Early Summer in the Garden

EARLY SUMMER IN THE GARDEN

Recent warm, dry weather has been great for weed control but watering some recently planted crops and flowers has been essential. Watering is best done in late evening if time permits.

Now is the time to potter around the garden as the hard work of preparation is complete, and planting done but numerous other small tasks seek attention in between relaxing on the sun lounger when its too hot to work, but of course with thoughts of planning the next few tasks.

The Flower Garden

Most Rhododendrons and Azaleas have flowered so remove the old seed heads to conserve energy for growth.

I have an excellent drift of delphiniums grown from seed obtained from the specialists Blackmore and Langdon in Bath. These are quite vigorous so need good staking and tying in

I grow both decorative and spray chrysanthemums on my allotment, but this year I am trying the sprays at the end of my herbaceous border to add colour in late summer when most of the other plants have finished. These sprays will get the tops removed twice to make sure they are well branched and hopefully dont need staking but I'll keep an open mind on that.

Iceland poppies have been outstanding yet again so I will save seed for sowing in a week or so to give me plants for planting in autumn or next spring.

Recently sown wallflower seeds has now germinated but will get transplanted later into rows for growing on.

Roses this year have never been better. Vigour is strong and pest and disease so far not been a problem. The climbers Madame Alfred Carrier, Etoile de Holland, Dublin Bay, Gertrude Jekyll and Morning Jewel have all been terrific, and the bush roses are now all in full flower. Very hard to pick a favourite.

Gertrude Jekyll is a pink highly scented old English shrub rose but can be grown as a climber as it has enough vigour and given the the right pruning for covering a wall or fence. I am also using shrub rose Graham Thomas as a climber to replace my Golden Showers, once one of the best yellow climbers, but after three wet years it got wiped out by black spot.

The Fruit Garden

The strawberry patch has been strawed to keep soil from splashing on the fruit during wet weather. Not been any of that for a wee while, so the fruit has been fantastic with hardly any rots. I have been very slow to get the nets on, but for some reason there is no damage from birds. Maybe they dont like my early variety Mae.

The first fruits were picked from my new perpetual variety Malling Opal. As with the previous one I grew, Flamenco, the fruit may not be as shapely as summer fruiting Honeoye or Elsanta but the flavour is excellent.

My thornless bramble Helen trained on the east side of my allotment shed has been a picture while in full bloom, but now the young shoots growing from the base (next years crops) need careful tying in as they are very brittle. This variety is very early fruiting in August but has great flavour and very small seeds so is excellent for jams.

Check over apple trees and remove any primary infections, ie. young shoots that have been infected by overwintering mildew spores. The young growths are stunted and totally covered in mildew ready to spread to the rest of the tree. Remove these immediately you see them.

My pear tree is a family type with two varieties grafted onto the same tree.

As is normal the more vigorous one (Comice) dominates and the weaker one (Conference) which gets overwhelmed. Comice is a terrific pear if scab was not a problem, but after three very wet years scab has taken a hold and virtually wiped out the Comice. Conference is less prone to scab but not a great pear in Dundee. I must graft some decent varieties onto this tree next April and cut out the Comice.

The Carse of Gowrie has a history of fruit growing and in the past top fruit predominated but now it is mainly soft fruit. There is a renewed interest in its heritage and there are still many of the old varieties to be found. Hopefully I will locate a good pear able to tolerate scab and do my wee bit to preserve a good old type.

The cold winter seems to have wiped out a lot of pollinating insects so although my Victoria plum tree was quite late in flowering there were no insects around to pollinate it. I even have a Berberis darwinnii planted at its feet to attract bees who just love it and it flowers at the same time as my plum. It is usually very successful in attracting pollinating bees, but this year I only saw two large bees. They must have been very efficient as I now have a fantastic potential plum crop.

The Allotment

Watering has been the main task this week keeping my courgettes, pumpkins, Swiss chard, lettuce and sweet corn growing through the dry spell.

I utilised the two failed rows of parsnips with a sowing of lettuce and radish, though giving the successful four parsnip seedlings every protection. If any greenfly wanders anywhere near them they are in deep trouble.

Mangetout sugar peas needed some support, so netting on a framework of posts and rails usually keeps them tidy and easy to pick.

My brassica rows of summer cabbage Golden Acre, winter savoy Traviata and my curly kale are all looking good. None have needed watering. Netting from pigeons seems to have worked, though even those unprotected have been left alone, (for now)

Could be that on an allotment site of over sixty plots there is ample food so damage is not too severe.

However I keep checking them for cabbage butterfly caterpillers and just pick these off as they appear.

You must also do the same on the gooseberries as sawfly caterpillers can multiply and devastate the bushes very quickly.

My Cape gooseberries (Physalis edulis) planted three weeks ago have been very slow to establish, though usually they are quite vigorous by late summer. I have a few more in pots in the greenhouse just in case we get another cool wet summer.

The Cold Greenhouse

Tomatoes continue to grow with constant watering and feeding and removal of sideshoots.

Grapes, Black Hamburg and my red seedless variety Flame require continual summer pruning of removal of shoots at two leaves after the fruiting bunch then one leaf after that.

This allows ample leaf cover to grow a good crop but not too much foliage otherwise mildew and botrytis could take hold. Keep plenty of ventilation at all times and leave the door open on any hot days.

Check for vine weevil beetles late evening and early mornings when they can be seen feeding and dispose of them before they lay hundreds of eggs that emerge as maggots doing untold damage.

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The Garden Beckons

As the season warms up, the garden has never shown so much potential. The long hard winter appears to have reduced the amount of overwintering pests and diseases, and now plants are showing a lot of promise for good crops and plenty flowers.

The Flower Garden

Summer bedding plants have now been planted out in borders, tubs and hanging baskets.

However my winter show of pansies in hanging baskets and tubs are still very colourful, so I let them finish their show grouped together on the patio beside the new summer tubs.

I rely on geraniums, and tuberous begonias for my main display, supplemented with other summer bedding plants.

I also plant out patches of spray chrysanthemums, and gladioli with sweet peas trained up some fence lines.

Roses seem to be healthier than ever this year. There is little signs of greenfly, mildew or blackspot. The last three very wet years really allowed diseases to flourish so I removed all roses than were not strong enough to fight off fungus attacks. So out went many bush and climbing roses to be replaced by stronger and more disease resisting types.

A heavy infestation of greenfly disappeared when a passing swarm of ladybirds spotted them. If only it was always that easy.

I replaced one climbing rose with a shrub rose Gertrude Jekyll then treated it as a climber. It just loves this spot on a west facing wall on the patio providing a mass of deep pink flowers with the old English rose scent wafting over the patio. Now this is summer.

Another border is ablaze with scented flag iris and oriental poppies. My garden may be my labour of love and main hobby, but my income comes from the world of art. Flowers give me inspiration to paint and the Iris just had to go onto a canvas together with some spectacular Iceland poppies both in my garden around the studio as well as on my allotment in City Road.

These new paintings on large canvases can be seen on my website on my Art Exhibition page.

The Fruit Garden

I have been a fruit lover since childhood having been weaned on the berry fields around Dundee since about nine years old, so growing raspberries and strawberries was essential to a normal way of life, but not forgetting rhubarb, previously so common in poor working class family gardens but now almost elevated to super food status. I have always loved it raw with or without a dip in the sugar bowl, or as crumble or stewed for dessert.

A short spell during my horticultural training years at our local Scottish Crops Research Institute in the sixties introduced me to a wide variety of fruit previously unknown.

We had the museum collection of apple trees from all over the world looking for a variety suitable for eastern Scotland. I also remember harvesting the first crops of Blueberries in 1967 totally unknown in the UK but now widely grown everywhere.

However, now we have global warming, my research background encourages experiments with outdoor grapes, peaches, figs and now saskatoons.

I have started picking the first of my strawberries from an early variety called Mae grown under a low polythene tunnel. These will continue until my other varieties take over including Honeoye then the late summer variety Symphony.

I am also trying a perpetual variety called Malling Opal which I hope will fruit till the end of October in the open.

Raspberry growing was always very easy in the north east of Scotland and SCRI bred an very heavy cropping and flavoursome raspberry called Glen Ample.

Then along came a root rot fungus Phytophthora. My row of Glen Ample was wiped out. Research is now under way to find a variety that can resist or at least tolerate the diseases. Fortunately the variety Autumn Bliss has not been affected by root rot so I still get raspberries from August till October.

I have replaced my Glen Ample with Cascade Delight, a new variety bred at Washington State University reputed to be fairly tolerant of root rot disease.

Time will tell.

The Allotment

The allotment of today is a place to indulge in the delights of growing whatever you want, whether vegetables, fruit, flowers or just create a garden place to relax in. Sheds with patios, and seating areas are common place, but to reach the stage of being able to wind down and relax, a wee bit of work does not go amiss. Once the crops are in and all the weeds are taken care of, (a major task) the site takes on a social function.

However do not ignore the benefits of fresh air, outdoor environment, exercise and the value of fresh vegetables, fruit and flowers.

In between socialising and weeding, my first crops of lettuce, radish, rhubarb and strawberries have all received a picking. Greenfly not controlled by ladybirds infested my blackcurrants and gooseberries, so I picked off all the young infected shoots. This will also help to push plant vigour into fruiting rather than growth.

By the middle of June my allotment is virtually all planted up.

Although most vegetables are giving good growth, my parsnips have failed. Only got four plants from a whole packet of seeds. They had better be very big as they need to last from November to April.

My ornamental border full of Iceland poppies always needs dead heading before they take over the whole allotment site and I get evicted, but what a fantastic display they give.

The Cold Greenhouse

My tomato main crop Alicante and Sweet One Million cherry tomatoes growing directly in growbags continue to need removal of sideshoots as I grow them as cordons. I am now feeding them a high potash feed at every second watering.

I also grow Black Hamburg Grapes, as well as Flame, a red seedless variety which fruits in August and does not need any fruit thinning. I have planted a new white seedless type known as Perlette but it will not fruit till next year at least.

Now the garden is sorted out I had better get a brush in my hand and get back to the easel.

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