a number of biological processes, but a key factor is a group of hormones called auxins. Auxins are present throughout the plant, in varying concentrations. They are produced by the growing tip of a plant. They make plant cells grow in length, and inhibit the growth of lateral…