Category Archives: Abbie’s column

Letter from England

Greetings from a Cornwall fishing village where we are currently in residence in an oh-so-cutsie-pie antique fisherman’s cottage, suitably renovated to bring it up to the level of comfort expected in 2009. The thatched roof has been replaced with slate tiles and actually I think thatching may be a great deal better in photographs than in reality. Not only does thatching have a limited lifespan and require a trained thatcher to replace (probably elderly, meticulous, speaking in a thick regional dialect but charging for the new millenium), it provides a cosy habitat for all manner of insect, rodent and bird life. Mark has even spotted a duck nesting on a thatched roof.

But I digress. We made this trip specifically to look and learn from English summer gardens and we placed a strong emphasis on private gardens of high quality, rather than the better known historic gardens. You will have to wait for another fortnight to get a more detailed analysis of what we have seen but suffice to say that we are abandoning that earlier plan and returning instead to an itinerary heavier on the known historic and estate gardens. We have been a little underwhelmed by the calibre of many of the private gardens that had been recommended to us. That is fine – it allows us to establish benchmarks and comparators – but now we want to see the best of English garden tradition and it appears we will find that in the trust and public gardens.

We have been particularly impressed by the country lanes where, thank goodness, glyphosate is clearly never used and hedgerows are valued. Of course many of our weeds in New Zealand are native to England (think of the Flower Fairy books) so completely at home in the natural environment here. And the lanes are natural wildflower environments. This is not territory for large cars or urban tractors and oft times, even very small cars such as we are driving have to reverse up to allow an equally small car travelling in the opposite direction to gain passage. Once away from the motorways and main arterial routes, the English summer countryside is simply charming. It makes our farming practices at home look very industrial and the green desert we inhabit is not environmentally rich in any way at all. We only get away with a clean green image because of a very small population and areas of considerable natural beauty, not because of any great sensitivity to environmental matters. Mark has long been railing against the District Council and Transit practices of spraying out wide areas of natural growth with weedkiller. It looks really bad and it is really bad practice.

Road verges along a Cornwall lane

Road verges along a Cornwall lane

So we are delighting in the hedgerows which team with insect and bird life and Mark is fast becoming very competent at identifying native birds and butterflies. And we also admire a society which has rediscovered the importance of allowing some of the natural environment to regenerate and where not everything in the countryside is sacrificed to the speedy passage of the internal combustion engine.

The current vegetable garden craze is by no means limited to New Zealand but in a society where dense population means that most people live cheek by jowl with minimal space, the allotment has taken on new importance and status. Allotments are areas of public land which are allocated on request. It appears that the right to allotment space is enshrined somewhere in law here, although the wait time in high demand areas can be up to 40 years. The line up of allotments down the road from our London hosts near High Barnet used to look very tatty and unloved when I first looked at them 18 years ago. Not so today. Now they are high producing areas much loved and tended by their leasees, in this case mostly Italian. It is a sign of the times, alas, that they are also surrounded by high security fencing. We spent a pleasant half hour chatting to Bruno, who was indeed Italian and in memory of his homeland, he had a fairly large number of fig trees, 18 as I recall. He also had every other fruit bush and tree (on dwarfing stock) that he could grow there, along with extensive crops of vegetables. I think he had managed to get down on a double allotment. It was from Bruno that we learned about the difficulty of gardening in competition with the squirrels. He had come down one morning to pick his pear crop, only to be disappointed. From being laden the previous day, there was not a single fruit left. He ferreted around the base of the tree and found a neat stack of pears, each one with tooth marks and damage, stored by the squirrel against winter famine.

Bruno in his London allotment

Bruno in his London allotment

Here in Cornwall, we tracked down the allotments in nearby Gerrans where we chatted to a young German woman who now lives locally and tends her allotment. She told me that Germany also has an allotment system but, being German, they were subject to tight controls prescribing what proportion of land must be devoted to food production, rather than ornamentals, and the standard to which your allotment must be maintained. She much preferred the more relaxed English model. She was watering in her leeks as we chatted. This being the UK, the allotments in Gerrans had what was probably a million pound view – literally. It is part of the wonderful contradiction that is England – an overheated property market with extremes of wealth and historic country cottages that are under-used holiday homes way out of the financial reach of local residents. The local council responds by allocating allotment land and building subsidised affordable housing, as it is called here, on a prime spot of coastal land with an astounding view out to sea. In rural Cornwall, none of these allotments were fenced but clearly a code of courtesy prevails. While being extremely impressed by a crop of peas which eclipsed anything we have ever managed to grow at home, we were sufficiently well mannered to resist the temptation to pick one to eat.

the impressive pea crop in a Cornish allotment at Gerrans

the impressive pea crop in a Cornish allotment at Gerrans

Allotments are different to community gardens. The former are individually rented (about $50 per annum in Gerrans, $100 in London) whereas the latter are managed collectively, also on public land. Keen gardeners tend to like individual allotments, community minded people and do-gooders lean to the latter option. In our very own Waitara, as I recall, the residents in Battiscomb Terrace wanted allotment rights whereas Mayor Pete preferred the more PC community garden approach. But part of the identity of allotments (or indeed community gardens) is that aesthetics do not enter the equation at all. While there may be increasing pressure to keep a tidy, productive allotment and to go organic, it is fine to cobble together a scruffy old shed, plastic water butt, rough paths and piles of accoutrements which may at some point possibly be useful, or not, as the case may be. Frankly it would not appeal at all to the conformist types who wanted Battiscomb Terrace residents to have tidy and preferably matched front fences.

Allotments are not usually aesthetically pleasing.

Allotments are not usually aesthetically pleasing.

Apparently being allocated an allotment is now a triumph worth boasting at dinner parties in Mayfair and even Ma’am is supervising the installation of an organic allotment plot at Buckingham Palace. Admittedly it is facing the wrong way for the sun, part shaded by a mulberry tree, hard up against a hedge and in less than ideal conditions, but it is the thought that counts and garden space is at a premium at The Palace.

In search of summer gardens

Plenty of detailed planning

Plenty of detailed planning

Readers of this blog may not have worked out that most pieces are published first in our regional newspaper, the Taranaki Daily News. After being a garden columnist for over a decade, last Saturday the editor published the equivalent of an abbreviated school report. Extensive readership surveys had given this column the thumbs up and in fact ranked it second only to the TV review. This was attributed to my writing “informed and often devilishly waspish garden pieces” . Try saying that after a glass or two of wine. But I was enchanted. True, the TV reviewer was described as witty and wry, but devilishly waspish has such a wonderfully archaic feel to it. I read on in the hope that other contributors would be described in such terms as, say, fiendishly roguish. Maybe graciously rubenesque or coquettishly impish. But no, I alone have the sting in the tail and a persona fitting of a Regency romance by Georgette Heyer.

But it will not be the editor sitting beside this devilishly waspish woman high above the world somewhere in transit between Tikorangi and London as you read this column. English summer gardens beckon.

Given the sudden upsurge in swine flu, Mark was tempted to grasp at straws and suggest that maybe we would be better staying at home. He is not the world’s most enthusiastic traveller, my Mark. When he worked out the scope of Google street map and individual websites, he ventured the suggestion that we could do a virtual tour without leaving the sofa, experiencing even the driving through London and the countryside in actual time. Was that not why I bought my lap top, he asked. But it is all part of the game and in fact this is a trip we have long hoped to share together.

English gardens are not new to us, but gardens in June are. We have tended to be spring time visitors but spring time gardens are what we can do very well indeed at home. Most of New Zealand, and Taranaki in particular, excels at spring gardens. We have a long spring and in the period between August and November, magnolias, blossom trees, rhododendrons, spring bulbs, spring perennials and early roses fill our gardens with flowers and fragrance. As I say often, in New Zealand it only takes about 10 years to build a very pretty tree and shrub garden. It is what we do. But gardens that peak in December and January and extend through to March are much less common here. So we want to go and look at summer gardening. We know the theories, now we want to see the practices and to see which parts we can apply at home.

Planning a garden visiting trip is certainly an interesting exercise, especially when you narrow your brief. We have done enough to know that while some of the very wealthy, large, historic gardens managed with many staff and a deep public purse are interesting to visit, we learn more from private gardens managed on small budgets but encompassing high skill levels. So while we will do the odd famous garden (Wisley, Hestercomb and maybe Sissinghurst) most of the gardens on our short list are ones many readers will never have heard of.

We have been lucky to be guided in our selection by An Expert who actually visits and reviews all of Britain and many of Europe’s best gardens. He commented that we should not expect too much of some of the Big Name gardens, that standards have lifted a great deal in the past two decades and some of those gardens have not necessarily lifted their game accordingly. Over the years we have heard the odd comment from New Zealanders on pilgrimage to English gardens citing cases where they were a little disappointed, so that all figures. We also learned from our Italian foray a few years ago that we enjoy looking at private gardens and that despite the very best of intentions, when private gardens go into public or shared trust ownership in order to preserve them, the genius and creativity of the original owner disappears over time.

Our brief to Trusted Advisor was that we wanted to see private gardens which combine good plantsmanship and design, have a summer focus and are managed without an army of staff and correspondingly deep pockets. He responded with a short list of 15 to 20 in our designated areas stretching from Norfolk to Cornwall. It takes a bit of planning and juggling because once you are away from the big name gardens which open daily, many of these private gardens are by appointment only or have odd set days and times. And with dear old Telecom here charging an extortionate amount to use our mobile phone in the UK (I just about fell off my chair when I read the rates), I don’t want to be relying on ringing while we are on the move.

In due course I will report back. We expect to see perennial gardening at its best. The English do it so well. Big swathes of flowering clumping plants in a sea of foliage and colour. It disappears away to nothing in winter. We have seen herbaceous borders in England in early spring – there is literally nothing visible at all bar the occasional giant gunnera wrapped up in straw and sacking to keep it alive. Yes the very same gunnera that is on our banned list here as a noxious weed. We have only seen on TV the near miraculous transformation from winter wasteland to summer carpet that is achieved with perennial gardening in this style. We want to assess whether we can achieve a similar effect here without the winter rest period (and without the gunnera). Here we have wind, torrential downpours which can flatten soft growth, rapid plant growth and very long gardening seasons. Our conditions may be less than ideal.

A couple of weeks of non stop garden visiting may not be everyone’s cup of tea but two heads are better than one and we hope to return inspired with new ideas. One thing is for sure though. When you are travelling across the world, it certainly helps to have good advisors who are switched on to what you want to see. We don’t have time to spend looking at very average gardens or queuing for tourist attractions. We are after hard-core gardening and hard-core gardeners.

Why we resigned from the New Zealand Gardens Trust

Latest update, published April 27, 2012, looks at matters related to garden assessment and NZGT. Not, as has been suggested, because we have not “moved on”, but because, fundamentally we still believe in the concept of NZGT. It is just the implementation with which we have issues.

And from May 2009:
We were enthusiastic founder members of the New Zealand Gardens Trust, contributing $2000 to get the scheme underway and promoting it in every way we could. Now we are ex members.

1.      We do not agree with the way the Trust operates. This is an organization which appoints itself, (existing trustees chose new trustees with no input from the membership), meetings are closed, the AGM is held in what amounts to a closed meeting and there is little, if any, consultation with members.

2.      There is a failure to separate the governance role (which should rest with the trustees) from the operation of the Trust. The paid executive officer is also a trustee. The chief assessor is also a trustee, another assessor is the deputy chair of the Trust, a third person was until recently both a trustee and a senior assessor. This affects the ability of the trustees to objectively review Trust activities, including the processes of garden assessment.

3.      Garden assessment is a points based system – get enough points and you too can be rated as nationally significant. Without clear definitions, there are now gardens which carry ratings which describe them as being “significant” when it is not at all clear what is significant about them beyond the fact that they are well presented and tidy.

4.      Garden assessment so far has often been adversarial and lacking accountability, even to garden owners who are paying for it. There are other methods of garden assessment which set standards without alienating participants. We want to see a garden assessment system which nurtures and encourages, rather than burning people off. It was the discourteous and arrogant treatment meted out to the owners of a particular garden which was the final catalyst for our resignation. We no longer wished to be part of an organization which could treat its members so carelessly.

5.      We opposed the concept of Gardens of International Significance from the first moment we heard of it in April 2008. International reputations are earned on the international stage and not awarded to ourselves. This new category was introduced with no consultation of members. The method of selecting the first four allegedly internationally significant gardens lacked robust process and was not even by assessment to meet new criteria. International significance appears to be a Trust response to a top heavy nationally significant class but it is not an appropriate action, in our opinion. In fact, we would describe it as frankly embarrassing. Even worse is the indication on the new NZGT website that provided you can afford the $1125.00 fee, you too can self identify as a potential internationally significant garden and request an assessment. (Note: The pricing structure has apparently been changed recently. For us, it was never about the money in the first instance and this change is still mere tinkering to keep some people happy while the fundamental problems have apparently still not been addressed.) How long before there are so many Gardens of International Significance that we see the Trust needing another category – Gardens of Universal Significance, perhaps?

6.      There appears to be little understanding from the Trust Board of visitor numbers to gardens around the country and even less monitoring of actual benefits derived from membership of the Trust. A bottom line for us is that NZGT endorsement was not delivering up sufficient extra visitors to pay for the annual subscription.

7.      We tabled concerns in writing to the trustees in May last year. We never received a reply. When we resigned, we mentioned those concerns again but all that happened was that we were taken off the website at lightning speed and we received a letter which said nothing of note. Even though we were a founder garden, even though we have actively promoted the Trust, even though we have a reasonably high profile in this country and overseas, not one trustee picked up the phone to talk to us about our resignation.

8.      We still think that the concept of the New Zealand Gardens Trust is a good one but there is too large a gap between the concept and the current reality.

Glyn Church from Woodleigh Gardens comments:
I totally agree with everything you say about NZGT. We resigned from NZGT for the same reasons.

Nicki and Clive Higgie from Paloma Garden comment:
We’re very disappointed NZGT accepted your resignation (horrified there was no communication from them to you!) for we feel any scheme for garden visiting in New Zealand is totally deficient without your garden being included.

We remain members for now, as we’d really like the scheme to work. At present we feel it’s uneconomic for us: we’re not gaining financial benefit from membership but we feel the potential’s there.

With regard to the trust’s failure to separate governance from management, we agree with you. While trustees have so far done a wonderful job, it’s not desirable to put them in that position of performing both governance and operational roles, as trustees and assessors (or CE) at the same time.

The structure of any trust must allow for full member participation, total transparency and accountability.

As for garden assessment, it’s very difficult to award tangible points to intangibles. We feel a workable model’s been put in place and, personally, have few complaints. But at the end of the day, in any system, a points system or whatever, assessors’ personal taste, personal experience (or lack thereof) and even just the garden’s geographical position can have a large influence on results. An example of the last point is that a Japanese garden, even of international standards, should never, in our opinion, be assessed as having international significance in New Zealand .
Regards
Nicki and Clive

Organics, baking soda and cooking oils

Over the counter organics or out of the kitchen cupboard

Over the counter organics or out of the kitchen cupboard

Organics are hot these days. More like the new religion, perhaps, which attracts converts who are often long on passion and conviction but at times distinctly short on logic and reason. This is not to say that there is not a great deal that is good and beneficial about organics. But we do not subscribe to the mantra that just because something is organic it is necessarily superior. A bit of rigour and enquiry never goes astray.

Regular readers will know that we have been advocating moving away from the use of chemical fertilisers and sprays in the home garden situation. The chemical arsenal that many people used routinely in the relatively recent past (the age of the 1960s to the 1990s) should be a cause of some shame in terms of what home gardeners inflicted on the planet, and still do with lawns. Such practices have been substantially tamed by modern advancements with safer chemicals and hugely increased controls on what is available over the counter. Inconvenient this may seem to some, but we regard it as a jolly good thing.

For those who prefer to avoid routine application of chemicals, there are two approaches. One is to try and continue gardening in exactly the same manner but substituting organic sprays to control pests and diseases previously managed with chemicals. The second approach is to take a much broader view (wholistic, the crystal gazers may call it) and to try and select plants which are more resistant to such problems and to manage their growing conditions so that they are less vulnerable. It is this latter approach to gardening which we have been advising as preferable and implementing ourselves (without the crystal gazing). But for those who wish to keep doing things the same way as previously, Tui have just brought out a range of certified organic products – an insecticide, a fungicide and a liquid fertiliser. They kindly sent me samples which had me whooping with delight. I notice that the wine writer for this paper has written about receiving samples and I am sure other writers must see samples but they are a bit lacking in the garden department.

Ours is an establishment which has more respect for science than many. While my own background is a little sparse, not for nothing am I the daughter of one scientist, the mother of another and married to someone who took science to a considerably higher level than I managed. So we tend to be a little analytical.

I looked at the label information on Tui’s Organic Eco-Fungicide. It is potassium bicarbonate. This necessitated a quick Google search followed by an email to scientist daughter to try and unravel the difference between potassium bicarbonate and sodium bicarbonate. The short answer is that the bicarbonated bit is the important part and that the potassium and sodium are generally interchangeable. Some of you will have already deduced what this means – Tui’s eco fungicide is 95% baking soda and the label does not say what the other 5% is. I did not do a price comparison between Tui’s product and the supermarket option. If you are serious, you can do it yourself. Baking soda is a bit of cure-all product and its anti fungal properties have long been acknowledged. The important information to know is that the recommended dosage is a level teaspoon per litre. The only downside is that to be effective, you will likely have to spray considerably more frequently than with the horticultural chemical alternative.

On to Tui’s Organic Eco-Pest to treat insect infestations. It sounds good – for the control of two-spotted mite, aphids, whitefly and scale and for helping control powdery mildew. I tried it out on whitefly which were infesting a container plant and it dealt to them. What is it? Canola oil, mainly. It is just over 85% canola oil in the form of an emulsifiable concentrate. I do not think you can concentrate the canola oil so the concentrated reference must be to the unspecified surfactant which enables the canola oil to be mixed with water. The label claims that Eco-Pest contains three powerful plant oils but the other two must be in very minor traces because they are not mentioned by name.

Purists may question the choice of canola – it is of course the food oil most likely to be the result of some genetic modification (lots of GE work done on rape seed production). As with the Eco-Fungicide, this product works but will need more frequent application than heavier duty non-organic sprays. It is not a magic bullet or a great new find. You can substitute with a home kitchen mix of a light cooking oil (there is no reason why rice bran or soya oil will not work just as well) with a squirt of dish washing detergent. Tui recommend diluting at 5ml per litre (that is about a teaspoon) for insects and 10ml per litre for scale.

Eco-Fert came as a little 100gram pot of concentrated seaweed extract which is mixed with water to make a massive 200 litres of liquid fertiliser. Recommended application is weekly or fortnightly. I haven’t tried this yet because liquid feeding is not part of our regular routine here so I will have to think what to experiment on. Liquid feed is the plant equivalent of human fast food. It does nothing to alter the soil structure but it will give plants an immediate boost. Seaweed has long been recognised as a good all round fertiliser. I can’t recommend a cheap alternative from the kitchen cupboard for this product but logically it sits alongside compost teas and worm farm liquids.

Tui’s products are marked as being registered with BFA Organic. Organic certification is a bit of shaky territory internationally (not all certifying bodies are of equal credibility). I had to Google BFA Organic. I had been guessing British Food Authority or similar, but no. It is Biological Farmers of Australia and I can not comment on credibility beyond noting that some might think that all farming is, by definition, a biological activity.

So Tui’s products are tried and true natural remedies packaged to meet the modern convenience market. There is nothing wrong with that but you are paying for convenience, not for extensive research or exciting new discoveries which are kind to the planet. The interesting aspect is the recognition by Tui of an important market which has emerged and the extent to which organics is becoming mainstream.

Avocados and figs in Taranaki

As I prepared guacamole this week, I realised I have never written about growing avocado trees in Taranaki, despite this fruit being one of our own mainstays. With a lull in the vegetable garden, we are relying on avocado and parsley to give the daily green intake. So herewith the short introduction to growing your own avocados.

1) Avos are frost tender and don’t like the cold so you need to live in a warmer, coastal area to grow them successfully in Taranaki (apologies to all those of you who live inland).

2) Buy a grafted, named variety. While it is easy to grow the seed, it is unlikely that a seedling will fruit satisfactorily, if at all. We have by far the most success with Hass.

3) Avocados are trees. Small trees up to five or six metres but definitely not shrubs or bushes. Give them space to grow and full sun.

4) Drainage is critical. Avocados are very sensitive in the roots and particularly vulnerable to phytopthera. Plant them in a position with brilliant drainage.

5) Be prepared for the fact that some years you will get a very poor harvest, or even no crop at all. The fruit takes around eighteen months to mature to picking stage but is most vulnerable at the time of fruit set when an untimely frost or spell of really bad weather can mean that no fruit is set.

There are brilliant years in between which make up for it when you have avocados for breakfast (a slice of Vogel’s toast spread with a thin layer of marmite and topped with avo), for lunch (sliced over leftovers or served with anything and everything) and for dinner (guacamole or in salads). The tree will pay for itself in one good season. Any surplus fruit, we notice, is gladly received by those around us, especially at this time of the year as the price is rising in the shops and the quality of the fruit is getting better. The oil content of the fruit rises over time and the current fruit was actually set in spring 2007. Be wary of fruit that is picked when immature. We harvest from our two Hass trees from Christmas to August or September. If it were not for the battle with the rats and the waxeyes, we could harvest for even longer.

So the bottom line on avocadoes is that it is well worth growing your own if you have the right position and conditions. Naturally that is predicated on the assumption that you enjoy eating them or giving them away.

There is still an open verdict on figs here. I adore fresh figs and I have never understood why you can buy them on every fruit stall in London but never see them for sale here. It wasn’t until I found some at the roadside stall where I buy my free range eggs that I had even thought of picking them green and letting them ripen off the bush. But of course you must be able to. All those figs I have bought in London can not have been tree ripened. They are not exactly a local crop there and as they become soft and squidgy when ripe, they must be shipped over from warmer climes in a firmer, green state.

I am looking at our Brown Turkey Fig with new eyes. It sets an early crop which reaches full size but the birds always beat me to the harvest. They are quite happy to eat the green fruit. And the second crop fails to mature. Now I am thinking that we need to manage the bush better and it should be manageable.

Most fruiting figs are large deciduous shrubs which clump and sucker. The leaves can be reasonable decorative, especially when they turn golden in autumn but overall they are not aesthetically pleasing plants. If you think about where they grow in the Med and North Africa, you will realize they want maximum warmth and sharp drainage but they don’t need high fertility soils and mollycoddling.

It being a shrub, rather than a tree, I think we should be able to net the fig next year to keep the birds at bay. And it seems to me that we need to actively thin out some of the foliage and the crop of fruit to encourage better ripening and more size to the figs. Added to that, I shall maybe sacrifice my belief in tree ripened fruit and experiment with picking earlier and ripening in the sunroom. Our fig is planted in full sun, up against a dark coloured water tank but you are likely to achieve more success if you have a warm concrete wall close to the sea.

Unlike avocados, you can grow figs easily from cuttings or suckers so you may not have to buy one. Over time, no doubt we will see more selection taking place in this country to choose cultivars better suited to our conditions but let’s face it: mild, humid, wet and fertile Taranaki is never going to emulate Mediterranean conditions so maybe we had better be grateful for any fresh figgy crops. Apparently fresh figs are absolutely divine served with Parma ham and blue cheese (I learned this from National Radio and the morning recipes) but I have not yet had sufficient to warrant laying in the Parma ham. I live in hope.