Gardeners Tips

One of the easiest and highest yielding vegetable crops to grow are runner beans. You may not need all these 5 tips to do well but here goes:

1. I keep some bean seeds from last years crop but a new packet of seeds will germinate in May for planting out as soon as the danger of frost has gone. Alternatively buy plug plants for June delivery. Pests may eat seeds sown direct so I start each seed in a small pot.
2. Give the young plant something to climb and twine up. A 6′ cane and some wide spaced netting will do.
3. There should be no more problems before you get a crop but beans are heavy feeders and drinkers so a rich, moisture retentive soil will help and so will a good drink in dry weather.
4. Flowers, red or white are insect pollinated so do not need to be sprayed with water (an old folks tale).
5. Pick the bean pods when young and pliable. When they get a bigger bean in the pod they will stop producing new pods. Otherwise the plants will produce until October or so.

Some plants give double pleasure by producing berries after their flowers have already performed. Here is my top 5:

1. Rose hips shown above come in various sizes and shapes. Ruga roses have large robust berries whilst this ‘Rambling Rector’ produces lots of hips after a grand flush of summer flowers.
2. Holly berries are a seasonal favorite that on 12th night we take out of the house. Holly bushes are either male or female and it is the latter that produce the berries.
3. Small black and purple berries are less ornamental but do a good job feeding the birds. Elderberry and Berberis are two larger shrubs that do well in my garden.
4. Whilst thinking about birds the cottoneaster family can produce prolific feast of berries that get gobbled up in autumn.
5. I find that the pyracantha berries are not eaten by the birds until winter is in full spate. They are available in red orange and yellow berries and are good structural shrubs an ornamentals.

New gardeners can improve the look and success rate of their new plants if they give them appropriate support. Stakes for trees, bamboo canes, metal rods or bought systems are all possible forms of support. Here are just 5 ideas.

1. Bushy perennials grow well through circular frames or netting.
2. Top heavy plants such as peonies and dahlia are suited to a Y-stake support or a grid of twine.
3. Pea sticks are useful for supporting shorter front of border plants like penstemon and some annuals.
4. Clump forming upright perennials like delphinium or Helianthus can be supported with twine or tubes of netting.
5. Runner beans and climbing beans need good support from wide ‘pea’ netting and a wigwam or line of good canes to support the weight of pods and summer breezes.

See also Supporting Role

There are several annual plants I would recommend to new gardeners who want to cover an unsightly mess but do not want permanent plants that could impede house maintenance.

1. Sweet peas give colour and scent and cover rapidly. They tend to go-over later in summer.
2. Climbing nasturtiums have bright coloured flowers and pungent leaves until the first frost.
3. Morning glory and canary creeper are half-hardy  are harder to get going but can be very brash.
4. There are many suitable perennials including various Vines and Ivys. Look around at other local gardens to see what does well before you decide on something that could become permanent.
5. Most importantly for a good show you should provide something to climb up and cling too. Trellis, horizontal wires or netting most common.

If you need more inspiration check out with Alan Titchmarsh

1. A first essential is enthusiasm and an interest in plants, flowers and growing things. You are reading this so you qualify on this first essential.
2. Know that plants require air, water and a safe home – (soil, plant pot or bit of land).
3. Seed or plant matter to start life then nourishment to continue living. Even without a gardener’s help bare soil will be colonised, mainly by unwanted weeds in my case.
4. Size ins’t important you can start to garden on a windowsill or in a plant pot.
5. I recommend some instant gratification, try acquiring a mature flowering plant or good vegetable seedlings to get you in the mood.

1. So cheap and simple a sand tray for cuttings doesn’t need a photograph. Fill a deep seed tray or box with damp horticultural sand.
2. Use your sand tray to hold small cuttings or plant snippets to help them root.
3. This method of rooting and growing increases your stock of plants for negligible cost. At that cost you do not need many rooting successes to give you a payback.
4. Silver leaved plants, perennials, even petunias can be rooted in a sand tray then grown on or be planted in the garden.
5. Use 2″-4″ young new growth cuttings and strip off the bottom leaves then plunge the bottom third in the sand. It will take a few weeks in summer and a few months in cooler weather to get root growth.

1. Lavender leaves, flowers and seed heads smell like aunty’s old perfume (and it obviously why she used lavender oil).
2. The English Lavender is the hardiest of Lavender called angistifolia
3. Loved by bees they produce stubby spikes on short stems above narrow leaves.
4. Taller billowing lavender intermedia and French or Spanish tuffted lavender flowerers are less hardy.
5. Trim or prune lavender after they have flowered. The less hardy the less you should prune.

1. Bugle is a native wild flower with a posh name Ajuga reptans.
2. Bugle flowers dark blue or purple and will grow in poor soil. That is why it is often used as ground cover or under shrubs.
3. It sends out stolons, like adventurous roots, to spread quite quickly.
4. Good varieties include Burgundy Glow and Caitlins Giant
5. Plants attract bees and are good fillers and good doers. ( To me a ‘good doer’ is a plant that produces more reward than I invest in time or cost to get it flowering)

A colony of Foxgloves not a skulk or earth as in Foxes

1. In the first year of growing from seed foxgloves produce a rosette of leaves but no flower as they are a true biennial.
2. In the second summer they produce a  spike of flowers mainly round three quarters of the circumference. After that they usually die or produce a poor plant in the third year. To compensate they produce a prolific amount of seeds.
3. Cutting off the first flower spike will encourage several smaller new flowers.
4. Self sown foxgloves tend to flower in purple shades irrespective of the parent plants.
5. As woodland plants the leaves can look a bit tatty particularly in dry spots.

For a yellow foxglove: see: Yellow Foxgloves