GARDENER'S WORD

My Japanese maple, Acer palmatum 'Katsura' needs a trim. Last year I turned what was a large shrub, which was using up too much ground space, into a multi-stemmed tree. As my garden is small, around 30ft x 30ft or less, lots of things have to be kept under some kind of control. Of all the gardening equipment I have accumulated over the years, I did not have a pair of gardening shears, except for lawn edging shears, so I was on the lookout for something that would last, which is something I expect from every piece of equipment that I buy, and I chose the  amazing Niwaki Karikomi shears.  As I pulled them out of the box, I could see that these are seriously sharp blades. Even the sound of them, as I opened and closed the blades, gave that satisfactory but alarming 'shing' sound. Niwaki Karikomi shears I'll share photos when I've trimmed my ' Acer palmatum Katsura '. At present it looks like this... Acer palmatum Katsura grown as a multi-stem tree - August ...

I thought that the dahlia, Feline Yvonne, was very similar to Great Silence at a glance when the buds started to open but when in full flower, Feline Yvonne is a vibrant pink with a deeper more purple-pink centre and a dark stem, a bit of an in-your-face show-stopper really, whereas Great Silence is a coral pink with a gold centre and a paler stem, 'quieter', more silent. 🤣 They both achieve a height of about 1 metre, 3ft 3". Dahlia 'Feline Yvonne' Dahlia 'Feline Yvonne' Below - Great Silence Dahlia - Great silence

In the past I have grown Liatris and they have always been a pink variety so this white one caught my eye when I was mooching around a garden centre. The label said its growing habit was 60cm height x 30cm spread. I repotted it into a somewhat larger pot and now it is about 140cm high. I take it that it likes its new home.  Liatris 'Floristan' - August 2025 I have to tell you that Floristan took quite a bashing not long ago when we had very strong winds here high on the Pennines of West Yorkshire but it didn't break and there was no damage at all. The pot is in a position where it couldn't fall over but perhaps other plants and containers also protected it to some degree.  Liatris 'Floristan' taller than expected The label describes it as "Bottle brush spikes of white fluffy flowers standing proud over clumps of narrow linear leaves. Loved by bees and butterflies."  It achieves a "height and spready of 60cm x 30cm - 24" x 12")" and ...

Dahlia 'Great Silence' has been trouble-free and was the first dahlia to flower out of several that I've grown in large terracotta containers this year. While dahlia 'Princess Nadine' doesn't seem to last too long when cut and put in a vase, quickly dropping its petals, Great Silence lasts quite a while, turning more and more yellow as it goes along. Dahlia 'Great Silence' I find it best to keep dead-heading and cutting dahlia flowers for indoor use as it promotes new growth, allows side shoot flowers to form and, if cut ruthlessly from time to time, sacrificing a bud or three, stops it getting leggy, creating an overall stronger plant.  Dahlia flowers do not tend to keep opening once cut so a decision has to be made as whether to wait for all petals to totally unfurl (taking energy from any side shoot flowers) or cut it less fully open.  Dahlia 'Great Silence' ready for a vase Dahlia 'Great Silence' in a vase with a little Princess Nad...

I have noticed that violas are opportunists. By that, I do not mean they are invasive but those little seeds will germinate in the most unlikely places. The only time I pull something out of my garden, including the patio, is when I know it is a nuisance weed.  Over winter, I had a pot that had held self-sown violas and everything had died back, or died.  I moved the shallow pot to another position as I thought, think, there are little spring bulbs in it. There was nothing to be seen above the surface of the soil but those little violas must have put down seeds which had dropped onto the pavement unnoticed.  I think it is so lovely. Where else but a garden can you get something for nothing? There are a few straggly bits of grass lurking among them but if I pull them out, it could dislodge the violas and I'm not risking it.  Self-seeded violas growing between paving slabs The violas are in a shady spot close the house that gets morning sun, under my Lazy Susan garden ...

The experts will tell you that you need to sow sweet pea seeds in late autumn or early spring and they are probably right. Who am I to say differently? However, it was May this year when I got sweet-pea cravings and so I ordered a packet of Suttons seeds on the 11th May, online, and sowed them as soon as I got them into trays.  When the seedlings reached a couple of inches or so height, I stuck them in my West Yorkshire garden around a metal obelisk. By the beginning of August they had reached a height of 5ft (150cm) and now, mid August, they are dripping with buds. It just goes to show that sometimes you can break the rules and get away with it.  If I had failed to get flowers, I had only lost out on the cost of a packet of seeds. Sweet peas picked 16 August 2025 - seeds planted May 2025 Sweet peas sown in May Sweet peas sown in May

This year I chose to have trailing pelargoniums in wall baskets at either side of my front door as usual, as well in plastic hanging baskets, suspended on what was once a bird feeding station, in my back garden.  I found other ways to feed wildlife and so I sawed the bird feeding station down to a lower height and now use it for plants.  Trailing pelargoniums 'Sybil Pink' and 'Sybil Blue' The Sybil variety of trailing pelargoniums are delightful and last year I chose Blue Sybil and Pink Sybil because of the way the flowers are formed. The ones in the above image are taken from cuttings of the ones which grew in baskets by the somewhat sheltered front door (below) and which overwintered there. I just tucked some bubble-wrap around their roots and it worked.  Trailing pelargoniums 'Sybil Pink' and 'Sybil Blue' Truthfully, I have tried to take trailing pelargonium cuttings before without success, even though I was always successful taking non-trailing varie...

I planted Hydrangea paniculata 'White Lady' over a decade ago. It was a small shrub when I bought it, perhaps not even 2ft (60cm) high, and I placed it in a shady north-facing spot against a 5ft (150cm) fence at the bottom of my slightly sloping and small Yorkshire garden. I felt it had a chance as that spot does, as the sun swings around, get a certain amount of sunlight all year round. I didn't feel it had much of a chance, however, when the dustbin men chucked the dustbin lid on top of the young shrub and broke it, ruining the shrub's shape. I soon realised that the best option was to grow the shrub  as a multi-stem tree. Now it has its head in the sun and it's feet in the shade.  Hydrangea paniculata 'White Lady - August 2025 grown as a multi-stemmed tree While Hydrangea paniculata is thought to dislike strong winds, mine gets its fair share as my garden is high on the Pennines where it is subject to somewhat ferocious winds from time to time. It doesn't...

I first planted Phlox paniculata 'Cherry Red' at least ten years ago, 2015, in front of my south facing fence. Over time, the nearby Acer palmatum 'Katsura' slowly grew into a monster. Well, not exactly a monster but it had grown to over 7ft high and easily as wide, and it had thrown everything growing under it and near it into shade in the process.  The phlox, meanwhile, struggled along in the shadow making flowers as best it could and, in truth, I pretty much forgot to move it. Last year, though, I attacked Katsura with my Niwaki pruners and saw, turning it into a multi-stemmed tree rather than an oversized bush, and the phlox took advantage of the light and this year has put on quite a show. I feel quite ashamed that I had let it struggle for so long. lol  It's a rather loud red; how could I have overlooked it?  Phlox paniculata 'Cherry Red' - 07 August 2025 If you want a plant that just gets on with it, without any fuss, you might like to try this reliab...

I was mooching in a huge garden centre when I saw these two types of Verbena bonariensis on display, but it wasn't the flowers, or the long stems, that immediately caught my attention, it was butterflies.  Verbena bonariensis is a butterfly magnet and even in the less than natural surroundings of grassless, treeless, garden centre they had found their way to these plants.   I even thought a butterfly was going to end up going home with me in the car. Below is Verbena bonariensis. There are no butterflies at the time I was taking the photograph, just an insect at the top and I can't tell whether it's a bee, a hoverfly or just your common or garden fly.  Verbena bonariensis The label tells us that Verbena bonariensis flowers from early summer until the first frosts, that it can achieve a height of 5ft (150cm) with a spread of 1'6" (45cm). It likes full sun and well-drained soil. Below is Verbena bonariensis 'Lollipop' a more dwarf variety, and its growth is 6...

I bought some Cosmos 'Dwarf Purple Picotee' seeds a while back.  I am not a great fan of growing things by seed but just now and then I do. I started them off in trays indoors in May and planted them out when they were a decent size. I wanted a type of Cosmos that would not be tall. I once grew some at the front of a border and then were huge, falling over, and they looked so wrongly placed.  Now my dwarf cosmos are in flower and only a couple of feet tall (24" = 60cm) and flowering profusely. I dead-head them daily and as fast as I cut off the dead flowers, new buds take their place. I grow them in tubs as I wasn't sure if slugs would eat the young plants if I planted them in a border. Cosmos 'Dwarf Purple Picotee' Look at all the buds. They really are lovely and, as a bonus, the open flowers attract pollinators. I've planted the plants in tubs in multi-purpose compost, and placed where they get full sun. They've b een flowering quite a while and are s...

Acidanthera murielae is also known as, wait for it, Abyssinian Gladiolus, Sword Lily, Peacock Lily, Gladiolus murielae or callianthus. I bought my acidanthera corms (they are not technically bulbs which have layers like an onion) online a couple of years ago, in 2023, and that first year I planted them in a pot but, although I did get a flower on a tall stem that year, the leaves kept folding and drooping. It was very disappointing. I grew them again in a pot last year, placing the pot in a different and even more sheltered position, and yet the same thing happened with the leaves and that time no flowers. Never one to give in easily, this year I have planted the bulbs in a sunny garden border at the top of my garden's slight slope but somewhat protected by the side of the garden room facing north and away from the wind. Success at last. If at first you don't succeed... Acidanthera aka Abyssinian gladioli I plant the corms when the danger of a hard frost has passed here in West...

I was relaxing and watching a gardening channel on YouTube called Walking Talking Gardeners and suddenly this image of Agapanthus 'Twister' came onto the screen. I immediately wanted one and I ordered one from a seller on Amazon called 'Growon Shrubs'.  Of course, when we order things online, particularly plants, we have a little anxiety as to what state they are going to arrive in. Imagine my surprise when my agapanthus arrived in super-quick time and in perfect condition. It even had a flower in excellent condition on its tall stem! It's taller than my other agapanthuses, 'Summer Love: Blue', and a real eye-catcher.  By the way, the apples in the below image are James Grieve full-size apples growing on a dwarf tree. Many are already ready to eat and detaching from the tree very easily, so a little earlier than usual this year.  RHS -  Growing Agapanthuses Agapanthus 'Twister' boxed Agapanthus 'Twister' unboxed

I recently became enamoured with agapanthuses (agapanthi) which are less toxic than lilies and I find them equally as beautiful. I am growing them in pots to raise them above the soil level of the garden so they do not come into contact with cats which frequently come and sunbathe in my garden. The first two agapanthus that I bought are agapanthus 'Summer Love Blue'. They are perennials, like full sun, flower from May to October, and will require protection in colder months as they are not totally hardy and don't like sub-zero temperatures. I shall pop them, in their pots, into my unheated garden room, protected with fleece, with my fingers crossed that they survive.  I think they will. This variety has strong sturdy stems and beautiful trumpet flowers which I like, so do pollinators.  Agapanthus 'Summer Love: Blue' I have the pots in sunny positions.  Removing the seed pods, which appear very rapidly, will encourage the plants to keep on flowers.  The RHS offers gu...

I had a wonderful 'surprise' when I saw these on display at the RHS shop in Harlow Carr. I liked the Dahlietta Surprise 'Demi' plants so much that I immediately bought four and have them on display in an outside trough under my living room window. They are delightful and those four have nicely filled the entire trough without growing too wide or too tall. Perfect.  The trough gets full afternoon sun right through to sundown. I dead head them every day and the flowers just keep on coming! Take a look.  Dahlietta Surprise 'Demi' The label describes Dahlietta Surprise 'Demi' as a perennial which is 25cm high by 20cm spread (10 x 8 inches). They like full sun or partial shade and a moist but well-drained soil. I have had no problems with them by way of pests or diseases.