GARDENER'S WORD

Apart from dead-heading, weeding, and watering, there is little to do at this time of year.  I am always happier when there is something to occupy me and so I am thinking of taking some lavender cuttings.  I have two plants (lavandula angustifolia) and they are so beautiful and compact that I think it worth while having more.  It would seem that this is a good enough time to do that - see link. http://www.gardenersworld.com/how-to/projects/lavender-cuttings/ Meanwhile, I'll keep on cutting the sweet peas to make them flower even more, and picking the tomatoes which never cease to amaze me.  When I read about others living in warmer parts of the country and all their tomato problems - the disease and the lack of flowers - I wonder what I am doing right!  Something, I guess.  Cosmos, Unwins Special Mix Sweet Peas, and carrot tops! Tumbling Toms I often pick the tomatoes just before they are ripe because there are so many growing, that the ...

Last year I introduced the raspberry 'Polka' to my garden.  I had never grown raspberries before and, having read up on them, expected this year to just have one small crop on the two tall canes that had grown.  The fruit was healthy and fat and juicy and I must have got about two small bowlfuls out of them.  When the canes looked as if they were finished producing fruit, I cut them down to the ground as 7 new, bright and healthy canes had sprung up to take their place - some really thick and strong and already over 6ft tall!  I was amazed to see yesterday that there are flowers on the new canes.  I had thought that the new canes would only produce fruit next year on this year's growth.   Polka Apparently, (without my knowing it), 'Polka' is an award winner.  I found the following website that says so.  Fancy that!  And additional bonus of 'Polka' is that it doesn't have thorns; the stems are smooth and clean. http://www.rhspla...

There's nothing like a couple of rainy days to invigorate plants after a long dry spell.  Tap water just isn't the same.  My lettuce, Webbs Wonderful, are going berserk out there, shooting up.  I've put a few slug pellets down as a precautionery measure (I never use them by the handful, just one or two here and there) to ward off any unwelcome dinner guests although I get very few slug or snail problems in my garden.  Touch wood!  Webbs Wonderful with Solo F1 Hybrid between between the rows   The shady side of the garden has been and is a challenge.  I am growing aquilegia, honeysuckle, astilbe, geraniums, and roses that are said to be shade tolerant - New Dawn, Aloha, and Wild Eve - but it is quite frustrating waiting for the roses to get going.  Even so, they are much larger than they were when I first planted them last year and patience is said to be a virtue...  With luck and sunshine, and rain, they may reach the top of the fence next ye...

Just a few more photos of plants in my garden.  Usually I will grow the regular Bacopa with its pretty little white flower in my hanging baskets.  It is a pretty trailer.  But this year I found another which the man at the nursery said was a bacopa and yet its label described it as Sutera Gulliver white.   Whatever the case, bacopa or not, it is certainly far prettier than the regular bacopa I have had before.   Sutera ' Gulliver ' (a kind of Bacopa - has a much larger flower)  The rose below, Wild Eve, has been planted on the shady side of my garden.  While it is described as tolerating some shade, it is not as vigorous as it might be but the flowers are stunning.  Hopefully, when it reaches nearer to the top of the fence, the trellis, it will get more sunshine to give it that extra vigour. Wild Eve - a David Austin shrub rose Below is a red lettuce which I grow in a small crop.  At the same time, I grew Ro...

While I love to visit the RHS Centre in Harlow Carr, near Harrogate, it never quite gives me that secluded, hideaway feeling that I have when I am in my own garden space.  And it disappoints me that they have so relatively few roses.  To me, the rose is the ultimate flower as it gives so much of itself - it is hardy, withstanding the foulest, cruelest, most miserable of winters; it is so often fragrant, and always beautiful; it can grow tall, or lay low, it can repeat flower or give the most amazing rosehips.  The petals can be used in potpourri or even used to decorate cakes.  What more can you ask of a plant?  An RHS rose - I could not locate the name Arthur Bell - one of my roses.   I highly recommend Arthur Bell.  It flowers prolifically, smells lovely, has rich glossy leaves, and is not prone to disease or pests.  Iceberg Iceberg is always in my garden, wherever I am in the UK.   I have never known a finer, more ge...

As many who know me will know, I love my roses.  Although they haven't yet reached their potential - the climbers and ramblers have a way to go yet to decorate the top of the fence - they are doing well and on their way.  Iceberg climber William Morris - a David Austin rose Princess Alexandra of Kent (darker one) and The Generous Gardener - both David Austin roses Troika - a Hybrid Tea

Everything is coming up roses.  Well, not quite.  Everything is coming up herbs, fruit and vegetables as well.  I feed unashamedly with Miracle Gro and Tomorite.  Last year I applied literally sackfuls of rich compost to my once rocky and impoverished garden, and the expense of that is now being cancelled out by the crops I can pick.  I see very little by way of slugs or insect damage (touching wood here) as I keep a close eye out for them.  Trespassers will be exterminated by either myself or Alfie who is on border control. I am thrilled (that's a sad admission!) that my courgettes are doing well, so far, this year.  Last year I planted Soleil F1 Hybrid and although it made the effort, no fruits were borne.  This year I have grown the same variety from seed and have planted out three - two in a bed and one in a large pot.  So far so good...  The strawberries are still churning out fr...