Articles – Page 32 – Gardeners Tips

Apple Blossom Time

December 11, 2015 hortoris

Late blossom arrivals in 2015 looked like being a good year for apple blossom and thus fruit in the North of England. And iut was with some great crops in my Yorkshire garden.

A cold and late spring delayed the buds and blossom until the worst of the weather was over. Energy has been diverted into fruit production rather than new wood after judicious pruning. There has been no significant late frost to damage blossom and there are now many pollinating insects on the wing. Hopefully these are signs that we will have a good crop of juicy apples this year. Just in case here are a few tips to help nature along.

Tips for Better Apples

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Creating A Focal Point in Your Garden

December 10, 2015 tejvan

lavender

Sometimes as gardeners, we place all the emphasis on plants. However, a few well positioned ornaments and focal points can heighten the interest and drama within a garden.

The above photo is from Lady Margaret Hall Gardens, Oxford. This is a sunken garden with a mixture of lavenders, verbena and ornamental grasses. The two earthenware pots and sun dial in the middle of the garden provide a perfect foil and complement to the understated planting.

Box Symmetry

In this photo, the eye is steered towards the gap in the end fence. There is a neat symmetry, which helps to provide a relaxing feel to the garden. Notice how, the gardener has encouraged the eye to follow a certain path.

Focal Point With Plants

Verbascum ‘Banana Custard’ provides a focal point in this mixed border

Photos from Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford and garden in Yorkshire; copyright gardeners tips.

Climate Change and Garden Insects

December 7, 2015 hortoris

One thing is sure the climate in your garden will change. You already know one week will be different to the next and I can’t remember when two months or any years were the identical to others. In many areas you can get 3 or 4 seasons in one day (or in Scotland one hour!).

Another thing to be sure about is the ‘law of unintended consequences’ or we might not get the effects we expect and plan for.

The march of insects, predators and undesirables.

Changing climate does not bring more alien species but it can make our environment more welcoming for them when they do arrive. Recent arrivals include but are not limited too:

Lily beetle the bright red insect devouring my lily bulbs as we read
The Harlequin ladybird still a pleasant curiosity but rapidly out eating or native species with its voracious appetite. …
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UK Deciduous Azaleas

November 26, 2015 hortoris

Description & Growing Deciduous Azalea

All Azalea are Rhododendron but not all Rhododendron are Azaleas. Now we have that as clear as a muddy pond what is an Azalea?
An Azalea can be an evergreen or deciduous flowering shrub with pale or startling coloured blooms.
Some Azaleas are scented whilst others are without scent. Whatever you think about deciduous Azaleas, ‘muddy and boring’ they are not.
Azalea are some of the most gay and brilliant flowering shrubs yet grown.
For the technically minded Azaleas are in the genus Rhododendron, with evergreen azaleas in the subgenus Tsutsusi and deciduous azaleas in the subgenus Pentanthera.
Most deciduous azaleas are hardy but asiatic species need more protection when young

Varieties & Hybrids of Deciduous Azalea for Growing

The species have been much crossed and bred but the scented Rhododendron luteum and Rhododendron japonica are available as species.
Knapp Hill hybrids are amongst the most colourful deciduous Azaleas.
The Ghent hybrids have sweetly scented, honeysuckle-shaped flowers with long stamen emarging from the tube.
The Rhododendron Mollis Azaleas are crossed between Rhododendron mollis and Rhododendron japonicum
Rustica hybrids have fragrant double flowers and Occidentale hybrids flower in late May
The Exbury range were bred by Lionel de Rothschild who loved deciduous azaleas and carried out much breeding work to enhance colours and scent. The Solent Range was started by George Hyde a private grower in Dorset but bought for Exbury (Images).
For specimen plants Azalea Coccinea Speciosa or R obtusum are recommended

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Chose Your Berberis Variety

November 25, 2015 hortoris

A prickly subject is our Berberis unless you pick with care.

Berberis Julianea is a colourful low maintenance foliage plant with flowers, berries and prickles! Good Berberis areÂ prickly flowering shrubs often with fragrant flowers ranging in colours from pale primrose to pumpkin orange, light pink to darker red.

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Saxifrages in Alpine Gardens

November 20, 2015 hortoris

There are a host of different Saxifraga or singular Saxifrage. They make for an interesting group to grow and collect both in the garden and in troughs or pots depending on the variety. Saxifrage kolenatiana has rosettes that throw up spikes of flower in summer similar to its better known Saxifrage relative ‘London Pride’.

Groups of Saxifrages

These are just some of the groupings of Saxifrage each contain many variants, varieties and species for which you need a more detailed document. See links below.

Saxifraga x arendsii or Mossy Saxifrage is useful for walls, troughs and shady rockeries.

Saxifraga stoloniferaÂ groundcover under flowering shrubs or small trees OK in shade or Saxifraga x urbium London Pride

Saxifraga cotyledon or Pyramidal Saxifrage for troughs and pots

Saxifraga paniculata: Encrusted Saxifrage, group 4 for walls, edger; sun to part shade

Saxifraga primuloides: a miniature variety for shaded rockeries

Links and Further Information
The Saxifrage Society

Saxifraga World

BBC

RHSÂ Silver Saxifrage Trials

Click on book to buy from Amazon.

Hydrangea Aspera Shrub

November 19, 2015 hortoris

The leaves of this Hydragea Aspera are one of its key features. As with other Aspera subspecies the branches and leaves are ‘strigose’ which botanically means ‘beset with appressed straight and stiff hairs’ that means rough and furry to me.

ThisÂ specimen shrub is 4-5 feet tall and whilst it comes from the Himalayas some plants can be a bit tender.

The Purple flowers open to a clear white (that is almost burned out on this photo) but the overall effect is pleasing. The flowerheads make good internal decorations.

The colouring of Hydrangea Aspera is not affected by aluminium or acidity of the soil.

Other Hydrangea species that are closely related include H.Involucrata, H. Strigosa and H.Â Villosa.Â Â H. Sargentiana is a taller more leggy coarse shrub brought from China by E H Wilson with a low growing H. Longipes and H. Galbripes.

For Complete Hydrangeas book click here and for cheap colourant click this link

Hydrangeas available from Thompson & Morgan

See Help to change Hydrangea colour

Gardeners Question Time

November 18, 2015 hortoris

A cheap tip for members of the RHS is to borrow books from their libraries. I am reading the entertaining Techniques and Tips for Gardeners from the BBC Gardeners Question Time Team. A well produced book of over 300 pages contains a wealth of information and ‘nuggetts that rarely find there way into practical books’

Nuggets and Gardeners Tips

Create shady areas for underplanting by puning off the lower stems of shrubs to create a trunk with a head of top growth.
If a tender shrub like Callistemon ‘Bottle Brush’ or Pittosporum is cut down by frost leave it until summer as it may grow back from the base. Once new growth starts you can cut away the dead stems.
Don’t be upset if windbreaks take a hammering during wild winters, that is the job they are supposed to do.
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Alan Titchmarsh Books For Gardeners?

November 17, 2015 hortoris

For less than Â£5 you can buy ‘Container Gardening’ by Alan Titchmarsh from Amazon. Just click on the picture above

Other books in the new series include ‘Gardening in the Shade’, ‘Vegetables and Herbs’, ‘Lawns Paths and Patios’ and ‘Pruning and Training’. All at below a fiver by clicking the link.

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16 Exceptional Gardeners and Seven Christmas Books

November 16, 2015 hortoris

If gardeners are exceptional people then buy them a copy of this book for Christmas. It contains 20 stories and profiles about encounters with gardeners and a day in their life to provide reading matter for dark garden-free evenings.

Amongst those covered are these sixteen:

Roy Roberts Landscape Gardener
Roy Lancaster from Gardener’s Question Time

Tony Schilling Asian Heath Garden at Wakenhirst
Thomas Pakenham Meetings with Remarkable Trees

Geoffrey Dutton the Concrete Gardener
Beth Chatto Essex girl gardener

Howard Donald Waterer
Anthea Gibson ‘The Cotswold Gardener’
Lady Salisbury writer of a Gardener’s Life

Dan Pearson ‘Guardian of Gardeners’
Kim Wilkie ‘Reality is a condition induced by lack of imagination’.
Ronald Blythe Outsiders Gardener Friends.

Lucinda Lambton President of Garden History Society
Richard Mabey of Food for Free

Hugh “Wine Atlas” Johnson
James “Gaia Hypothesis” Lovelock.