A Blaze of Colour

 A BLAZE OF COLOUR    

There is just enough warmth and sunshine, in between showers, to bring the best out of the flowers.

Although everything has its season, and some may be short lived, if you grow a wide range of plants, there is always some part of the garden looking fantastic just about all year round. At this time of year we are spoilt for choice. The Shasta daisies have been allowed to spread over a few square metres as they are excellent ground cover. They started off a few years ago as a small box of six plants, but soon multiplied in our alluvial soil. They have now finished flowering but the show continues with the Shirley poppies sown adjacent. They really respond to the warmth of sunshine when it appears for a few hours every three to four days. Still, with an ample supply of rainfall in between, we no longer need to bother getting the garden hose out.

Summer flowers everywhere

 

The hanging baskets are a blaze of colour with petunias, nemesia, geraniums, Impatiens and lobelia, and tubs and pots have a similar mixture but in different colours.

The main flower bed of Nonstop tuberous begonias just seems to get better each day.

Roses have had their first main flush and are now getting ready for the second flush, but mildew keeps having a go at them. However my huge climbing rose Mme Alfred Carrier continues into her second flush with numerous large white scented blooms. It grows up a trellis fence but I try to keep its height down to about twelve feet, though I know it wants to grow at least twice that height.

If you have a large spare sunny spot and something for it to hang on to this rose will reward you immensely. It may get a wee bit of blackspot, but never too severe.

Gladioli are now in full bloom on my allotment giving it some welcome splash of colour as well as providing ample cut flower for the house. Sweet peas from the allotment add both colour and scent for the house.

The time has come for Anemone Honorine Jobert to take centre stage as the clumps and display get bigger each year.  It really is very eye catching and a favourite for sun, semi shade or even shade and is very reliable and easy to grow.

Fruit

Save Now

My gooseberries survived the hard winter, spring gales, early summer thunderstorms, a plague of sawfly caterpillars and the heavy crop was monitored daily with a wee bit of sampling to see how sweet the fruit was before I picked them. Then I noticed the crop slowly disappear over a few days before I could pick the ripe ones. City Road Allotments have a resident family of foxes only ever seen by those few hardy souls who can always be found at dawn when the sun rises. I know of no other pest who would devour my gooseberries before they are fully ripe. They could not reach the lower ones because of the thorns, but did manage to eat half of the berries still on the bush. I thought foxes ate chickens, not gooseberries, and why can’t they have a go at the pigeons while they perch on the cabbages having a picnic.

However although they were very partial to Invicta, a large golden sweet juicy berry, quite delicious I recall from last year, even though the bush is thick with vicious thorns, they did not bother my other red gooseberry on trial for disease resistance. It is a mildew resistant thornless type so easy to harvest, but apparently not tasty enough for foxes. Scientists at James Hutton should look at this one again for flavour.

Autumn raspberries are late this year, and only just started to crop. Berries are not very sweet as they need more sunshine to increase sugar content. Summer raspberries that have finished fruiting can be pruned any time now by removing the old fruiting canes but leaving this years canes which will fruit next year.

Strawberries that have finished fruiting can be tidied up. Cut off the old leaves down to the top of the crown, and remove them together with any straw used to protect the fruit from soil splashing. Only allow the strawberry crop to fruit for three years, and then replace it with new runners saved from the old rows, or buy in new plants during winter.

The strawberry net has been removed to cover the blueberry patch as birds love these just as much as saskatoons which are now finished. Blueberries are now colouring up just nicely, but the crop is not as heavy as last year as the spring gales done them no favour at all.

The compost heap will be getting a fair bit of material as the summer harvest is well under way, so help it to rot down by giving it at least one turning. This is one dirty, unpleasant and hard task so a wee bit of muttering and swearing is permissible and does help the breakdown process to work faster.

Bramble Helen has now started to crop providing fruit for compote, jam and the freezer. So far the fox has not noticed these.

Vegetables

It is very hard to stay one step ahead of nature. The wet years have allowed clubroot to become a major problem with brassicas. We can no longer get Calomel dust and as the spores remain active for up to twelve years, the normal four year rotation has little affect. We can lime the ground ahead of planting, even dust some more into the planting holes and grow the plants in pots during the early stages. This gives a bigger more robust plant a good chance to fight off any attack.

I lost most of my spring planted cauliflower All Year Round to clubroot, so I was determined to give my summer crop a better chance. They all got potted up and regular feeding so I was quite proud of my two rows looking so strong after planting. Nets protected them from pigeons, and I don’t think the fox likes caulis. A week later I was horrified to find half of them wilting. Digging a few of them up, it was not clubroot, but the cabbage rootfly maggots.

We try hard but nature wins in the end.

Next year we must seriously look at pest and disease resistant varieties, though that often means at the expense of flavour.

End

Summer has Arrived

SUMMER HAS ARRIVED    

The summer must be here. The sun is shining, not too many clouds, great weather for killing weeds, but it is too hot to work. This is the time to relax on the patio with an ice cold lager and lime as the lilies, now in full bloom waft over the garden. To keep cool while still working the land, many gardeners get into their shorts and give their fair skinned legs a wee airing, but you do not want to see the photos.

Garden problems are beginning to disappear. Weeds are under control, pests have been wiped out, and diseases, mainly mildew, sprayed with a rose fungicide which worked.

Weather on the garden

Now is a good time to assess the damage on those plants that suffered from the hard winter, spring gales and early summer thunderstorms.

Outdoor hardy fuchsias are now growing strongly and are in full bloom.

Cistus shrubs are only just alive though they have been flowering, but there is now no re-growth of buds near the centre, so after a tidy up pruning, they will be monitored to see how they recover. They are not yet off the replacement list.

Cordyline had reached a height of about twelve feet but was wiped out right back to ground level. Previous experience has shown me that they do recover, so I was very pleased to see some new shoots push up from below the ground. They will recover.

Broom, Cytisus praecox, was so badly damaged in the gales it had to be removed.

My mature Eucalyptus has lost half of its foliage and the canopy looks thin, but there is a lot of new young shoots to replace them. They can grow quite rapidly in warm moist conditions.

Courgettes and pumpkins are still on the sick list, after the tops got separated from the roots in the gales, but seem to be trying to make a recovery. Fingers crossed.

Tomatoes have suffered from cold temperatures, cloudy skies and damp weather. Flowers bloom then fall off, foliage has blight, which then gets botrytis. A lot of leaves have had to be removed, weakening the plants, which were prey to an attack of greenfly. This is not their year.

Nature always has a reason to throw up the unexpected. I have no idea why my Hellebores (Christmas rose) have decided to come into flower again. It should be semi dormant as it builds up its strength for its peak flowering period in winter, but now it is trying to compete with the annual Shirley poppies. These were sown in spring from seed saved from last years display.

Summer flowers

 

The tubs, pots and hanging baskets have now all recovered from the gales and after a fair bit of watering and feeding are looking fantastic. I have a hanging basket just outside each door planted with geraniums, lobelia, impatiens and the deep blue petunias which provide a strong scent when you are close to them.

Tuberous begonias are in full bloom in a large bed at the front of the house. They have never looked better. They are in good soil and get plenty of sun beside a south facing wall.

Fruit

Maincrop strawberries are now finished, but the perpetual variety, Malling Opal has now started and should continue to fruit till the autumn.

Apple and pear grafts are growing very strongly, especially, pear Beurre Hardy and The Christie, both of which seem to be forming fruit buds along the base of long shoots. If we get a long warm dry autumn these shoots will ripen up and I may get a few fruit of these new varieties in 2012.

Fig bushes suffered a lot of die back in the winter and a lot of young fruit buds were killed, so this year’s crop will be a bit meager, but it has made a lot of growth that could ripen up in autumn for a bumper year in 2012, hopefully.

Allotment

Sowing summer salads has continued, with lettuce, radish, and golden ball turnip whenever some spare ground becomes available.

Spring cabbage April was sown in pots as club root risk is too high for an outdoor sowing in a seed bed. They germinated very quickly and will soon be potted up into large cellular trays.

Cauliflower All Year Round was planted out for an autumn crop. These were potted up to give them a better chance against clubroot.

Aberdeen Art Fair

The garden and allotment have kept me occupied during the day with planting, sowing, harvesting and preparing produce for the freezer and wine making, but evenings have seen me back at the easel preparing the last of my new paintings for display at the Aberdeen Arts Fair which runs from Saturday 13^th August to Sunday 14^th August 2011 at the Music Hall in Union Street.

As well as bold flowers on large box canvases, I will also show some of my latest figure studies including a portrait of Lady Gaga.

End

Back to the Land

 BACK TO THE LAND   

Allotment life was supposed to be about living the dream. A place for quiet recreation, fresh air, sunshine, an abundance of fresh fruit and vegetables, then after a wee bit of horticultural exercise and graft, we relax on the patio by our sheds enjoying the scent from the flower border while we have a wee refreshment.

There has not been a lot of leisure time on the land this year. The season has not been in our favour, at least not in the north east of Scotland. The summer did try to appear on more than a couple of occasions, but was rapidly followed by cool and wet conditions.

Those plants of a more tender nature, beans, courgettes, pumpkins, sweet corn and Cape gooseberries have not had a chance.

However, our native weeds have not been deterred and hoeing just seemed to transplant them rather than eradicate them. Still, we plod on as there is always a job to do and hope that sometime soon the sun will return and plant growth will be back to normal. 

Vegetables

Onions are looking really strong this year. The ground had a lot of compost dug in and had been green manured with an early mustard crop. The onions were sown at home on a windowsill in cellular trays then hardened off in my cold greenhouse. The plants germinated in groups of one to four plants per cell, then each cell clump was planted out six to nine inches apart. This close spacing has not held back the onion size. The wet season has caused a few plants to suffer white rot, but these diseased plants were removed as soon as they appeared.

Beetroot, lettuce, radish and spring onions have all grown well and continue to crop with repeated sowings.

Sweet corn is very poor with only half the plants putting up a flowering spike.

Pumpkins and courgettes have been in a state of shock for weeks, though the French beans have now decided to grow.

Cabbage, cauliflower, sprouts and kale have been very mixed. I lost most of the first two through some very serious clubroot fungus, but the others seem to resist it and are putting on excellent growth. Turnips and Swedes are also growing very well in the wet season.

Broad beans have now been harvested, but I am trying another sowing to see if I can catch a late crop. I am also cutting the old plants down to a few inches of ground level to see if they will regrow and give me another crop. Sometimes you get lucky.

Fruit

Red currants are now in the demijohn, and black currants in the freezer. Some will be for jam, some for compote and some for wine. The bushes can now be pruned. Red currants get side shoots shortened by a third to encourage spurs on the main shoots and blackcurrants get one third to a quarter of older fruited wood removed. You can usually find a strong one year old shoot that you leave as it will produce the best fruit next year.

Bramble Helen is now in full cropping as is the gooseberries and saskatoons. They are all bearing heavy crops and do not seem to be affected by this years weather. It is the beginning of the Saskatoon pie season, though there is plenty for eating fresh off the bush, jam, compote and wine.

Flowers

This is a time for planning ahead for the next spring flowering display. Wallflower seedlings are now ready for transplanting into rows a foot apart so they can grow on and make a bigger plant for flower beds in October. They get dibbled in at four inch spacings. If you want really good plants you have to grow your own from seed as garden centres will only supply smaller plants in boxes.

However pansies, polyanthus, primroses, myosotis, daisies and Iceland poppies can either be home grown or bought from local garden centres as the plants are usually smaller and easily produced.

Pests, diseases and weed control

The weather affects these just as much as us. Caterpillars have had a great time and greenflies and blackflies had a slow start but are now at epidemic levels. You can only go so far with picking these off. However there are still some chemicals available that will do the job without harming the environment.

Mildew is now a big problem as the chemicals available to the amateur gardener are very weak and continual wet weather means the sprays get washed off before they get a chance to work.

Weed control is at the same stage. Glyphosate is available, quite environmentally friendly and an excellent herbicide, but needs at least two to three days of dry weather to work effectively.

The formulation available to the amateur gardener is about a quarter of the strength of the commercial product used by farmers, growers and local authorities.

Allotment Open Day

The City Road Allotments are having an open day to let the public see our plots.

Refreshments are available and there will be many plants for sale, fresh vegetables, home baking, jams and tablet. Open on Sunday 7^th August 2011 from 10. 30am to 2.30pm

End

Focus on soft fruit

FOCUS ON SOFT FRUIT  

The soils and climate around Tayside and Angus are perfect for growing a wide range of soft fruit.

We have specialised in raspberry and strawberry growing for local and national markets for generations and now blackcurrants, brambles and blueberries are grown on a large scale.

The James Hutton Institute, previously known as the Scottish Crops Research Institute has been studying soft fruit for a long time. Initially the emphasis was on commercial growing methods, pest and disease control and breeding new varieties suited to our location. Research now continues on a global scale and includes potatoes, and cereals and research into improving the health benefits of edible plants, integrated pest and disease management rather than total control with chemicals as in the past, and working with the environment especially with weather pattern changes brought on by global warming. Scientists from all over the world come to Dundee to carry out research.

Research will always require a commercial application to attract funding, so new varieties and growing techniques are aimed at growers and farmers, but there is usually a spin off for the amateur gardener who likes to keep up to date. Unfortunately, however for the amateur gardener, most of the new varieties of soft fruit are bred to be successful under polythene tunnels as this type of production is demanded of the growers from their main clients, the supermarkets. Be aware of this when trying out new varieties that you wish to grow in the open without protection, as they may be a bit prone to botrytis, especially if we are in for a spell of wet summers.

The Scottish diet gets a fairly bad press, but we now have knowledge of all the best foods we should be eating, and as healthy living becomes more fashionable and demand for allotment grows maybe in time we can reverse this reputation.

Modern soft fruit is now being bred for flavour, scent, and increased antioxidant values as well as resistance to the major pests and diseases.

New blackcurrant varieties are being bred for a high vitamin C content.

Now I wonder if it is possible to retain these healthy attributes in a blackcurrant fruit wine.

That way I can still enjoy a wee tipple in the knowledge that it really is doing me good.

Strawberries

Elsanta is still hard to beat for a mid season strawberry, but Honeoye is earlier. Mae is even earlier still and if you put a low polythene tunnel over them in mid March you will gain another fortnight.

I continue with the late varieties of Symphony and Florence. The fruit is large, firm with a great flavour, but Florence can be a bit too dark in colour.

Raspberries

Glen Ample is one of the best main crop varieties, but can suffer from phytophthora root rot which is now becoming a real menace. Autumn Bliss will fruit from mid summer till the frosts. It has large fruit of an excellent flavour and is resistant to root rots. Work is continuing at James Hutton Institute to breed new raspberry varieties with sufficient vigour to resist phytophthora root rots.

Blackcurrants and Gooseberries

Ben Conan is my favourite, though Ben Lomond is very popular. Both have large fruit with excellent flavour, produce heavy yields and are very high in vitamin C.

Ben Conan does not grow too tall, so is very suited to gardens and allotments with limited space.
Big Ben is said to have huge berries, but I have not tried it yet.

Research work continues at Invergowrie into producing a red and a yellow gooseberry with resistance to mildew and also with thornless stems to ease picking.

Blackberries

Helen is very early bramble. The fruit a great flavour with very small seeds so is suitable for jam as well as eating fresh. I tried Loch Ness but found it suffered a lot of botrytis in our wet summers, though commercially under tunnels it is one of the best.

Blueberries

Bluecrop is very popular with large fruit, but they will still need netting from birds and will only grow in an acid soil.

Saskatoons and Chokeberries

Both still at the novelty stage, but very easy to grow with heavy crops of black fruits very high in anti-oxidants. Aronia Viking is the most popular variety of Chokeberry.

Saskatoons crop in July and can be eaten fresh, added to yoghurts, baked for pies, scones, oaties, sauces, jam and compot and makes a delicious wine if there is any spare.

Chokeberry is used in a similar way except that it is a wee bit too astringent for eating fresh, but its high vitamin C content makes it a must have for the health conscious gardeners.

End