The mushroom we see is the fruiting part of a fungus that distributes the spores of the fungus for its own reproduction.

Fungus Facts

• Most fungi are small microorganisms that live in soil, on dead matter, or as a symbiont of plants or animals.
• Fungi perform an essential role in the decomposition of organic matter and have fundamental roles in recycling nutrients.
• The study of fungi is known as mycology, which is often regarded as a branch of botany
• Yeasts and moulds are forms of fungi but slimes are not.
• The Kingdom Fungi has been estimated to include approximately 1.5 million species, most of which have not been classified.

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Vegetation of open habitats can be an interesting form of study for the keen gardener. Knowing what grows where in the wild, inform us about our own harden habitats.

Develop an understanding of ecology and wild plant development to augment your gardening interests.

Plant Habitat Classifications

Plants growing in the wild are found in several types of location that have been classified below.

• Mires and heaths
• Woodland and scrub
• Grassland
• Aquatics
• Maritime

The authoritative texts are written by J S Rodwell provide a framework for a wide variety of teaching, research and management activities in ecology, conservation and land-use planning.

There are sub-classifications including geological, geographical and environmental.
These situations include:-  Height above sea level, rainfall, wind direction and strength. Soil fertility, cultivation practices now and in the past all can play a part.

Grow and Crop your own Soya Beans

• For a little grown vegetable Soya are an easy and attractive crop to grow.
• Sow in a propagator or into warm soil May or June if sowing direct outside.
• Plant in well-drained, moist rich soil, 6 inches apart. Keep well watered, particularly as pods are setting.
• You will get 3-4 beans to a pod but you get lots of hairy self pollinated pods at the top of the plant.
• Plants are virtually pest and disease free.

How to Use Your Soya Beans

• You can pick pods whilst beans are still green and boil them in the pods with salt. Butterbean & Envy are good varieties for this purpose available from organicseedsonline.com
• Shelled the green beans can be treated like broad beans
• When pods turn brown harvest the dry beans and they can be stored in an airtight container. Soak them for 12 hours before using.
• Good varieties include Ustie, Butterbean and Elna.
• Commercially grown Soya is often GM but produces oil, Soya milk, Bean Curd or Tofu and can also be fermented to make Soya sauce.

Japanese Beans

• Azuki beans are a hairy annual similar to Soya beans. They have yellow flowers and longer pods.
• Daizu is the Japanese Soya rich in oil and protein. Flowers are violet or white and pea shaped.
• Miso is a bean paste made from Soya beans rice and salt.
• Tofu is an easily digested protein made from soaked and curded soya beans.
• Natto is fermented Soya beans often eaten at Japanese breakfasts.

Explanation of Scent

• Scent is the oxidisation of essential oils of flowers and leaves.
• Oils are mainly found on the upper surface of petals.
• The most scented flowers are those with thick velvet like petals which slow down the evaporation of the scent.
• Double white flowers like the rose are especially fragrant.
• Oils are produced in inverse proportion to colour pigment which is why orange and scarlet flowers tend to have less scent.
• Scent is classified into 10 and more groupings.

Wild Flower Families and Scented Examples.

• Buttercup: Stinking Hellebore is sulphury smelling, Aquilegia vulgaris have a soft clove like scent (without scent in blue and purple varieties) and Clematis vitalba or Old Man’s Beard has a light scent.
• Cabbage: Stinkweed smells when bruised, Sweet Alyssum and Wallflowers are  well known for their scent. Hesperis and Matthoila are also native plants to smell out for.
• Hypericum: All the St Johns Wort family have a foxy or goat like smell but Hypericum androsaemum has a more lemony scent.
• Pinks: include the Dianthus and Silene vulgaris or Bladder Campion have the characteristic clove like scent.
• Geranium: Mallows and Laveteria have little or no scent but Geranium robertianum or Herb Robert is quite pungent.
• Rose: Meadow Sweet says it in the name. Wild Strawberry has scented fruit and the drying leaves also produce a good scent. Geum or Wood Avens and Water Avens have scented roots that traditionally add fragrance to apple pie. For Roses go for the field or musk Rosa arvensis, Sweetbriar or Dog Rose Rosa canina. This is a big family and Hawthornes and Mountain ash have a rubber scented flower on a still spring day. Fruit smells come from Pear and Crab Apples.

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Hosepipe bans and talk of drought conditions turns gardeners minds to plants that can still thrive in those circumstances. I have suggested several types of plant to consider in the lists below.

Mediterranean Originated Herbs and Oil Producers

• Lavender has pungent foliage and makes a scented oil. The dried flowers retain scent indoors.
• Rosemary and Thyme are both herbs that will survive hot dry conditions. The sun even makes the flavour stronger.
• Oregano or Origanum laevigatum is blooming fine in my herb bed. The deep pink flowers are a bonus to the aromatic leaves.
• Other aromatics that will do well in dry conditions include Sage and Achillea.

Silver Leaved (sun reflecting) Plants

• Pinks and carnations have fine thin leaves so they do not desiccate easily.
• Santolina with fluffy yellow pompom flowers are good dry spot shrubs.
• Cistus is a family of flowering shrubs that has developed an oily leaf to protect against water loss.
• I like the silvery Sea Holly Eryngium giganteum which is a good doer in the dry spots.

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To coin a phrase ‘Sustainable Gardening is for Life not just a passing fancy’. It is easy to drop sustainable gardening when it gets tough but here are a few tips to help you stay the distance.

Composting

• Good compost contains huge, free food resources and conserves moisture in the soil. You know you could do more.
• Save money on fertilizer by adding Comfrey leaves to compost bins to boost nitrogen content.
• Do not put animal and fish bones on the compost heap but you can crush and bury these bones.
• Wormeries and worm bins will eat food waste and produce good soil conditioner.

Water Conservation

• It is more popular to save water when the drought starts but the wise gardener has already got solutions in place. But me more  Butts.
• Harvest water, it saves money if you are on a meter, even grey water is of use.
• Use drought tolerant plants such as Alpines and Mediterranean plants.

Recycle, Repurpose and Reuse

• Pruned stems can be used as plant supports and cut logs can go in a wood pile.
• Various bits of packaging can be used as planters.
• Reuse plant pots or donate them to charities who sell plants and are always asking me for contributions.
• Stones from a rocky part of the garden can improve drainage in another or be used to create a soak-away.

Encourage Wildlife

• Log Piles and brash piles save landfill and help insects and fungi.
• Companion planting can attract particular pest predators.
• Wild life encourages a natural balance in your garden.
• Leave areas of lawn unmown or create natural garden areas.

Green roofs are sustainable food, water and heat resources, read about Harlow Carr

Seeds are self sown when seeds germinate and grow without the help of a gardener. The majority of plants grow, flower, get pollinated then set seeds. If seeds are then distributed naturally from the plant they are self sown.

What Plants are Self Sown

• Weeds are the most common self sown plants. I am thinking of Dandelions, Daisies and Buttercups but unfortunately there are lots more.
• In a broadleaved wood you may get Oak trees growing from self sown acorns whilst Rowan and Elderberry are sown by birds eating berries and dropping seeds.
• Garden flowers that are commonly self sown include Foxgloves, Nigella, Candytuft, Poppy, For-get-me-not and Nasturtium.

How are Seeds Self Sown

• Wind distributes seeds that are very light or have a float mechanism like a Dandelion clock or Sycamore seed’s wings.
• Some seeds are expressed from seed pods by firing. Pansy seedpods tighten up and the ripe seed is squirted a good distance from the parent plant.
• Birds and animals including humans can be responsible for spreading seeds. Some stick to your clothing others are eaten but not digested like Tomatoes.

Top Ten Self-Sown Plants

1. This list was compiled with the help of Crocus whose first choice was Alchemilla mollis aka Lady’s mantle, good for edging sunny and shady borders and filling cracks in paving.
2. Aquilegia ‘Nora Barlow’ or Columbines self-seed readily and are very easy to grow in sun or partial shade.

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June is a spectacular month for flowering hedgerows and particularly the under-storey.

Identifying plants whilst out walking as a child, was my first introduction to the environment and natural gardening. There is still a buzz seeing a plant growing in the wild that some careful gardeners has subsequently developed for the garden or nursery trade.

Why not under-plant your garden hedges with native species of hedgerow flowers. The trick is to leave them undisturbed, unfed and untreated with chemicals. I would bank up the soil to start your hedge’s lower storey.

Hedgerows by County

• I nominate Somerset as my favourite hedgerow county but I would like to know what other UK counties can lay claim to be hedgerow county 2010.
• Cornish hedgerows have a soil banking (so that helps the smaller plants) with a rocky top and shrubs.
• Devon hedges are similar to Cornwall but with turf on and at the top of the banking.
• The Yorkshire Dales tends to have dry stone walls rather than hedges but the understorey plants can still be attractive.
• In Perth, near Blairgowrie, is the tallest and longest hedge on earth. Meikleour Beech Hedge, planted in 1745, is 98 ft in height and nearly half a mile long. (I wouldn’t want to trim it).

‘Hedgerows, moors, meadows and woods – these hold a veritable feast for the forager.’ and all is laid bear in the River Cottage Handbook. Book link

The English Hedgerow Trust provided this apposite quote from Shakespeare.

I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows
Where oxlips and the nodding violet grows
Quite canopied over with luscious woodbine
With sweet muskroses and with eglantine.

For a bit of fun read Copper Beech Hedges

Soil that is fit for purpose will help your plants grow, thrive and even excel.
Some plants need special soils or composts but good general principles are discussed below and this book will provide detailed information.

Purpose of Garden Soil

• Soil provides the base to anchor plants through their roots.
• Good soil holds moisture and air necessary for the health of plant roots.
• Soil feeds plants with nutrients (NPK) and makes other trace elements available.
• Soil recycles dead matter and hosts a variety of life forms.

Features of Good Soil

• Soil consists of “the living, the recently dead and the very dead.”
• Soil should be able to hold moisture but not become water logged.
• Excess water should drain away and not puddle under the plant. To prevent puddling the sub-soil, or lower layer of soil below cultivation depth, should be broken up and not compacted. Read the rest of this entry »

An effective way to use wild flowers  is to mix in some trusted garden plants. Using some  trusted garden stand-bys will provide extra colour and structure to a wild area.

Plants to Support Wild Flower Beds

• After the Aconites, Snowdrops and Marsh Marigolds the first blooms may be from Primroses or Day Lilies followed by Dianthus to give a mix of vibrant colour.
• Evening Primrose has yellow bell shaped flowers. Oenothera tetragona flowers in spring on reddish green stems, Oenothera missouriensis  later in the year
• Campanula the blue white or sometimes pink Bellflower can also look good.
• Foxgloves give height and structure and you could add some Delphiniums.
• For some white flowers choose Sneezewort ‘Acillea ptarmica’, Candytuft , Ox-eye daisy or Anthemis punctata
• Heliopsis, Rudbeckia and Achillea are good looking yellows.
• Cranesbill geraniums and Columbines can also complement wild flowers.

Wild Flowers

• You can buy seed mixtures aimed at different locations such as Cornfield mix from Thompson Morgan
• Many individual plants appeal as wild flowers particularly the daisy and buttercups
• The red Poppy is potentially one of the most popular varieties and I would opt for Papaver rhoeas.
• Wild Orchids are harder to grow but if you have the patience they can be rewarding
• See also Wild Seed Suppliers
• Do not forget the humble Dandelion in various leaf forms.

Tips on Wild Seed Sowing

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