Green and Red Compliment your Spring Garden

Green and Red Compliment your Spring Garden

peonie

The two best complimentary colours are Red and Green.  There are many ways this is demonstrated in the spring garden and they will be sure to draw compliments. The Peonies are just opening under a bit of shelter and shade.

rg-no-b

The early Rhododendrons escaped frost damage and the red flower is set off by the texture and green of the healthy leaves.

This flowering Quince gave strong colour before many leaves had opened light green but the surrounding grass had been trimed with neat lines in the lawn and the effect was stunning.

quince

See also Colourful Tips for other complementary colour combinations.

colour-contrast

These lime green leaves are complementary to the Azaleas bright vermilion.

Some of the best art work by Georgia O’Keeffe is her paintings of Red Poppies. I recommend you try growing Oriental Red Poppies the for your Red – Green garden.

See also Colourful Tips for other complementary colour combinations.

A Splash of Floral Yellow sans-narcissus

A Splash of Floral Yellow sans-narcissus

You may see a splash of yellow if the Fawn decides to take a spring dip in the pond. The skunk cabbages are reputed to stink but these Lysichiton americanus are also named swamp lanterns so they flower well near the boggy pond.

The Erythronium bear long, strong stems producing canary yellow flowers that compete with late daffodils and the pink azalea.

Magnolia hybrids  can have spectacular yellow flowers in the familiar magnolia cup shape. Aptly named variety ‘Yellow Bird’ looks like it says on the tin.

‘Hotei’ is a famous yellow Rhododendron that I aspire to grow successfully in my Yorkshire garden – space and chance would be a fine thing.

Some colour schemes should never be seen

Some colour schemes should never be seen

How do you plan a colour scheme when gardening with a wide palette of colour. The answer is to use complimentary colours that are directly opposite on the colour wheel. This give a lie to the old phrase about red and green which is about dress sense rather than gardening nous.

Other colour combinations that work well include yellow and violet or deep purple and for the adventurous blue and orange.

wallpaper tulip

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Why are Everyone’s Weeds Better than Mine

Why are Everyone’s Weeds Better than Mine

What is the collective noun for a group of dandelions?   A drift or adrift in my garden!

With so many potential ‘clocks’ ticking away to dispersal I wonder at the number of flowers on this fine weed. (Dandelion makes a wine but I am not so sure that it is quite so ‘fine’.)

Bindweed

Bindweed can be deceptively attractive except when flowering in my garden. I would call their group noun a ‘knot’ or a pestilence of convolvulous. Heaven forbid that they should become a congregation!

Photogenic & Aromatic Lavender

Photogenic & Aromatic Lavender

Some flowers look best in groups or large swathes. These fields of cultivated Lavender demonstrate the point clearly. Imagine the scent from all these individual stems of flowers a heady experience. For commercial purposes growing in rows makes Lavender easier to mechanically crop and maintain.

Uses of Lavender include: dried-flower production, fresh flower displays,  fragrance, lotions, soap, oils and perfumes, edible flavoring, potpourris relaxation products and bath bags you can even make some pet products but for our purposes garden plants and small ornamental hedges are some of the prime uses.

Other pages with photographs worth viewing

British French and Spanish Lavender

8 Amazing Lavender farms

 

bee lavender

Soil and Healthy Grass

Soil and Healthy Grass

Grass Land, Meadows & Lawns

  • Getting to the grass root of the problem grass is the  largest irrigated crop in the USA.
  • Like other crops grass depends on the health of the soil in which it grows.
  • Moisture and nutrient retention is crucial to keeping your soil in good shape.
  • Clover is good news not bad news at least in moderation. I bit less attractive but a force for good with grass. Nodules on the clover store and deliver nitrogen more effectively than synthetic fertilisers.
  • Home chemical applications tend to be significantly over done compared to agriculture. Less not more is far better.
  • Water wisely in early morning. Evening watering can encourage some disease.
  • Allow clippings to fall back on the grass and rot down to keep the soil in good heart.
  • Higher cutting blades and grass helps prevent weeds and helps retain moisture.

Other Methods for Healthy Grass Lawns

  1. Scarifying – rake out the dead leaves and detritus
  2. Aerating  – spike the soil to allow air in and de-compact the ground
  3. Feeding – nitrogen rich food is the grass’s choice
  4. Top Dressing  – a bit of sand and soil brushed in helps new roots
  5. Moss Control – get rid of moss in spring
  6. Weed control – selective chemical weed killer
  7. Damage Repair – even the best lawns can get damaged – patches reseeding or just turning the edge of a turf around can help
Who Cuts the Grass

Who Cuts the Grass

Woodbank Nursery in Harden W. Yorkshire has an interesting line in old garden equipment and mechanical ephemera. The various items are best seen over afternoon tea in the cafe where they complement the good healthy stock of plants. The exception is this lawnmower ‘recycled’ for the missus to use. The sign says ‘Does your wife cuts the lawn? If the answer is yes, why not spoil her rotten and buy her a ride on mower? You can even treat her again next year by adding some gears.’

Another feature of this nursery come retail destination is the stock of inanimate animals and the very animated ‘Elvis’ the shop parrot.

Every year Woodbank grows over 2 million plants on their 10 acres across an extensive range. Woodbank partners with the parent operation ACW in Bradford which has less space but quick through put sales of annuals, shrubs and trees.

My Spring Actions

My Spring Actions

2019 was off to a great start in Yorkshire; weather-wise at least.

Never knowing how many more springs I will be gardening I resolved to try the new and not to repeat the same mistakes as previous years. Surprisingly this philosophy has delivered several new tips that may be worth sharing.

New Spring Tips

  • Why have I never watered my dry compost before seed sowing. I use commercial compost for starting dahlias and summer bulbs into growth in frost free conditions. This year they have gone into predampened compost and the results are encouraging.
  • The daffodils have been great and I am photographing the garden in sections to see where they excel and where I can add new bulbs for next year.
  • Members of the primula family are also benefiting from the good damp ground that has followed a virtually snow free winter.
  • I can’t compete with the price of a bunch of daffodils from the supermarket so I am not trying. The space is too precious. However gardeners can compete on variety and specials and I have them in a dozen deep plant pots .
  • On miniature varieties of daffodils gardeners can compete handsomely as prolific results and good naturalisation seem to be easy. That is where I am setting my stall out.

Trying the New

  • I chop and change my selection of plants to grow each year. It means I get to select and buy new items that take my fancy. I do try to be loyal to a species for a couple of seasons but I think my auricula love affair is waning.
  • I have already dropped my membership of the Cactus Society and just composted the last specimens.
  • This year I am majoring on cyclamen which may take some years to reach excellence level. So to compliment that I have opted to try some indoor and outdoor Gloxinia.
  • I have returned to seaweed extract and just tried to perk up the lawn with a special watering. I will see how that goes.
Design Tips for a Physic Garden

Design Tips for a Physic Garden

Chelsea Physic garden

The design of the Chesea Physic Garden dates back to 1673 when it replaced market gardens and orchards on the same spot alongside the Thames. Intended to be a physic garden ‘pertaining to things natural as distinct to metaphysical’ it is exceptionally practical rather than being design led.

Design Features With Appeal

  • Many excellent descriptions of plants with their practical or medicinal uses, in my view put it ahead of the RHS show gardens.
  • Rectilinear beds are arranged and labeled in botanic classification.
  • Old walls and old trees give shelter and help create a micro climate but there are also hot houses for exotic tropical plants.
  • Because the garden is not about gardening in a modern sense there are many features that need to be studied to take in the benefit from a visit to the garden. I liked the slate beds for pot plants, the variety of berries and seedheads (see below) and the statuary.

Incorporate Helpful Plants

  • Plan your garden with a good herbal or read up on plants before you select your range of subjects.
  • Consider viewing points and natural aspects of your garden.
  • A few of the plants that profit from being grown together include:
    • Marigolds and roses, aphids are lured naturally by roses, and these feed on the flowers and leaves. By planting marigolds around the roses, they will keep at bay insects.
    • Garlic, when grown in annual and perennial gardens, aids in warding off insects that feed on leaves.
    • Monarda or Bee Balm is not only an herb but also a striking flower, and this plant draws bees, and butterflies to the flower garden to assist with pollination.
    • Dahlias hold off insects and enrich the soil with nitrogen but otherwise are big drinkers and feeders. …

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