This week 3 Nov 2006

  • If you are planting hostas, try laying a circle of sand, sawdust or crushed egg shells around each plant. Slimy slugs and snails don’t like crawling over gritty material so it delays their forays for fresh foliage.
  • Slug bait is not pleasant material for the birds or for dogs. If you don’t like using it, you can try cheap bran flakes instead. Spread it liberally around plants which are getting attacked. Slugs and snails appear to find it irresistible and they can’t stop eating it. It doesn’t kill them but they lie there in an over stuffed and comatose state and the birds will pick them up in the morning and not be poisoned.
  • Early flowering narcissus can be trimmed or mown now. Apparently as long as they have had 65 days of growth, you can trim the leaves off. This gem came from a visiting commercial grower. Cutting off the leaves and laying mulch deters the dreaded narcissi fly which is starting to hatch now. These nasties lay their eggs in the crown and the larvae hatch and eat out the bulbs.
  • As far as we can tell, spring has been exceptionally cold and late this year and climatically this weekend is the equivalent of Labour Weekend so it is still all go for planting out in the vegetable garden. If you failed to plant out your corn last weekend as instructed, you can take some pride in getting it right and getting on to it this weekend. Of course it is not that you missed the recommended time. You knew that this was a particularly cold season. But be prepared for it to warm up quickly now.
  • The vegetable garden rakeover is really important at this time of the season. Mark is determinedly grabbing quiet time to rake the vegetable garden as weed seeds are determinedly germinating after the recent rain. Remember the creed: “one year’s seeding, seven years weeding”. Raking now minimises the amount of hoeing needed later.
  • If you are tempted to buy trees and shrubs in this week of garden visiting and plant buying, plant them as soon as possible. Summer may come soon (we hope). Alternatively, heel them in to your vegetable garden or similar well cultivated soil for autumn planting in to their permanent spot.

This week 27 Oct 2006

  • If you have not got your own garden open to the public, then forget about staying at home this weekend and get out and gather ideas and enjoy those gardens that are open.
  • Alternatively, if you have got over the shock and disappointment of Labour Weekend’s weather, continue all the planting out in the vegetable garden which was meant to be done a week ago.
  • Pumpkins can be started on a mound comprised of layers of soil and lawn clippings. The decomposing grass generates heat which speeds up germination and initial growth considerably. Don’t make the heap too big or you may cook the seeds. A metre wide by 60cm high is about the right size.
  • Start deadheading rhododendrons as they finish flowering. This is important to stop the plant putting its energies into setting seed instead of new growth and next year’s flower buds.
  • Grape and tomato plants are very susceptible to hormone sprays at this time of the year, so be very careful if you are still using these types of sprays on your lawn.
  • If you want to grow watermelons and rock melons, this is really your last opportunity to start off seeds. They should have been started earlier but you may manage to force them under cover for planting out in six weeks time.
  • If you want seed from your clivias, you will get far more if you hand pollinate now. Find flowers on two different plants that stand out as good and use a child’s paintbrush to transfer the pollen from one flower to another on a different plant. They don’t self pollinate readily so you need more than one clone to be effective. Clivias are an extraordinarily useful plant for harsh, dry shade but must be frostfree.

In praise of vulgar flower power

With the excess of open gardens and garden events this weekend, we thought of putting up a poster: “Caution. Endangered species. Garden Visitor.”

Some of us remember the heydays of the late 1980s and early 90s when garden visiting ranked very high as a preferred leisure activity. While other garden festivals throughout the country have flowed but mostly ebbed in the time since, our annual Rhododendron and Garden Festival has managed to hold on and to gain a pre-eminent position as a premier garden event despite the overall decline in visitor numbers.
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This week 20 Oct 2006

  • If you have box hedges surrounding garden, root prune them when you are trimming them. In other words cut along the garden perimeter a small way out from the hedge with a sharp spade. Buxus have big matted root systems which will reach in to the garden and compete with other plants. But they are also hardy so will take root pruning.
  • Dead heading annuals and perennials greatly extends their flowering. The plant’s instinct is to set seed to ensure its perpetuity so if you prevent it setting seed, it keeps putting up flowers to try again.
  • Clematis are on the move and need something to climb up. One cheap option is bamboo teepees to prevent them choosing their own host and risking strangulation.
  • Check for any infestation of mealie bugs, particularly on clematis and grapevines and any plants under cover. It may be necessary to resort to an insecticide spray to prevent them getting out of control. Mealie bugs are a white aphid and you can see infestations as clusters of white threads and webs. Confidor appears to be the current recommended insecticide for the home gardener with Conqueror Oil added at summer strength.
  • Mulch ornamental flower beds now to retain moisture and suppress weeds.
  • Labour Weekend is the traditional magic date for many activities in the vegetable garden. If you follow this time honoured ritual you will have no spare hours this weekend but readers in cold, inland areas may want to delay another couple of weeks. It is time for the first direct sowings of corn. Plants of tomatoes, cucumbers, courgettes, pumpkin, melons if you have your plants all ready – these can all be planted into the garden now. Keep successional sowings of peas going before it gets too hot. Main crop potatoes are planted now and even kumara plants if your runners are prepared. Get carrots in now if you haven’t planted them yet.
  • We have been enjoying the mesclun salad mix sown into a seed tray at the end of August. Kept in a glasshouse, we started cutting it after thirty days. It is a clean crop, tasty and it keeps growing if you cut it with scissors. Even if you don’t grow other vegetables, mesclun mix is worth a try and may actually save you money if you buy it from the bins at supermarket. It is a great way of bridging the salad gap in early spring but can be grown any time. Misome, a Japanese green, is a similar tasty leafy veg ready in 30 days and edible raw or lightly cooked. Kings Seeds sell both.

This week 13 Oct 2006

  • Resist the temptation to be too ruthless cleaning up after spring bulbs which have finished flowering. They rely on keeping their foliage as long as possible to build up strength for next year’s display. It is best to leave the foliage until it turns brown.
  • If you have bulbs which are charming but threaten to seed everywhere (attractive weeds, really) it pays to deadhead them into a bucket.
  • Clipping box hedges as soon as they have made their fresh growth is the best way to keep the hedge dense and compact.
  • Camellia hedges are putting on their first growth now so it is the time to clip them.
  • Feed roses.
  • It is still too cold to direct sow corn, melons, cucurbits and kumara in to the garden but tomatoes can be planted out now in mild areas.
  • Keep raking the soil in the vegetable garden to stay on top of the germinating weeds. Think of it like vacuum cleaning – best done frequently.
  • Continue with succession sowing of brassicas, lettuces, peas etc. Mark advises protecting early lettuces from pesky sparrows which he wishes had been left in their Northern Hemisphere home.