Jean Vernon retells the story of Johnny Appleseed and encourages a little tree planting Yes you can grow apple trees from the pips inside ripe apple fruits, but if you want a reliable crop of tasty apples it’s not the best way to get started. If you have a large area and want to experiment […]
“Suit your plants to your soil, rather than creating soil to suit your plants.” That’s what Paul Bonine tells me. He’s the co-owner of Xera Plants, in Portland, Oregon, and author of the upcoming Gardening in the Pacific Northwest—A Complete Homeowners Guide. The results of following his advice? We’d all experience less struggle, less work, […]
As many of you may know I live in the wonderfully named village of Cold Aston, up above Bourton on the Water, and it lives up to its name wonderfully well because it’s chilly throughout the year. Many gardeners get my village mixed up with Cold Aston near Bath, the home of Derry Watkin’s Special […]
You need a greenhouse to crop Feijoas though not to grow these as ornamental evergreen shrubs. For these are fairly hardy, tougher than thought. I’ve had a couple surviving outdoors here in Norfolk for twenty plus years which have never fruited. First introduced from S. America in 1898 these are found in Botanic gardens though […]
Now it is getting chilly, terracotta or glazed pots should be wrapped with several layers of ‘bubble wrap’ or hessian and raised from the ground on bricks or pot feet to stop water-logging and reduce the chances of cracking. They can also be over-wintered in a frost-free glasshouse, at the base of a sheltered wall, […]
It’s very tempting to have an empty greenhouse during winter, but there are things you can grow. For many years now I’ve been taking the tomatoes out of one greenhouse, having a quick tidy up and popping winter salads in. It all began when I read that bagged salads might have been washed in diluted […]
The aspen trees have moved from shining beacons on the mountainsides to puddles of gold beneath the trees; greenhouses — retail and residential — are being cleaned out, and pumpkins, turkeys and sugar plum fairies are dancing in shoppers’ heads. The holiday season is upon us. In 1574, Nicolas Monardes, a Spanish man of letters, […]
Jean Vernon uncovers a few easy to grow perennial crops for your garden. Wouldn’t it be wonderful to have a few vegetable plants in the garden that grow year on year and don’t need sowing, planting and constant attention? Well you can. Just like your raspberries and strawberries that get better and better as time […]
It litters our landscapes and pervades our soils, our seas, our atmosphere – and our plots. Tackling gardening’s dependency on plastic requires some radical new thinking. More moons ago than I dare count, I played my part in creating one of the most urgent and pernicious crises now bearing down on the living world. It’s […]
Cape Primrose, or Streptocarpus, is a genus of beautiful flowering plants that contains numerous species, most of which are easily grown in a heated greenhouse. These plants superficially resemble those of the genus Primula but are not related to them. In many ways, the five-petalled Cape Primrose flowers remind me of orchids. Each has somewhat […]
With the encroaching cold there is propagation to be done in unheated greenhouses or cold frames: hawthorns for hedges. Until recently I had a few hawthorn trees along the boundary with my neighbour, but we have chopped them right down to the base. The idea is to encourage them to sprout from the ground to […]
Often your glasshouse or conservatory collection will have a theme be it edible, scented or just all orange flowers. I have had several queries recently on plants typical of when dinosaurs ruled the Earth. An interesting question as if you want actual survivors from that period then the selection is rather limited and of course contains […]
