Into the Ground

Tags

Ammi visnaga, Beetroot 'Chioggia', Daucus carota 'Black Knight', seed sowing

Seed sowing

I decided to get sowing some seeds directly into the ground the other day. I don’t sow many seeds this way. Experience has taught me that the seeds and seedlings are easy pickings for slugs, snails and mice. Unlike plants in the garden I can’t get up to the allotment as frequently to check how everything is doing so I much prefer to start most of my plants off at home in seed trays, pots and modules, where I can nurture them to a good size before releasing them into the wild to fend for themselves. By this point they are much more able to cope with whatever the allotment might throw at them, whether its pest or weather related.

There are some seeds, however that prefer to be directly sown into the ground. They don’t like having their roots disturbed and it’s just as well really, with a limited amount of space to sow and grow on seeds it’s a bit of a relief that some can go straight into the soil. Of course with direct sowing does come problems. If you sow too early and the soil is still cold they will sulk, well wouldn’t you? Last year we had such a dry spring that lack of water was the problem. Quite a few of my early sown seeds didn’t germinate because I found it difficult to keep the seed drills moist. This isn’t normally a problem you would expect in spring, that’s what April showers are for after all, to provide just the right amount of moisture interspersed with sunny spells providing the warmth to provide the perfect conditions for seeds to germinate. Whether it’s climate change or just a blip in weather patterns we might not be able to rely on these perfect conditions in future.

The ground feels like it is warming up nicely. The old farmers’ way of checking the soil apparently was to sit on it with a bare bottom!! I have to say I didn’t go to these lengths. I don’t want that sort of reputation at the allotment and I find hands do a good enough job. If the soil feels nicely warm and it’s not too wet then it should be perfect to sow. Another good indicator is whether annual weed seeds have started to appear. If the conditions are right for them, your seeds should be fine too.

watering the seed drill first to help germination

The weather here in Wales has been glorious for 2 weeks now and the soil is quite dry so there are a few tactics I’m going to adopt to see if I can keep the soil moist enough for the seeds to germinate. The first task is making sure you’ve prepared the soil well with some organic matter, this helps to retain moisture not just in the initial stages but hopefully throughout the growing season. Then it’s a good idea to water the seed drill before sowing and finally, once you’ve covered over the seeds, mulch the drill with dry compost which helps to retain the moisture under the surface rather than it evaporating away. That’s the theory anyway, hopefully in practice it will work.

Dill flowers growing on the plot last year

The seeds I sowed today were two varieties of beetroot, ‘Boltardy’ and ‘Chioggia’. I had soaked the seeds overnight. I can’t remember where I read this tip but I had much better germination rates doing this last year. I also sowed some dill. I love dill’s feathery foliage chopped into potato salads, in omlettes and in sauces for fish but an extra benefit is the beautiful yellow flower heads make nice fillers in cut flower arrangements.

The other seeds were for my cut flower patch, Ammi visnaga and Daucus carota ‘Black Knight’. Both of these produce umbellifer flower heads which give arrangements an airy feel. I grew Ammi majus last year but visnaga is a chunkier form and ‘Black Knight’ is a cousin of Ammi majus but with crimson-black flowers which looked so unusual in the seed catalogue I just had to give it a go. Certainly Ammi majus was loved by hoverflies last year, so I hoping both these additions to my cut flower patch will benefit insects too.

I’d love to hear whether you started sowing outdoors yet.

Plant of the Moment – Pulsatilla vulgaris ‘Rubra’

Tags

English Nature, Pasque Flower, Plantlife, Pulsatilla vulgaris

Pulsatilla vulgaris 'Rubra'

Spring really is the time for bulbs to fill the garden with colour from the early snowdrops and narcissi through to tulips and alliums, we rely on them to kick start the garden into life. There are however, other plants that shine at this time of year and one of my favourites is Pulsatilla vulgaris ‘Rubra’.

I grow mine in a terracotta bowl shaped pot by my front door and for weeks now I have seen stalks gradually sprout from the crown and flower buds start to swell. The anticipation rises because I know what a beautiful flower it is once open. Finally, at the weekend, this warm sunshine coaxed the flowers to open displaying rich velvety red petals and a bright yellow centre.

Pulsatilla vulgaris 'Rubra'

The foliage is mid green in colour and delicately dissected, with the flowers and stems, in particular, covered in soft downy hairs. The main variety has purplish coloured petals but it’s possible to get a white form, ‘Alba’ and a red shade, ‘Rubra’ which is the one I have.

In the garden Pulsatillas like lots of sun and well drained soil and make perfect plants for alpine gardens and containers. Once planted they don’t like being disturbed but are fairly undemanding plants otherwise. The best way to propagate them is to sow the seed in the green. I haven’t tried this yet but plan to this year.

Beautiful downy Pulsatilla

Also known as the Pasque Flower because it flowers around the time of Easter it surprised me to discover that they are native wildflowers, albeit scarce, here in Britain. It had been recorded at over 120 sites but can now be found at only 19 and of these 19 it is only found in good numbers at 5 sites. In the wild it grows in dry, chalk or limestone grassland found in the Cotswolds, East Anglia, the Chilterns, Lincolnshire and West Yorkshire. It is recognised as a ‘Priority Species’ under the UK’s Biodiversity Plan and organisations such as Natural England are working with landowners to protect their habitats. It’s main threat is from reduced grazing by sheep of grassland, stronger plants takeover and the Pasque Flower can’t compete.

Pulsatilla is the county flower of Cambridgeshire and Hertfordshire which might indicate how much more common it used to be. One of the best places to see them in the wild is Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust’s Barnsley Warren Reserve. A site of Special Scientific Interest, Pasque Flowers are found here, which is the western limit of this species’ range in Europe.

Legend has it that the plants grow on the graves of Viking warriors, with the flowers springing form their blood. They are found on earth works and mounds but this has more to do with this ground being difficult to plough and therefore the soil has remained undisturbed providing the perfect conditions for Pulsatilla vulgaris to grow.

It’s sad that such a beautiful native wildflower is struggling to survive. I posted last autumn about Plantlife’s Wildflower Count Survey that we did last April. It’s not too late to sign up for this year’s survey. We have just had our form through the post and will hopefully get a chance to get out over the Easter weekend. Anyone can join, you don’t have to live in the countryside, you could survey the hedgerow on the way to the allotment. It’s a great way to collect data so that more can be learnt about our native plants and how we can go about protecting them.

For more information about seeing Pasque flowers in the wild visit Escape to the Cotswolds, Hertfordshire Wildlife Trust and Natural England.

To take part in the Wildflower Count Survey visit Plantlife.

Posts, Poles and Pea Netting

Tags

espalier apple tree, Herefordshire, Moreton Wood, National Beanpole Week, Planting Charlotte potatoes

Our chitted potatoes waiting to be planted

Another weekend of glorious weather. This doesn’t feel like spring, it’s more like summer, 21C and tshirts in March isn’t typical for the time of year in these parts so we made the most of it and had a really productive couple of days in the garden and on the plot.

Wellyman put in the posts and wire supports for the new espalier apple tree. These are the sort of jobs that invariably take three times longer than anticipated and before you know it a whole morning has been swallowed up by something that seemed so straightforward. Usually Wellyman discovers the drill has no charge, the drill bit he needs is the one that broke last time and the various screws, bolts, nails required are the wrong size. Not this time though, maybe we’re just getting more adept at this DIY thing but it all went really smoothly, which was just as well because we had an appointment to collect some beanpoles.

Coppiced hazel beanpoles from Moreton Wood in Herefordshire

I posted last autumn about National Beanpole Week and how there has been a resurgence in people managing coppice woodlands and selling the products. National Beanpole Week runs from 21st April to 29th April this year but because we wouldn’t be able to make these dates I had managed to find a woodland in Herefordshire where I could pick some up early. It wasn’t exactly local but it was such a beautiful day and Herefordshire is a lovely county that it wasn’t a chore to drive that little bit further. Moreton Wood is classified as ancient woodland with records going back 400 years but in the 1960s the deciduous, native trees were cleared for conifer plantations. The couple who now manage the woodland are slowly restoring it, removing the conifers and allowing broadleaved, deciduous trees to grow again. The practice of coppicing dates back to the early medieval period but declined from the 19th century. It seems to be making something of a comeback as people realise that coppicing is a great way to produce a fast and reliable source of timber without needing to replant and that it has beneficial effects on the woodland ecosystem. At a time when every company is jumping on the eco-bandwagon this really is a sustainable business. We came away with some great, sturdy posts about 8ft long which will be perfect for their job and they were only 50p each.

Baby pea plants ready for planting

Back at home we carefully carried up to the allotment the chitted potatoes with their fat, stubby shoots and some small pea plants for planting out. The potatoes are Charlottes, a very versatile potato that is excellent as a salad spud or left to grow a bit bigger and can then be roasted, particularly tasty with a little bit of butter and chives chopped on top. Wellyman dug holes for each tuber and I put some compost and a handful of comfrey pellets in the planting hole before placing in the tubers, being careful not to damage the shoots, especially as you backfill.

Then came the pea planting. Is there another piece of gardening kit more annoying than plastic pea netting? It has a life of its own and trying to cut it, making sure you cut in a straight line and don’t go off at an angle leaving you with an oddshaped piece of netting that is no use to anyone is easier said than done. Getting exasperated doesn’t help but that’s also easier said than done. We got there in the end, with sections attached to canes so the newly planted peas have something to scramble up. I think only trying to use fleece to cover your plants on a windy day and discovering a kink in the hosepipe at the opposite end of the plot to where I am, can match pea netting for annoyance.

Forced rhubarb stems

Just before we left I checked the rhubarb I’m forcing and we should be able to pick our first stems and the first produce of the plot this year, in the next week. So everything is taking shape. Exciting times ahead.

For more information on coppicing and finding a wood local to you visit Coppice Products.

Garden Centre Splurge

Tags

Discovery Apple, Espaliered apple, garden pond, mycchorizal fungi, Puddle Plants

Our new apple tree

Last weekend must have been the weekend for impulse buying for the garden. Both Jo at The Good Life and Caro at Urban Veg Patch succumbed to the charms of their local garden centre and they weren’t alone. I only popped in to have a look at climbing plants and came out with 2 pots of cottage pinks, a pond liner and an espaliered apple tree. Oh dear, where did my willpower go?

We had been thinking about a pond and an apple tree for a while but had procrastinated and managed to find plenty of reasons not to buy them; we should be saving up, too many bills to pay, how long are we going to stay in this house, all those sorts of things. Then I read a post at The Garden Smallholder by Karen, about her own pond and it got me thinking all over again. I started eyeing up potential spots, we don’t have much room so it would really depend on whether we could get the right size liner and that they weren’t too expensive. So I mentioned it to Wellyman and he said he was keen too. In the case of the apple, well we had the perfect spot for an espalier but thought we had left it too late to find one.

Scroll forward several days to the garden centre. We headed straight for the aquatic section where there was a liner that looked about the right size. Not ones to be totally impulsive, we took the measurments and decided we’d check first at home that it would fit without looking ridiculous and then maybe pop back on Sunday.

We then found the climbers and I had pretty much decided to go for a Trachelospermum jasminoides to go by our front door when I got distracted by some cottage pinks, which I love. There were really lovely specimens with plenty of cuttings potential and then Wellyman, who had wandered off somewhere reappeared declaring he had found the perfect apple tree and it was a good price. He was right, it was exactly the right size for it’s potential home, a two tiered Discovery apple. There followed much humming and hawing, the purchase of the cottage pinks and a trip home to do said measurements. An hour later we were back at the garden centre handing over the credit card. Ouch!

The pond looking a little bare at the moment

So we’re now the proud owners of a pond and an apple tree. The bank balance has taken a bit of a hit. There are of course all the other costs involved, pond plants, stones for around the edge, plants for around the edge of the pond to give it that, well pondy feel. As for the apple, there are posts and hooks and wire and mycchorizal fungi. We spent another hour or so at the garden centre yesterday buying all that stuff. Even so, I’m sure we’ll get a huge amount of pleasure from both. I’m hoping we’ll attract some frogs, I could do with some help on the slug front and I’m looking forward to the blossom on the apple tree and then eating our own fruit in the autumn. Both will add different elements to the garden and I’ll have to learn how to prune an espalier properly, which is good because I like a new challenge.

Hopefully, with a dry weekend Wellyman should get the posts and wires in place for the apple so we can get rid of the temporary supports and then I need to hit the books to find some plants to put around the pond so it doesn’t look so bare. Although I don’t like makeover, instant gardens I never like the stage of a garden where you’re waiting for everything to fill out and there’s just a bit too much soil on display. It’s for this reason I tend to buy to many plants and then realise that it doesn’t actually take them too long to fill a space. So I will have to be more restrained this time.

This morning I made a small boggy area around the pond, digging out some soil and placing some black liner in the hole. I made sure there were plenty of holes in the liner and added some grit to the bottom, so that the soil doesn’t clog up the holes and then backfilled and planted up some Iris sibirica and a couple of ragged robin plants, both of which like damp soil. Hopefully it won’t be long before we’ve attracted some wildlife.

I’d just like to give a quick mention to Puddle Plants. One of the things that had put me off about establishing our own pond in the past had been the price of pond plants. The typical cost at our local garden centres was £6 a plant but at Puddle Plants they are around £2 to £3 and although there is a delivery charge they still worked out cheaper. They are based in Suffolk and have a great website and from ordering on Monday I had the plants by Thursday, so I would definitely recommend them.

Unsung Garden Heroes

Tags

cut flower, Oriental poppies, vase life

Roses can be hard work

There are some plants that are just a pain to grow, rather like a new born baby they need a high level of input to look after them. In my own garden I’m thinking roses in particular, not only is there the appropriate pruning regime for that particular rose but also the feeding, the deadheading, the watering and that’s before I even mention the list of pests and diseases just waiting to attack them. Then there are plants such as delphiniums and hostas which are mauled by slugs. Stunning magnolias which you wait all year for to flower and then just when they are looking at their best there is a frost, which turns all those petals to brown mush and oriental poppies whose flowers can be destroyed by a heavy shower. I still grow these plants, well apart from the delphiniums there really was no point giving the slugs a slap up meal every spring, because for all the hard work they are glamorous and beautiful. Fortunately though there are some plants out there that just get on and do their thing without any fuss or attention. These are often not the showiest, most dramatic of plants but they are in my opinion the unsung heroes.

Alchemilla mollis

I’m thinking of plants such as Alchemilla mollis. I know a lot of people who think of it as a weed. Yes it does self seed but I’ve found the young plants easy enough to remove. I love its crinkly fresh green foliage as it starts to grow in early spring and once fully unfurled the leaves capture raindrops, where they sit like globules of mercury. The lime green, fading to yellow, flowers are not dramatic but give the garden a zing and contrast well with so many other plants. I love using the flowers in my cut flower arrangements where they have a good vase life and the foliage is a useful filler too. By July the leaves and flowers of alchemilla are starting to look tired but if you cut them back fairly hard, in several weeks you will have plenty of new, fresh green growth and with a mild autumn, a second flush of flowers.

Erigeron or Mexican fleabane

Another favourite of mine is erigeron or Mexican fleabane. It’s a plant I remember from my childhood holidays in Cornwall growing in rocky crevices. These plants always looked a bit scrawny in such poor conditions but grown in richer garden soil it will make larger, greener clumps that are covered in daisy like flowers all summer long. The only care erigeron needs is a cut back in mid spring.

Sedums are a must in any garden. From as early as February their thick, fleshy rosettes of leaves push through, forming clumps as the spring and summer progresses. From July they start to flower in a range of pinks, reds and white and are adored by butterflies, bees and hoverflies. Their flowers fade in mid autumn but as they die and dry out they leave seedheads which if left over winter look beautiful rimed with frost. A quick trim back of these stems in late spring is enough to keep these plants looking good.

Geranium

Geraniums are a large group of plants and they are an excellent easy going addition to any garden, from tiny alpine plants to big and blousy clumps they will tolerate a variety of conditions. Geranium phaeum is an early flowerer but most will bloom from May until July. To get a second flush of  flowers be brave and cut the plant back down to the ground. This may seem extreme but you will be rewarded with fresh leaves and more flowers.

And finally, valerian or centranthus is another unsung hero in my own garden. It too, reminds me of holidays in Cornwall where it can be found growing in fairly inhospitable places, virtually growing in sand and being hit by salt-laden winds. It will grow more lush in garden soil producing good sized clumps with either reddish pink or white flowers, I personally prefer the pink. Leaves start to appear in late February with flowers appearing from late May and given a sunny spot it will flower all summer long. It does benefit form a little deadheading and this helps to restrict it self sowing but is otherwise unfussy.

All these plants are untroubled by pests and diseases, left untouched by slugs and are easily propagated, so are great for filling gardens on a budget. So lets hear it for the unsung heroes of our gardens and be grateful that not all plants are as needy as roses!

I loved to hear about the plants you think deserve a bit more attention.

Book Review – Gardening at Longmeadow by Monty Don

Tags

BBC Gardeners' World, Gardening at Longmeadow, Monty Don, Soil Association

Monty Don, gardener, writer and presenter of the BBC’s Gardeners’ World programme has been gardening the land around his home, on the English/Welsh border, for nearly 20 years now. A year ago his garden, Longmeadow, became the location for the filming of Gardeners’ World and this book takes the reader through a typical gardening year there.

The book starts with an introduction to Longmeadow, with Monty describing how it was a complete blank canvas of farmyard and fields when they first moved there and how he has tried to create a garden that works with nature and sits happily in the landscape. From the beginning of the book you get a real sense that Longmeadow is a very special place to the author. Although viewers of Gardeners’ World see parts of the garden every week, it still felt that the book was giving me an insight into a private space.

The book is then divided into months but it isn’t a book with your typical monthly listings of things to do. Each month focuses on plants that are at their height that month whether they are ornamental or edible, tasks to do and what that month means to Monty and Longmeadow. The plants featured are those growing in his garden and he shares his knowledge and tips and doesn’t mind writing about his mistakes and disasters, which makes any gardener feel much better about their own shortcomings.

I particularly liked the relaxed feel to the book, maybe this is because the author is self-taught and has no hang-ups about how things should be done. A lot of gardening books are written from the perspective of teaching the right way to do things and feel quite strict and a little scary for new gardeners. He manages to combine horticultural knowledge and skill without it feeling like a straightjacket. Monty’s approach is very refreshing and it’s heartening to know that he has created such a successful garden with this attitude. The book is peppered with stories and anecdotes such as the day he went out to buy a few yew plants and came back with 1400 trees! It is this personal element that makes this book so enjoyable.

Monty, currently President of the Soil Association, the main body for organic regulation in Britain, has always been a passionate advocate of organic gardening and working with nature. The sumptuous photographs in the book of kitchen garden abundance and stunningly beautiful flowers could not be better adverts for both policies.

The book covers most aspects of gardening; from the coppice he has established to dry areas and parts that flood, to the comprehensive range of fruit and vegetables, from topiary to his passion for flowers, it’s all there. I liked the added touches of a page where he talks about foraging and how the book finishes with Christmas and what are the best presents for gardeners.

My only criticism is there was a degree of repetition when talking about some plants or tasks if they featured in several months but I think this is inevitable in gardening books. In my opinion, it isn’t a book to turn to for quick reference or if you’re looking for lists of tasks to do but then it wasn’t designed with this in mind and most gardeners have those books already anyway.

I would certainly recommend this book, Monty’s enthusiasm is infectious and you don’t need to watch Gardeners’ World to find this book useful and a good read. For me, the book has captured many of the reasons why people like to blog about their gardens; to share knowledge and a passion with fellow gardeners, to write about seasonal changes and what they’re doing at that moment and to find inspiration from other people’s gardens.

Monty Don’s book Gardening at Longmeadow is available from Amazon and all good bookshops now.

Thanks to Claire at Ebury Press

Calling All Gardeners – The Big Biochar Experiment

Tags

Oxford Biochar Ltd, the Big Biochar Experiment

The Big Biochar Experiment

An article in a magazine caught my eye the other day, scientists were looking for gardeners to take part in an experiment, the Big Biochar Experiment to be precise. I’d heard a bit about biochar but didn’t know much so out of curiosity I took a look at the website. Several days later I now have a bag of biochar soil conditioner in my kitchen waiting to be used on my allotment.

So what is biochar? Well it’s the result of heating plant material, known as biomass, in a closed container with little or no air allowed in. As the plant material is broken down half of the CO2 that the plant absorbed during it’s life is released but crucially the other half is trapped within the remains of the burning process. The potential importance of this is huge. Currently a large amount of waste from agriculture, forestry, saw mills and paper making facilities is burnt or sent to landfill. When this waste decomposes all of the CO2 trapped in the material is released into the atmosphere contributing to the rising levels of CO2 in the atmosphere. To be able to reduce this figure by half would make an enormous difference to the global need to reduce CO2 levels. Unlike other plant material, say that put in compost heaps, the carbon stored in biochar breaks down incredibly slowly, over the course of hundreds and even thousands of years.

However, this is not the only advantage of biochar and this is probably the bit that is of most interest to food producers, whether that’s on an allotment or on a farm. So far, trials have shown that biochar improves the structure of soils, aids the breakdown of pesticides, increases yields and improves root development. Biochar does this because it’s particles have a high surface area. This creates areas in the soil where beneficial fungi and other organisms thrive, it improves the water and nutrient holding capacities of the soil and raises the soil’s pH which is important as most soils gradually become more acid over time.

The use of biochar is not new though. Humans have been creating biochar for millions of years. We know how the ash and charcoal left after forest fires improves the fertility of the soil and in the Amazon early settlers created the highly fertile Terra Preta soils with a slash and burn technique. Despite this knowledge studies into the benefits on European soils are only in their early stages and this is where the Big Biochar Experiment comes in. The team of scientists behind Oxford Biochar Ltd, a not for profit organisation, want to see if biochar can be used effectively in a sustainable way. It is the first major experiment on the use of biochar in gardens and on allotments. As yet the scientists don’t have enough data to assess fully the potential benefits of biochar. And this is where us gardeners can help. To take part all you have to do is register and you will receive your own bag of biochar soil enhancer. You then create a bed 1 metre by 1 metre as a control and then 1 or more 1 metre by 1 metre beds where you incorporate the biochar. The seeds you sow in all the beds must be the same, sown at the same time and the same density. Then as the summer goes on you need to record the germination rates, health of the plants and yields. You then send this data to the scientists where they will collate and study the information. The scientists are still looking for more volunteers for the experiment so if you’re interested go to the Big Biochar Experiment where you’ll find more information about the potential benefits, how to register and what is involved in the experiment.

So now all I have to do is work out where I’m going to put the biochar and then the experiment can begin.

Gardening for Kids – The Campaign for School Gardens

Tags

Alan Titchmarsh, Eden Project, RHS Campaign for School Gardening, RHS National Garden Week, Writhlington School Orchid Project

Alan Titchmarsh encouraging children to garden as part of the RHS Campaign for School Gardens (image courtesy of picselect)

As part of the RHS’s first ever National Garden Week which runs from 16th to 22nd April 2012 they will be launching a Campaign for School Gardening. The RHS want to get as many schools as possible to create their own ‘living classrooms’, where children can learn how to grow plants, understand where the food they eat comes from and build a love for the environment. The RHS will provide tools and course material for teachers illustrating how gardening can fit in with the National Curriculum and there will be teams of local advisers on hand to come along and help get the ‘living classrooms’ up and running.

I loved gardening when I was little. My first real gardening memory is being given a small part of my parents’ garden and spending my pocket money on alpines from my local DIY store. I would spend hours with a trowel digging, weeding and just generally messing about in the soil. I loved it, being outdoors and watching the bees and butterflies landing on the sedums I’d planted. Me and a friend would exchange plants we’d grown and I loved the visits to his dad’s allotment. His dad’s shed and greenhouse, stuffed full of tomatoes, had a mystical quality about them. But then I hit my teens and the combined distractions of schoolwork, boys and music filled my time. Although I did have a guilty secret, Friday nights were always about Gardeners’ World but I knew this wasn’t cool.

There are so many more distractions for children nowadays though, generally involving mobile phones and computers, is it possible to get the next generation interested in gardening?

Well the RHS believes it is and that is why projects like the Campaign for School Gardening are brilliant. There was nothing like this at my schools. My secondary school had had an extension built in the 1980s that included a large lean-to greenhouse and a small patch of land outside it that was meant for growing plants. Great you think, how forward thinking. Well it would have been if someone had actually done something with them. In the 7 years that I was there from the late 80s to the mid 90s the greenhouse was never used, in fact I never even saw anyone go inside and the garden, well it was knee deep in weeds, the sort of growth that wouldn’t have looked out of place on a railway embankment. It breaks my heart to think about this now, this potentially amazing resource that was so neglected.

Fortunately, it seems that things are changing with education understanding the benefits to children of time spent growing plants. So far 15,000 schools have registered with the RHS. However, it does seem that whilst primary schools have embraced the grow your own idea, secondary schools seem a differerent matter. Just as I lost interest in my teens, gardening seems to drift off the radar with post primary education. Maybe if mine had made use of the greenhouse, well who knows. There are schools who are bucking the trend, for instance Batley Girls High School which has an on site garden, allotment, greenhouse and polytunnels and pupils have recently designed a sensory garden for a local nursing home.

There is also the incredibly inspiring Writhlington School near Bath and their orchid growing project. They started out growing native orchids from seed and reintroducing them into the wild but the project expanded so that they are now world famous for their work with growing tropical orchids by micropropagation. Pupils who join the Greenhouse Club in their first year at the school are given responsibility for their own orchids and older students act as consultants to Kew Gardens and the Eden Project. Students have won gold medals at Chelsea and there are opportunities to travel to places such as the Himalaya to carry out actual scientific research. Doesn’t this sound like the most amazing place. My school had the gear but obviously no idea, (can you tell I’m annoyed by this!!). So despite the constraints of the curriculum, projects like these prove it is possible to engage teenagers in horticulture, disappointingly though they do seem few and far between. It would be a shame if gardening was just thought of as the green equivalent to messing about in the sand pit. It isn’t really enough to encourage young kids to have an interest in growing plants if it’s abandoned by schools as they get older. Hopefully, the Campaign for School Gardening will encourage more secondary schools to see the value of horticulture, with a changing climate, plant science and the environment are going to be increasingly important areas where we will need passion, interest and knowledge.

I’d love to here about your early gardening experiences. Do you know of any great projects getting young people involved in horticulture?

More information is available at the Campaign for School Gardening

Buds and Mummified Fruit

Tags

buds opening, crab apple tree, grape hyacinths, pinching out sweet peas, seed sowing

After a week of mild weather the garden feels like it has really shaken off the last vestiges of winter. The snowdrops are no more but have been replaced by the golden glow of daffodils and clumps of primroses. Hellebores are still going strong and they have been joined by pulmonarias and grape hyacinths. But the sight that fills me with most joy is the tiny buds on my crab apple that are starting to unfurl. On Saturday I was doing the washing up and looking out of my kitchen window when I thought the branches looked different, squinting through the glass it looked like little specks of green were appearing. Abandoning my dishes and pans to investigate further I was greeted by this sight.

Crab apple buds

At the start of last week I had the not so pleasant job of removing the mummified fruit that were left on the tree. Last year had been a particularly good year for fruit and the tree had provided blackbirds, starlings, thrushes and redstarts with some vital food through the winter but there are always fruit that they don’t get to.

It’s not essential with a crab apple to remove the mummified fruit, I do it for aesthetic reasons. Not wanting the old wizened fruit to detract from the blossom that will start to appear over the next month. However, with a tree that provides eating apples it is important to remove any old fruit remaining on the tree as these can harbour diseases. I couldn’t get to all of the old fruit, especially those on branches over-hanging the neighbour’s garden but it still looked better for a bit of a tidy up. The smell from the apples was a quite potent, fermenting apple juice aroma. The excitement of what is to come over the next month as tight pink flower buds appear and then unfold to produce whitish pink blossom is building.

Clematis flower buds

Not only this but I discovered the soft, almost furry, flower buds on an early flowering Clematis. My honeysuckle is now covered in leaves and roses are springing into life. In fact, everywhere I look are signs of plants emerging, it’s like being reunited with old friends. I wander around the garden stopping and puzzling over plants appearing. I redesigned a couple of borders in my garden last autumn and I can’t remember where I put certain plants. I was also very kindly given some plants by gentleman from the allotments which I planted up but I couldn’t remember what I’d done with them. I’m really looking forward to seeing how my redesign will work.

Grape hyacinth (Muscari)

The garden isn’t the only place with signs of new life. My cold frame and kitchen window sill have trays and pots of seeds pushing through. I have broad beans waiting to go up to the allotment, sweet peas that I have pinched out the growing tips to make bushier plants and edible peas which are just germinating. There are celeriac seedlings that need pricking out and only a week after sowing I have my first hardy annuals for my cut flower patch. I have a ritual every morning of opening the blind in the kitchen and then checking my seeds. Even though I know it’s not possible for seeds to germinate overnight I will check them the day after sowing. It generally takes between 7 to 14 days for seeds to germinate so I was really surprised to find seeds sown last Tuesday had germinated by Saturday and that I could see my first echium and scabious plants.

Cold Frame

There’s plenty to do, with the busiest time for gardeners upon us. So on that note I’m off to sow some more sweet peas and having read other blogs it sounds like I should introduce some leek seeds to some compost. Happy seed sowing!!!

The Weed Killing Plant

Tags

Chiltern Seeds, Garden Organic, getting rid of weeds, Sarah Raven, Tagetes minuta

Tagetes minuta (image taken from metafro.be)

Gardeners everywhere understand how annoying and frustrating perennial weeds can be. For years people have turned to chemicals to solve the problem but as fewer chemicals are now available and more of us want to grow organically could growing a particular plant, Tagetes minuta, be the answer.

Annual weeds maybe the bain of a gardener’s life, especially in spring when the increasing light levels and warm soil mean they appear all over the place. However, a spot of regular hoeing is all that is needed to keep on top of these weeds.

Perennial weeds are another matter. Some, such as daisies and plantain are easily removed but the discovery of some perennial weeds can strike terror into the heart of a gardener. There is a sinking feeling when you come across ground elder, bindweed and, heaven forbid, Japanese knotweed. Most of us would probably turn to glyphosate, a systemic weedkiller, which means it travels through the leaves, into the main body of the plant, where it is transported through to the roots killing the whole plant. Although glyphosate is deemed to be a fairly safe chemical because it is broken down quickly in the soil, there is talk that it may be banned by Europe in the coming years and I think most of us would ultimately prefer not to use any chemicals.

So could this be where Tagetes minuta comes into it’s own. It’s common name, which I love is ‘stinking roger’ because of the smell given off by it’s leaves. A native of South America it is a half hardy annual which can grow up to 2 metres. It certainly isn’t a looker with tiny nondescript flowers but it’s what is going on in the soil that is important. Tagetes minuta exudes chemicals from its roots which repel weeds such as couch grass, bindweed and ground elder. This is a biological phenomenon called allelopathy, when one organism produces one or more chemicals which influence the growth and ultimately the survival of other organisms.

Tagetes’ ability to cleanse the soil was discovered by a bulb grower in Holland in the 1940s. After the bulb harvest and before he planted his next crop he grew some African marigolds (Tagetes erecta) to sell as cut flowers. He started to notice that land where the marigolds had been growing no longer had problems with eelworms, tiny worms that burrow into bulbs and tubers. Over the next couple of years he continued to clear strips and grow these marigolds, curing his soil of ‘root rot’. He told the local agricultural research team who studied the marigolds and produced a report which became known as ‘The Tagetes Effect’. The Henry Doubleday Research Association (HDRA), now known as Garden Organic, then took up the baton and started their own research to see if there were other members of the Tagetes family that could combat problems such as potato cyst eelworm. Their quest led them to South America where the first potatoes had been grown by pre-Inca civilisations. Land was limited with crops being grown on terraces. There wasn’t the space to rotate their crops and yet they had no eelworms in the soil and this was down to Tagetes minuta which had sacred status amongst these early people.

Working with Swansea University the Henry Doubleday Research Association discovered the 5 important compounds in Tagetes minuta and then a member of HDRA grew some in the hope it would also cure a wireworm problem. It didn’t, but it did clear the soil of ground elder. It seems that the same chemical compounds that deter pests in the soil also interfere with the life cycle of some particularly invasive weeds. Sarah Raven has recently used it to clear a bed of ground elder.

A note of caution however, Tagetes minuta itself is actually considered a weed in over 35 countries, including the USA. It is only a problem though if allowed to set seed which is unlikely if grown in Britain because it flowers late, in September/October. It could be used as a green manure, grown in an area with pests or weed problems and then cut down in autumn with the bushy green foliage being added to the compost heap. Chemicals released from the plant when touched can cause dermatitis so it is advised to wear gloves when handling.

Many of us have used members of the Tagetes family as companion plants for tomatoes to repel aphids but it’s fascinating to discover that plants themselves could hold the key for future ways of controlling pests and diseases.

Seed available from Sarah Raven, Chiltern Seeds and Nicky’s Nursery.

Information taken from The Ecologist Vol 2 No. 3 1972