AN EARLY HARVEST BEGINS

AN EARLY HARVEST BEGINS

The 2017 weather has been unbelievable for gardeners so far. The long dry spring with plenty sun warmed up the soil, then just when we needed some moisture for planting, down came the rain. This was followed by a few dry sunny days. Perfect for planting and sowing, but moisture had just gone down a few inches with dry soil underneath, but worry not, along came another couple of days of torrential rain to make up the deficit. You could not wish for better weather.

Thinning beetroot

So every dry sunny day let us catch up with numerous gardening tasks.

This has been perfect growing weather, so salads such as lettuce, radish, rocket and spring onions matured early and harvesting started at the end of May. Fresh salads picked twenty minutes before they are on the plate could not be more tasty and healthy.

However salads do not last long as they all mature together and after about three weeks they are gone, so successional sowings are made to cover the summer and autumn periods. Fast maturing salads can be intercropped between slower growing crops with wide spacings such as sweet corn and brussels sprouts. Other space becomes available when existing salads are cleared and early potatoes start to get lifted.

Casablanca first early potatoes had the first sample shaws dug up at the end of May. Although this is a salad potato, size was still on the small side but hopefully will improve after another week. The small spuds were delicious and although the crops harvested early lacked in size, the freshness and flavour made it well worth while.

Lettuce Lollo Rosso

Other young seedlings such as carrots, turnip, Swedes, beetroot, mizuna and all the salad successional sowings are in need of thinning, but the warm sunny days made this quite a pleasant task. I usually perform thinning over two operations to allow for any pest damage taking out a few more plants.

Pea Kelvedon Wonder is now three feet tall and full of flowers and a later sowing of Hurst Green Shaft is well through the ground and looking strong. These will soon need stakes, netting or other means to support them.

Currant leaf blister aphid

There is always a feeling of summer has arrived once the first strawberries are ripe for picking. Last year I started towards the end of May, but this year with different varieties my first berries had to wait till the first week in June. Albion my autumn fruiting variety was the first to fruit. Weird !!!

Redcurrants have put on a lot of summer growth so some spur pruning will be done to let the light into the ripening bunches. The tops of most shoots have been infected by the leaf blister aphid, but as these will all get cut back with the summer pruning it will not be a problem.

Tall bearded flag iris are stealing the show for early summer, but some varieties that fail to impress or have weak stems causing them to fall over when it rains, will be discarded and new varieties purchased in autumn.

Iris Dusky Challenger

Iris Jean Price

As well as the iris both bush, shrub and climbing roses are at their best, and it is difficult to decide where our favourite spot is. The large shrub Ispahan, and the climbers Mme Alfred Carriere, Dublin Bay and Gertrude Jekyll are all performing to script. They are very reliable and never let us down.

A small infestation of greenfly and some rose mildew and rust made an appearance so the sprayer came out to keep the bushes healthy.

A new compost heap was started in January and after turning it over twice it is now ready for use for mulching fruit trees and bushes and our courgettes and pumpkins.

Wee jobs to do this week

Planting leeks

If young leeks have put on enough growth and are now about nine inches tall and a fair thickness they can be lifted for transplanting to their permanent positions. I take out a shallow furrow then put deep dibble holes about four to six inches apart along the row. Lift the young leeks and give them a top and tail and drop them into the dibbled holes. Water them in and let them get on with it.

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A LADY GARDENER

A LADY GARDENER

A mature garden that has been well designed with a lot of interest all year round gives a great deal of pleasure and has plenty of plant stories to write about. Although these gardening articles go under my name, the reality is that I am only one half of the team that creates and maintains the garden and allotment. Anna Anderson, the other team member has a huge garden and together we create an ever changing horticultural world that we like to share.

Anna relaxing on the patio

It was through art that we met many years ago when Anna visited my art exhibition in Roseangle Gallery looking for a painting of her home town Alyth. As I had no paintings of her home town I was commissioned to paint the Old Packbridge over the Alyth Burn. I was very impressed by this small town so another twenty paintings covering all seasons were completed for my next exhibition. We soon found that we both had an interest not only in art but also gardening. At that time I needed a

Anna in the summer garden

studio and Anna needed a hand with her large garden so a team was formed. The garden is built on a steep facing south slope. In the early days the garden had been planted with a lot of evergreen ground cover surrounded with tall conifers to help smother weeds. There was a lot of plants we would love to grow if only we had room, so it was sleeves rolled up as we started to dig out all the ground cover plants, but we had to call in professional foresters to remove a dozen huge conifer trees complete with roots. Most of the wood went through their shredder so it ended up on our allotment paths as well as the compost heap.

Garden construction continued with new fences, paths, two patios and terracing, and then areas identified for shady borders, dry borders, sun traps, herbaceous borders and a rose garden. We also

Anna harvesting the pumpkins

allocated space for fruit trees and some vegetables.

Then the interesting phase began as we both sorted out our favourite plants. We both had thoughts on those must have plants, so numerous trips took place to garden centres, nurseries, flower shows at Camperdown and Ingliston as well as further afield to RHS Wisley and Hampton Court Palace. We always took home some new plants or seeds. I started my rose collection of bushes, climbers and shrubs and Anna took a shine to Heucheras. Every time we visited the Dundee Flower Show at Camperdown Park she came away with ever more Heucheras. I was sure she was aiming for status as a national collection.

Luck was on our side when we won the lottery. We got £90 between us, so were able to indulge in a few special plants. I got Rhododendron Horizon Monarch and Anna got the coral barked maple Acer Sango Kaku, but it needed a partner so we also got the white stemmed birch and a golden Robinia frisia. Soon the autumn catalogues came in and Anna went for a flag iris collection and I started our affair with spring bulbs from aconites and snowdrops through daffodils and tulips and now into the summer with oriental lilies. We both fell in love with azaleas after a trip around Glendoick Gardens, so now they are our latest passion.

Anna with rose Gertrude Jekyll

It was our holidays abroad that introduced us to the exotics of figs, grapes, cherries and saskatoons. The latter discovery was a day trip to a pick your own Saskatoon farm in Canada while visiting Anna’s sister. When I realised they were a species of Amelanchier I knew they had every chance of success in Scotland. I later discovered that James Hutton had them growing in a field for forty years. As the garden and allotment provide us with ample produce we have just about become self sufficient in fruit and vegetables and now excellent wine from home grown grapes and other fruit.

Wee jobs to do this week

Spraying the roses

The moist warm weather has been perfect for pests and diseases on numerous plants. Roses have been troubled by mildew, blackspot, rust and greenfly and evergreen rhododendrons and camellias are plagued by scale insects. Up on the allotment the cabbage white butterflies are seeking out the cabbages and cauliflowers and the gooseberry sawfly has been chomping its way through the gooseberry bushes. Slugs and snails attack anything green at ground level so keep vigilant and take preventive action as soon as possible with practical as well as sprays with insecticide and pesticides.

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A WEEK ON THE PLOT

A WEEK ON THE PLOT

Gardeners could not ask for better weather this year. After the mild winter we got a dry spring then summer arrived in April and May, and then just as we were getting a bit worried about dry soil the rains came and watered the plants. My first rose opened up in mid May and it looks like I will be getting a few first early potatoes at the end of May.

Earthing up potatoes

Weeds are now trying to spoil the show, but we had so much dry weather that weed control by hoeing took care of most weeds early on. Pests and diseases are a bit rampant as there was no severe winter weather to hold them back. Slugs and snails are everywhere now the rains have arrived, and greenfly are chomping away at anything green.

Potatoes are growing so fast it is difficult to get time to earth them up and my first early Casa Blanca looks strong enough to allow a picking at the end of May.

Bramble Helen

All my root crops (carrots, turnips, Swedes) have all germinated and been thinned but my parsnips have yet to appear. I know they are always the last to germinate, but patience is being put to the test.

Early pea Kelvedon Wonder is now three feet tall well staked with my willow prunings and protected from pigeons with the old fashioned idea of a couple of lines of black thread.

A later sowing of Hurst Green Shaft is now through the ground and ready for staking.

Dwarf French Beans sown direct into the soil gave me a good

Outdoor grape Regent showing great crop potential

germination so will need thinning out when they are a few inches tall.

Sweet corn has been a bit disappointing this year as the plants have always been very pale, despite extra feeding so now they are in the soil I am hoping for a good recovery as they start to grow.

Courgettes and pumpkins just love this weather, but needed to kept well watered as they have been very thirsty in the hot sun. They both got planted on land that had extra helpings of well rotted compost as they are gross feeders and the compost retains moisture. In past years they have suffered from wind damage in early summer gales but this year has been fine so far.

Cabbage, cauliflower, sprouts and kale planted in early May have all established well, but they all got net protection for pigeons, slug pellets for slugs and snails and collars for rootfly.

Brassicas were always a battlefield for pests and I see plenty cabbage white butterflies trying to seek them out.

Young salads in May

Onions grown from seed sown in early March have also established well as this warm weather really suits them. Leeks are thickening up and will soon be ready to lift and transplant into their final rows.

Lettuce, spring onions and radish have grown very fast and picking started in mid May, but I keep sowing new batches for succession of salads together with some mizuna and rocket.

Strawberries are all swelling up so the rows have all got straw laid to prevent soil splashing and crop potential looks great, though it may be early June before I get my first picking.

Raspberries, red and blackcurrants, saskatoons, brambles and gooseberries are all growing strong and look like crops will be heavy. Gooseberries got attacked by hundreds of sawfly larvae, but an insecticide spray was needed to sort them out.

Outdoor grapes are having a good start with plenty of bunches showing.

Anna clearing up old tulip leaves

Wee jobs to do this week

Clear up withered leaves from spring bulbs as most have now died down assisted by the dry spring. These can all go on the compost heap, but remove any seed pods from bluebells and grape hyacinths as these can be very invasive.

Another timely job is to check over the stems and leaves of rhododendrons and camellias as scale insects have become a new problem with these evergreens. They are climbing up stems just now to reach the new leaves so can easily be seen and crushed or if your bushes are too big there are some insecticides available to control scale insects which cause the sooty mould.

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SUMMER FLOWERS

SUMMER FLOWERS

We have enjoyed a brilliant spring display of flowering bulbs, wallflower, polyanthus and pansies, but as most have now given us their best it is time to make the change over to the summer bedding plants for beds, borders, tubs, pots and hanging baskets. As usual my winter flowering pansies refuse to die down and always seem at their best just when I need to remove them, but with some care they can be replanted into a border where they will continue to flower for a few more weeks.

Summer hanging basket

Any tulips, narcissus, crocus or hyacinths removed from tubs and baskets can be replanted into a spare patch of ground to allow them to die back slowly. Once they are fully dormant they can be lifted for storing somewhere dry and free from mice. The bulbs can be planted in borders in the autumn and left undisturbed to naturalise.

Before planting up pots, tubs and baskets freshen them up with some new compost and some fertiliser. It is ok to retain a fair bit of the old compost but it will be deficient in humus and nutrients, so will benefit by the addition of fresh compost.

Tuberous begonias

We can now plan for the summer displays using whatever we have grown ourselves plus other bedding plants from garden centres which offer us a great variety. We all have our favourites that we continue to grow every year. I have my own range of geraniums that give me a dazzling red, a lovely pink, a pure white and a salmon with a strong zonal leaf effect. I retain these varieties by taking cuttings at the end of summer and growing them over winter on a windowsill. My tuberous begonias were purchased about twenty years ago and although the tubers can get to a fair size I just chop them up as long as each bit has two to three shoots. They never let me down.

It is good to have a range of bright dazzling colours, but I also like some white petunias and  as well as Nemesia and trailing Lobelia.

Impatiens to cool down the display. For a splash of yellow there are many good varieties of dwarf French marigolds, but keep the African Marigolds for larger tubs and borders as they can grow a fair size. Tubs and hanging baskets also need edge plants to hang down the sides so I use Impatiens

Summer bedding plants

Where ever I have a hanging basket beside entrance door ways I add in some dark blue Petunias as they have a wonderful perfume, and I usually place a bright red geranium in the middle for impact.

Fuchsias are also perfect in baskets as we can appreciate the flowers best when they are at eye level. Two varieties that really stand out are Swingtime a red and white double and Southern Belle a white with deep purple petals. Another perfect hanging basket plant is the trailing tuberous begonias available in a wide range of colours. It is a good idea to plant up the hanging baskets well ahead of time and give them some greenhouse protection (if you can find space) to get them established, and make sure the wall support brackets are strong enough to take the weight as a large hanging basket that has just been watered can be quite heavy.

When planting up beds, borders and other spare places in need of brightening up we can extend the range with Antirrhinums, Salvias and African Marigolds and for a soothing drift of deep blue Lobelia Crystal Palace is just perfect.

Dot plants were once essential to add height and character, but times change so we don’t see so many Caster Oil plants, Brugmansias (Angels trumpets) or Kochias or even Zea maize, though you could substitute it with a few sweet corn plants.

Wee jobs to do this week

 

Sweet corn freshly planted

Sweet corn sown at the end of March was potted up and grown in the greenhouse to make a strong plants which were ready to plant out towards the end of May. I choose land that has been well manured or composted and as the ground has been lying vacant there has been just enough time to grow a fast acting green manure to improve soil structure before it gets dug in a fortnight before the sweet corn needs the space. Space the plants just over a foot apart in a square block. This assists pollination in summer as these plants are wind pollinated.

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