Before you start to plant up your asbestos pond, leave it filled with water for about 7-10 days so that any impurities can be leached out. Then empty the water out of the pond and begin planting. There are a number of water plants suitablefor a garden pond – just how many you use will depend on the size of your pond. Read the rest of this entry »

While there are some excellent pre-formed and long-lasting fibreglass and fiberglass and cement pools available — some even have built-in ledges — they tend to be fairly costly. Another disadvantage is that packing the ground beneath them to marry precisely with their bumps and hollows can be quite a chore. Read the rest of this entry »

• Recycle household water: siphon bath or shower water from the bath out of the bathroom window with a hose or attach a hose to the bathroom’s outlet drain. Use the rinsing water from your washing machine and water from a defrosted freezer — but don’t use water containing detergents (such as washing-up water) or water from a swimming pool which usually contains too much chlorine for plants.
• When choosing plants for your garden, concentrate on drought-resistant species.
• Put plants that need regular watering in beds near the house or near a water source.
• Make shallow wells around plants so that no water will be wasted.
• Never water in the heat of the day.
• Water near the roots of plants, don’t spray them indiscriminately.
• Install water butts to c ollect rainwater for future use on the garden.

  

A successful landscape needs a garden style which appeals to you, and this is often linked to the house design. It can also be influenced by the kind of plants you like, or by your garden site and its climate.

Garden styles

There is a variety of garden styles, from formal to cottage garden, each with its own atmosphere and character. A predominantly natural or wild garden might look best in the country, or, alternatively, it could turn a town garden into a green oasis and bird sanctuary. A Mediterranean courtyard style would suit a small garden or echo Spanish-style architecture. You may like a formal garden for its symmetry, or an oriental garden for its serenity. Read the rest of this entry »

Freeze green beans whole to prevent sogginess. Blanch in boiling water for three minutes, cool in ice water, and blot dry before freezing.

Chop or slice onions and green pepper and freeze raw. Toss into cooked dishes straight from the freezer.

To quick-freeze berries, pour them, unwashed if possible, or well-drained, on a cookie sheet and pop into the freezer. When frozen, spoon into small plastic bags or containers and return to freezer. Read the rest of this entry »

The temperature in a root cellar is always a compromise. It’s never equal in all parts of the cellar. Most vegetables never get the perfect temperature.

The temperature near the ceiling of many root cellars can sometimes be 10° F. or so higher than near the floor. This variance creates temperature zones in the root cellar. Your vegetables will keep better if you understand the temperature zones of your root cellar and store crops accordingly. Read the rest of this entry »

I blanch it with its own leaves

A thriving row of cauliflower is a spectacular sight in the vegetable garden, but few people think they can have great success with it. I think it’s as easy to grow as any cabbage family crop. Cauliflower is less tolerant to hot weather than its relatives, though, so it’s important to set your plants out very early or plan on a fall crop. If the heads mature in the heat, they’re apt to have a bitter taste or go by very quickly.

For your first crop, set out some plants 3 or 4 weeks before the average date of the last spring frost. Pinch off a couple of the lower leaves.

As cauliflower heads get to be 4 to 5 inches across, they should be blanched by preventing sunlight from reaching the heads. Read the rest of this entry »

Chard has a lot going for it. You can plant it as soon as you can work your garden in the spring, and it will provide tasty, nutritious greens for months. Through cold weather or hot, it won’t get bitter, tough, or strong as long as you keep it harvested.

With wide rows you can get basket after basket of chard to can or freeze for the winter. To me, it’s the perfect green for a wintertime meal. It tastes good, it’s nutritious, and it’s a lot cheaper than store-bought greens. Read the rest of this entry »

Pull your storage onions when the plants are dead. The tops will lose their green color, turn brown, and start to wither. That’s the time they should be harvested. Don’t let them stay in the ground once they are dead.

A warm, sunny day is ideal for pulling onions. Leave them bottom side up in the garden for 2 or 3 days until they are dry.

Keep roots away from the ground. The drying kills the roots—they look like little brittle wires. When thoroughly dry, they’ll break off easily with a swipe of your hand. Read the rest of this entry »

Inadequate soil preparation before planting or sowing is a major cause of horticultural disappointment. Digging and the application of fertilizers and bulky organic materials are usually necessary to ensure that the soil is suited to the plants or crops that you want to grow. Drainage may also be required.

Four fertilizers that supply all the major foods.

There are certain fertilizers that supply all three of the principal foods required by plants: nitrogen for leaf and stem growth; phosphorus for good root growth; potassium (potash), which helps to form and ripen flowers, fruits and seeds.

• Blood, fish and bone Slowly releases nitrogen, phosphorus and potash; use before sowing or planting, or around established plants.
• Fishmeal Dig in before planting or sowing in spring. Read the rest of this entry »

Vegetative propagation involves raising plants from cuttings and by methods like layering and division.

• Division Used mainly for hardy perennials (herbaceous plants) but also for other clump-forming plants (for example, many alpines). The method is to split a complete clump into a number of smaller pieces, complete with roots and top growth or buds. Do this while plants are dormant, in autumn or early spring. Usually the centre portion of a clump is discarded, as it’s the oldest part and declining in vigour. The young vigorous outer parts are retained for replanting. With most herbaceous plants, division for replanting should be of a size which fits into the palm of your hand. Before dividing a clump shake off most of the soil from around the roots. You can split large tough clumps with an axe. The two divisions can be split further in the same way. Read the rest of this entry »

Success with this method depends upon providing the right conditions. Warmth and humidity are essential for good results in every case.

• Alpines Take small cuttings as soon as ready in spring. Best rooted in greenhouse.
• Chrysanthemum Outdoor and greenhouse kinds. Remove 5cm/2in-long cuttings from as close as possible to crown of plant. Root in greenhouse.
• Dahlia Start tubers into growth in heated greenhouse early in year. Take 8cm/3in-long cuttings from the tubers and root in warmth and humidity.
• Delphinium Remove 8cm/3in-long shoots from as close as possible to crown of plant in spring. Root in greenhouse. Read the rest of this entry »

Three pruning methods for roses

Pruning roses will not reward you with more flowers nextyear. However, it will control shape and maintain health. Wild (species) roses and hybrid shrub roses need no pruning — just the removal of dead wood.

• Bush types Large-flowered (hybrid tea) and cluster-flowered (floribunda) roses are pruned annually in early spring. Remove all weak growth and reduce remaining strong stems to 15-20cm/6-8in above ground level. Cut to outward-facing buds. Make sure centre of each bush is free from growth: shape bush like a vase.
• ClimbersAllow a framework of permanent stems which are trained to their supports. From these stems side shoots grow, which produce the flowers. To prune, cut back old side shoots to within one or two buds of their base in early spring. Tips of main stems can also be cut back, if becoming too tall. Read the rest of this entry »

Garden pools can look rather bleak unless you grace them with water plants. These should certainly include some waterlilies, with large, rounded, floating leaves which help to shade the water and exotic-looking blooms, mostly bowl-shaped, in summer and autumn.

Water plants are best planted during late spring or early summer. Most will be happy in ordinary fibrous garden soil in purpose-made planting baskets, but first you must line each basket with clean, coarse sacking. Before immersing in the pool, spread a layer of coarse gravel over the soil to prevent it from floating off and to prevent disturbance by fish. Baskets 25-30cm/10-12in square are suitable for most vigorous plants, but small versions, 20cm/8in square, are better for pygmy waterlilies and less invasive plants. Read the rest of this entry »

The most common problem with lawns is discoloured turf. Mainly this is caused by some adverse cultural condition such as drought, waterlogging, faulty feeding or poor mowing. However, there are pests and diseases that can disfigure, weaken or even kill large areas of turf, so you should always investigate discoloured areas early and apply control measures, if needed, as soon as possible.

Three pests found in lawns

These are the most common, and most troublesome, pests that are likely to invade your lawn. Read the rest of this entry »

Climbing roses will grow in tubs. Choose climbers rather than ramblers, as climbers grow more circumspectly and are less prone to mildew and other problems. The list is endless, but I would not like to be without ‘Zephyrine Drouhin’, despite her tendency to mildew, ‘Handel’, which is cream with rosy pink edges and has handsome bronze foliage, or ‘Maigold’, which is double yellow and beautifully scented. Some roses will flourish only on south walls while others are happy in a west or east aspect and others will even tolerate a north wall. Then there are those that are scented and those that are not, those that have one magnificent flowering and then call it a day and others that flower less prolifically but throughout the summer. Read the rest of this entry »

Verbena is an old-fashioned cottage garden plant that is making something of a comeback. It is really a perennial but is best treated as an annual; the new hybrids have dense heads of pink, white and purple flowers that still retain their scent. Take out the growing shoots to encourage bushiness and dead-head regularly. Verbena is usually sold in boxes of mixed colours and these mixtures are particularly attractive. It reaches a height of up to 10 inches.

Gazania is another perennial most commonly grown as an annual. G. x hybrida at 9 inches has dark green foliage with a grey underside; the daisy flowers are in the yellow, orange, bronze range though you can also have some deep pinks. They like full sun. Read the rest of this entry »

Alyssum is always associated with lobelia—usually planted alternately along suburban front paths and all right, I suppose, if you like that sort of thing. Once available only in white, it can now be found in pinks and purples that have more charm. Ageratum, too, now comes in some really deep shades of lilac and blue, which makes it more appealing for the front of the box. Again, pack it in tightly.

Dianthus, the annual, is increasingly produced for window boxes and also for hanging baskets. Most varieties flower in flushes, three or four times during the season rather than continuously, so it is a good idea to plant a second basket three weeks later in the hope that when the flush in the first one is over you can quickly replace it with the second just coming into its best. Read the rest of this entry »

Kitchen

The next most popular room in the house for growing plants is the kitchen. Since it is a working area in common use it is natural that the room should be at a comfortable temperature and the steam created by cooking provides a good supply of humidity. However where gas is installed for cooking, as with heating, there may be trouble from the fumes. Unfortunately, because it is a’ working area, space is often limited in the kitchen but a room divider in a combined kitchen/dining room can be turned into a real and interesting feature of the room with a little indoor gardening. Here orchids can be used successfully with other plants to great advantage. Read the rest of this entry »

These roses are remarkable for producing clusters of blooms, and flowering freely and continuously on hardy bushes. Although Floribundas are planted particularly for their colour display in the garden, the clustered stems can also be cut for informal flower arrangements.

The shape of the flowers may besingle (five-petalled), semi-double (two to three layers of petals), star-shaped (firm petals reflexing from a pointed bud) or cup- shaped (numerous petals from a dense, quartered centre). The forerunners of this group of roses were known as Polyantha roses and the next generations resulting from cross- pollination became known as Polyantha Hybrids. In the 1950s, well- known American rose breeder Gene Boerner coined the catchy name ‘Floribunda’ for promotion purposes, and it was soon adopted worldwide. Read the rest of this entry »