COMPANION PLANTING

                                                          COMPANION PLANTING

I first became aware of the benefits of companion planting in early apprenticeship times. As an

apprentice gardener we learned to make the best of spring flower displays as all wallflowers,

daisies, polyanthus, myosotis and pansies always got an underplanting of tulip bulbs.

Doronicums with Tulip Negrita (purple) and Abba (red)

Different heights of tulips were important as you needed the taller Darwin hybrids to accompany the taller wallflower, but the smaller pansies and myosotis and other ground hugging bedding got the dwarf double tulips. In summer the spring flowering bedding plants got replaced with summer flowering bedding plants all in flower together, and flower beds tended to be grouped together in well

manicured lawns. In spring our tutor Walter Gilmore arranged a trip to St. Andrews Botanic

Gardens.

Geraniums and Californian poppies

They had tall forsythia shrubs covered in a mass of golden yellow flowers and all

underplanted with the fosteriana tulip, Red Emperor, also known as Mme lefebre which was also in full bloom. These lessons stayed with me and I soon began to see many amateur and professional gardeners with great colourful gardens but very few had grouped plants together with the same flowering time. There may have had very impressive plants in full bloom but all at different parts of the garden. I realised the value of grouping plants with the same flowering time together to create maximum impact. Another lesson at bulb planting time was to plant daffodils and tulips in deep tubs with one layer below the other to maximise impact of flowers. I have now applied these ideas with a whole range of plants.

Senecio, Delosperma, Erigeron and Cistus flower together

The layer style of companion planting is great with bulbs. I have a bed

devoted to Oriental Lilies planted quite deep, which flower in mid summer, but this bed also has a layer of tulips planted above the lilies as well as a surface layer of grape hyacinths. This way I get a spring display followed by a summer display. However grape hyacinths can form a thick layer of bulbs so some periodic thinning is required to allow the tulips and lilies to push through. Tall

Oriental lilies are also fine amongst dwarf azaleas. Beds of azaleas have little impact once the flowering is finished, but the lilies give a great show in summer.

Woodland fringe areas are also perfect places to create a spring display with snowdrops, wood

Berberis darwinii

anemones, crocus, aconites and narcissus provided the trees are deciduous. The bulbs are happy to go dormant once the trees produce leaves and close the canopy. Aconites can smother the ground in late winter, but they are a great companion to Cyclamen hederifolium as they emerge just as the aconites die down. Other good companions have been plants selected for the top of a wall where it can get a bit dry. Senecio with grey foliage and yellow flowers is at its best as ground hugging

Lettuce crop under chrysamthemums

Delosperma cooperii with purple flowers is in full flower. These two also flower at the same time as Cistus and Erigerons. My first tulips to flower is the Scarlet Baby coming out in March at the same time as a yellow saxifrage. Then in April and May the yellow Doronicum Little Leo flowers with purple tulip Negrita and red Abba.
An unusual combination is to plant the orange Berberis darwinii beside your plum, pear and apple trees as the berberis is very attractive to bees which then help to pollinate the other trees.

On the allotment I plant lettuce between rows of freshly planted chrysanthemums and harvest them before the chrysanthemums need the space.

My climbing rose Dublin Bay with red flowers covers the wall, but at ground level I have

geraniums and some naturalised Californian poppies all flowering together.

Wee jobs to do this week

John prunes outdoor fuchsia Mrs Popple

Outdoor fuchsias are now showing young buds starting to put on some growth. They have a habit of dieing back in various degrees depending on the severity of the winter. This year winter has been fairly mild though a bit wet so dieback is not too serious, but still cut back any shoot to remove dead ends and other shoots where the bushes have been growing beyond there allocated space, especially next to footpaths.

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TIME TO START SPRING GARDENING

                               TIME TO START SPRING GARDENING

My gardening year has always started by selecting plants and seed in mid winter and drawing up my seed sowing schedule. Last year the spring arrived early after a very mild winter and warm weather allowed sowing and planting well ahead (a fortnight) of that planned on my schedule, so this year I adjusted the schedule to allow for another early start.

Geraniums go into their final pots

Weather however is very unpredictable as climate change is erratic and although global warming would appear to benefit gardening in Scotland, you just cannot rely on it. The winter has now just about finished, and again been very mild. I have not seen one snowflake land on my garden, but torrential storms and gales have kept us off the land for a wee bit.

Casa Blanca potatoes ready to plant out

However my sowing schedule has started indoors with onion Hybound, sweet peas and pepper Early Jalapeno sown in mid February based on last year’s early start, and if we get another early spring I will be happy. This is also a great time to sow Lobelia as it needs a long growing season. My unheated cold greenhouse is too cold for seed germination so south facing windowsills are used for both seeds and geraniums rooted from autumn cuttings now growing strongly. By the end of February my geraniums will have been potted up into their final pots and in need of more space so they will get moved into the greenhouse, assuming there will be a wee bit of global warming to get them started.

Sowing seeds

Geraniums are pretty tough so no need to molly coddle them, in fact the two I left outdoors all winter are surviving, though one looks a wee bit sad. Onion seedlings, peppers and sweet peas will soon be needing more space so they will go into the cold greenhouse but I will keep an eye on the weather forecasts and if any frost is threatened I have an electric heater I can use.

The end of February is the time to sow many other crops including broad bean Aquadulce, Lettuce Lollo Rossa, Cauliflower Clapton (clubroot resistant) spring onions and tomatoes. After last year’s tomato trial I will be growing my favourite maincrop Alicante, Supersweet 100 my best red cherry and Sungold my best yellow cherry. These will all come from seed saved from last year. Making a seed packet last two years comes from time tested tradition for Scottish gardeners, a practise taught as apprentices and it has never gone away.

Chrysanthemum cuttings in a propagator

However problems arise when seed producers decide to severely limit the amount of seed in each packet. Tomatoes all came with ten seeds declared in each packet, and not one had eleven. So last year only five got sown from each packet, which was just fine, and this year it should also be just fine as long as I get good germination from the remaining five. Time will tell.

Just like last year the mild winter has allowed chrysanthemum stools to put on a lot of growth so a batch of cuttings were taken. There is no room at home so they went into a propagator in the

Tomato seedlings just pricked out

greenhouse. It is still quite early so the stools will continue to grow and give me more cuttings later on. Begonia tubers need a long growing season before they flower so dry corms got boxed up and watered in. They need warmth so I will keep them in the house for a few weeks placed on plastic trays. They do not need light until the shoots begin to grow, but hopefully by that time the weather will be warmer and they can go into the unheated greenhouse.
If the spring comes in early this year I will be on schedule to plant a row of first early Casa Blanca potatoes as the chitted seed looks ready to go into the ground.

Wee jobs to do this week

Spreading lime for brassicas

When growing a wide variety of flowers, fruit and vegetables we try to keep to a good plan of rotation. This allows us to group together plants requiring the same soil conditions of fertility and soil alkalinity as well as trying to avoid any build up of pests and diseases. The cabbage family including sprouts, kale, cauliflower, swedes, turnips and radish do not like an acid soil, so land for these gets a dressing of hydrated lime in late winter. As they also like a fertile soil it was composted and dug over in December so now is a good time to spread some lime over this area.

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GOOD TIME TO PLANT ROSES

                                             GOOD TIME TO PLANT ROSES

Roses have been in and out of favour all my gardening life. I have always been a rose lover and never had a garden without them, but just like fashion they have their moments, then everything changes. Sixty years ago they were very much in favour, but relatively expensive.

John waters climbing rose Dublin Bay

They were a means to brighten up towns, and parks departments all over UK grew them and planted them by the thousands. Aberdeen’s Anderson Drive was famous for its roses and Dundee planted them in Parks and housing estates. In my apprenticeship training we spent summer in Camperdown nursery

Rose Dawn Chorus

budding thousands of roses. It was a great time, brilliant training and a lot of fun. Roses were also used (the very vigorous and thorny types) as barriers and hedgerows to prevent access in various places. In my early years working in many parts of Scotland and England I always bought a

hundred briar as rootstocks to grow my own plants. Roses tended to suffer from mildew, blackspot, rust and greenfly, but there was always a chemical to use to keep these under control. Plant breeders were always bringing out new varieties to try. Time has moved on and everything changes. Most chemicals of yesterday are no longer in use, though there is still some safe chemicals available to keep pests and diseases under control. Plant breeders now look for diseases resistance for new roses as most folk no longer bother to spray. Fashion in gardening has also changed as the

Rose Gaujard

younger

generation are less keen on gardening, and as they all have one or two cars they need somewhere to park them, so front gardens are disappearing. People now want easy to maintain smaller gardens with permanent planting easy to look after, so now roses are coming back into favour. Once planted in good soil they can last for years if helped by some good pruning, and an annual dressing of

fertiliser. Late winter is a perfect time to order in roses as bare root plants, but today interest in gardening for most folk begins in spring. At this time garden centres are just packed with container grown roses all with colourful labels, but if you wait a wee bit longer you can see them in bloom when you can select your favourite colours and hopefully some with a good rose scent. As these plants are permanent make

Rose Myriam

sure the ground is well prepared in advance. For dedicated gardeners this means double digging, especially if soil has a high clay content, incorporating well rotted

compost as digging proceeds, but for others digging as deep as you can to help drainage will always keep the bushes happy. Plant bushes at same depth as in pots and for bare root bushes plant with crown at ground level. Suckers on roses are no longer a problem as growers have changed

rootstocks to those that no longer send up suckers. Cut new plants by about half after planting to

encourage them to branch. Use Floribunda and Hybrid Tea types for beds, shrub roses for bigger borders and perimeter hedges and climbers to grow up walls. Pruning of all types is usually aimed at replacing older wood with younger wood, where ever possible.

Although over time we all find our favourites, rose nurseries will always have a few new varieties to try out every year. My criteria is always firstly to see a good shaped flower with pleasing colour and scent and must have healthy disease resistant foliage. I have bought a lot of new roses in the past, only to dig them out a few years later as disease wipes out the leaves. Last year was very dry early on so mildew and greenfly became a huge problem, then the rain arrived and forgot to go off, so blackspot and rust took over. Hopefully 2020 will be better. I’ve added a few photos of my

favourite bushes, E H Morse, Dawn Chorus, Arthur Bell, shrubs Ispahan and climbers, Dublin Bay and Gertrude Jekyll, but these can always change as new roses are tried out.

Wee jobs to do this week

Stored crops in February

Check over fruit and vegetables in store. Onions and pumpkins can store for months, but apples need checking as some begin to shrivel, and potatoes begin to sprout even in a cold garage as the mild weather keeps temperatures too high for good storage. Parsnips, swedes and leeks are best left in the ground and dug up as needed. Cabbage, sprouts and kale are also just fine outdoors over winter. Kale putting on excellent top growth in the mild winter.

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FIRST FLOWERS APPEAR

                                                 FIRST FLOWERS APPEAR

In past times it was a great occasion when the first flowers appeared in winter, usually towards the end as it heralded the coming of spring.

Early spring polyanthus

Climate change appears to have moved us on to a new

Hammamelis mollis

scenario. The mild winter is no longer newsworthy as it seems to happen every winter, well at least since 2010 when the severe weather let us know what winter was supposed to look like. The garden flowers are not complaining. In fact they have never had it better. My snowdrops regularly start to flower at the end of December and Aconites are a mass of colour now at the beginning of February. Both of these early bulbous plants are spreading at a great pace and allow me to pass on spare plants and seeds to those admire them. New aconite seedlings germinated at the end of January, but wont flower till 2023. Gardeners learn to be patient. We started with a tray of six aconites many years ago, but can now count them as several thousand, and I still find space to sow a few more.

Snowdrops in January

The crocus species usually flower ahead of the larger hybrids, but both are now coming into flower in early February. Just hope they can keep their heads down as gales and a deep depression is

forecast for middle of February. However the polyanthus in tubs seem to be unaware of this

impending storm as they are all flowering happily, and this year I only see one that appears to be getting attacked by a few vine weevils that seem to love eating their roots.

Pansies in pots outdoors are a bit further behind, but the two hanging baskets full of pansies moved into the cold greenhouse to

Crocus Yellow Mammoth

give them some winter protection just love it and are happy to start the flowering season. Just a bit unfortunate that the warmer atmosphere under glass also favours the greenfly and pansy leaf spot, so some careful spraying on a dull day is necessary. At the moment there is plenty space under glass as my young lettuce crop is still small but growing and as yet my seed sowing will start in the warmth of the house for a few weeks before going into the greenhouse.

March is usually the month when greenhouse space is at a premium and anything slightly hardy goes outdoors, which is normally sweet peas, broad beans, some onions and geraniums. My wee trial of testing the hardiness of geraniums to be left outdoors in a mild winter is going fairly well as they are all still just fine, but looking a wee bit sorry for themselves. If they can hang on till after the storm passes good times are just a few days away.

Mahonia Charity

Garden shrubs are enjoying this winter. Viburnum Dawn is in full flower as well as Hamamelis mollis, Mahonia Charity (been in flower from December), the yellow Jasminum nudiflorum and down at ground level the pink Erica carnea. Rhododendron praecox is always very early and in previous years got caught out with late frosts. The buds are all showing colour but are not as yet open, so fingers crossed hoping the mild winter continues.

Christmas cactus

Several garden pinks are in flower from last year’s buds which never died down in winter. There is almost enough for a bunch for the house where we can enjoy the colour as well as the scent.

Looking around the garden, everything is taking advantage of the mild weather. Rose buds are all growing, even on those shoots I took as hardwood cuttings, and tulips are already six to ten inches tall and some narcissus showing buds. My companion planting experiment of Tulip Scarlet Baby and yellow saxifrage both frequently flower together in early March, but this year the tulip is still quite small but the saxifrage is now showing colour. Time will tell. Back indoors my Christmas

Amaryllis growing strongly

cactus was very late. It missed Christmas, but flowered in January and rooted geranium cutting on windowsills need tips and flower buds removed to make sturdy bushy plants.

Wee jobs to do this week

Amaryllis that flowered just before Christmas is now wanting to grow, so keep it watered and give it a feed every two to three weeks, but do not pot it up. This will help the bulb to grow strongly through spring and into summer, but at the end of summer start to dry it off. This will give it some dormancy so it can put its energy into flower bud production ready for next Christmas.

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INTERNET GARDENING

                                                INTERNET GARDENING

There was a time way back in the dim and distant past when we gained our gardening knowledge from gardening magazines, and those more wealthy individuals who had a television were able to see the professional gardeners like Percy Thrower and Geoff Hamilton from the box in their living room. Growing up in Dundee we also had Crolls nursery in the Ferry and Lauries Nursery in Ninewells where we could wander around and see garden plants all named up.

John tackling the Windows 10 computer

I was lucky to get a five year gardening apprenticeship, with trained gardeners at Duntrune Terrace for practical help and the Kingsway Tech for our written lessons. Those were great days, but now relegated to pleasant distant memories as we head at great speed into the new world of technology.

Tomatoes from Dobbies Seeds

This may be fantastic for the young kids introduced to this world from primary school where even those kids from poor backgrounds all have the essential mobile phone. Alas we silver haired surfers are left to struggle trying to understand this massive knowledge now available with information technology. We no longer need to ask some expert for gardening advise, just ask Mr Google. He has all the answers, or knows someone with answers to every question. I had thought that I had a fair grasp of computers, even building my own website, www.johnstoa.com but the world moves on quicker than I can run, so now Google frowns at my website as it is not mobile friendly.

Rhododendron Sneezy from Glendoick

Microsoft has now brought out a new Windows 10 to replace my old Windows 7. The last few weeks have been a nightmare. Emails disappear, photos disappear, jpegs that I normally resize to just over one megabite are now well over ten. New folders appear that I haven’t asked for and I struggle to use my new posh keyboard as it is black and needs a light so I can see which keys I am using.

However once you calm down and embrace this new world there is no limit to finding answers to all your gardening queries. We hear about problems on the high streets with so many shops closing down as folk today do so much shopping on the internet.

Pumpkin Mammoth from Simply Seeds

The gardening world is going through the same problems. I am now more likely to buy online rather than go to my local garden centres, which I notice are filling up with household goods at the expense of garden plants. In the autumn my tulips, daffodils and crocus were ordered online from,www.peternyssen.com oriental lilies from www.hartsnursery.co.uk and Angels Trumpets from www.vanmeuwen.com My garden seeds ordered in January from www.simplyseed.co.uk and www.dobies.co.uk . A great source for fruit bushes is www.pomonafruits.co.uk and www.kenmuir.co.uk and the best chrysanthemums come from www.walkersplantcentre.co.uk If you are looking for tuberous begonias, delphiniums or polyanthus try www.blackmore-langdon.com. A great nursery from Bath.

Previous Courier articles are archived in my weekly blog scottishartistandhisgarden.blogspot.co.uk which goes back to 2008. Today every nursery and garden center has a website, and there is also one for our

Tulip Scarlet Baby from Peter Nyssen

local Botanic Gardens www.dundee.ac.uk/botanic and for horticultural research see our local www.hutton.ac.uk However there is still garden centers to walk around at www.glendoick.com who specialize in rhododendrons and www.dobbies.com They are only a short drive away and both have excellent restaurants. If you are looking for quality rose bushes try Cockers Roses in Aberdeen, www.roses.uk.com and www.davidaustinroses.com

Allotments are also fairly well covered with websites with www.allotment.org.uk which has links to everything you are likely to grow, then check out both the National Society at www.nsalg.org.uk and the Scottish Society at www.sags.org.uk. Then off course the City Road allotments have a

website at www.cityroadallotments.com, though there is a tendency to go modern and use social media with Facebook and Instagram. Now I wonder if Google can help me with the digging !!!

Wee jobs to do this week

Winter border

The winter border is at its best just now with the bright coloured dogwoods and willow but keep the ground free of leaves and weeds as the crocus and snowdrop bulbs are now all through the ground and keen to open up their flowers as we all enjoy the mild winter. Even the tulips are emerging up into the sunlight so spring may come early this year.

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A FEW WINTER JOBS

                                                    A FEW WINTER JOBS

The gardeners weather has been very kind over winter. Seems like we must be getting

another mild winter, as we are now at the end of January and I have yet to see a snow flake. In fact it has been dry and warm with

Checking tree stakes and ties

just a few morning frosts and ground preparations up on the allotment are well ahead. Digging has been completed apart from where winter

Fig cuttings

vegetables are growing, but it is always very easy to find other jobs needing attention.

Fruit trees and bushes and roses, (bush, shrub and climbers) have all been pruned. Most grape vines inside the greenhouse as well as outdoor varieties have all been pruned though I left a few shoots on so I could get a batch of cuttings. Grape vines like an early start and with the mild winter they are quick to spring into growth, so to prevent sap bleeding from pruned shoots the pruning is best completed by the end of January for those under glass and a couple of weeks later for those grown outdoors. Where ever they are grown adopt a

Grape vine cuttings

system that allows good air circulation around developing bunches and continual summer pruning to prevent the vines

Top of pruned vine rod

from growing excessively at the expense of grapes. Establish a permanent framework of rods and laterals with spurs every six inches or so. Vines are very adaptable and are happy to be restricted to any space available, and perfect on a warm south facing wall. During December to early February cut all shoots back to one bud on the rods or laterals. Once growth starts in spring wait till you see the young grape bunches appear then start the summer pruning. Cut the shoot tips after two leaves have formed beyond the fruit bunches then subsequently cut all shoots after one leaf. When the vine is prevented from growing excessively it puts all its energy into developing the bunches of grapes.

Vine rods pruned in winter

Grapes are very easy to propagate. Retain some of the strongest shoots and cut to lengths of two to three buds and putting them into small pots, three to a pot. Grow them indoors in a cold greenhouse or on a windowsill. Once rooting takes place and growth commences

remove them from the pot and place them in individual pots. They grow very quickly.

Rhubarb crowns ready to divide

Figs growing outdoors can also be propagated by hardwood cuttings taken about four to six inches long and treated the same as vines.

Another task on a dry day is to check over tree stakes and ties and replace where necessary.

Picking a few sprouts

This is also a good time to dig up and divide rhubarb clumps that may have been growing for several years. Dig up the clump and divide them into strong roots with at least two or three good buds. Replant these on fresh ground that has been dug over and compost worked into the soil. Add a dusting of fertiliser to help them get established in spring.

Harvesting continues with swedes, cabbage, sprouts, kale, parsnips and leeks. The mild winter has allowed excellent growth of overwintered vegetables.

Indoors it is time to start the first seed sowing. Peppers need a long growing season so they are first to get sown. Varieties worth trying include Tabasco, Basket of Fire, Krakatoa, Demon Red and Padron. Peppers will be followed by onions, broad beans and sweet peas and if the mild winter continues my tuberous begonias will be coming out of storage to get boxed up in good

compost and placed in a warm room.

Leaf spot and greenfly on pansy

Wee jobs to do this week

Check over young spring flowering pansies for greenfly (aphids) and leaf spot disease and spray all affected plants with a rose combined pest and disease insecticide. Plants in sheltered spots are liable to infection in our mild winters as both greenfly and leaf spot disease keep growing.

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THE NEW GARDENING YEAR HAS STARTED

                                THE NEW GARDENING YEAR HAS STARTED

Now that 2019 has passed and that very wet year is behind us we now look forward to 2020 hoping that a warmer and sunnier year is ahead. Yet again we seem to be having a mild winter, and half way through January the garden has not seen one snow flake. I always draw up a rough guide at the end of the last season of where the next crops are going in the following year so I can plan a rotation which I need so I can allocate garden compost to those crops that need the most. The peas, beans, onions, leeks, sweet corn, courgettes, pumpkins get a good helping, then the potatoes and brassicas also get some, but the root crops and salads are fine on land that was composted the previous year.

Time for a break on a sunny January

The first snowdrops are in flower and the aconites are not far behind. The wet December put a stop to the winter digging, but there were a few frosty days when it was ok to crack on with the digging, then

Greenhouse in January

in early January the strong gales dried up the surface just enough to allow digging without mud sticking to the wellies. My compost heap got emptied and a new one started. I was pleased that the winter digging session got completed by the middle of January. Other allotment plot gardeners were all on site getting the land sorted, erecting greenhouses, repairing fences, sheds and installing bed systems to help organise the plots. Our communal shed was busy as you always need a break from the graft and there is always someone putting on the kettle. It was brilliant to be sitting outdoors for a coffee break on a warm January day.

The short day length limits time spent outdoors, but we can always find a few indoor tasks. This is a

Potato Casa Blanca

great time to browse through new catalogues and see what new varieties of vegetables flowers and fruit we can try out. I try and get my seeds ordered by the end of January as some plants such as onions, broad beans and sweet peas get an early start. Last year the winter was so mild that my early seed sowing started in early February with onions and sweet peas, then I was taking chrysanthemum cuttings in mid February as there was plenty growth on the stools in my unheated greenhouse. I also started my begonias in mid February followed by broad beans and salads on a warm windowsill. February last year was so warm that I got my first early potatoes planted at the end of the month. That was a bonus as they were able to put on a lot of growth before the wet

Angels Trumpet

summer blight appeared. This year my first early potatoes, Casa Blanca are being chitted beside a window in a cool but bright room, as the sprouts are already growing though they are still quite stocky. Time will tell whether I can again get planting done by the end of February.

In the past I had always grown some Cape Gooseberries outdoors in a sheltered spot, but after a few wet, cold and dreich summers when ripening of the fruit was a problem I gave up on them. However this year I will try them again as they are a lovely fruit when we get a decent summer.

Cape Gooseberry painting

Another plant from the past that will get planted is the Brugmansia, also known as Angels Trumpets as I just love the scent, and they make a great dot plant in a large tub with other summer bedding plants around it. This flower is pollinated by night flying moths so the best scent comes in the evening, so best to use it on patios where you often relax on a

warm summers evening.

The greenhouse got tidied up after the tomato plants had finished and old plants removed and the grapes harvested. Once they had lost their leaves in December the vines got spur pruned back to the upright cordons. The borders then all got some compost and a light dressing of fertiliser and I planted a few plants of lettuce Lollo Rossa and some spring onions. This will give us some fresh salads over winter, but as we go into early spring the greenhouse will again be bursting at the seams as young growing plants fight for space.

Wee jobs to do this week

The Geraniums taken from autumn cuttings are now all rooted and beginning to put on growth. To

create short jointed plants grow them in a cool room with plenty light and remove any flowers as they appear. Also remove the tops to hold back growth and encourage a bushy plant.

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DANGER IN THE GARDEN

                                                 DANGER IN THE GARDEN

I chose a career in horticulture as I just loved growing plants and enjoying the beauty of flowers, and it has only been lately that I discovered just how many garden plants contain toxins, poisons and skin irritants. In the early training years it was the Laburnum with beautiful golden yellow flowers followed on with poisonous seeds.

Laburnum vossii

Later on when hogweed became notorious we knew not to touch the sap or hairy stems. As kids we all got stung by nettles and were amazed that folk gathered the leaves to make tea. Growing up in St. Marys in Dundee we grew rhubarb (the poor mans fruit) and were well aware that we only ate the red stems and not the leaves. They are rich in oxalic acid, but no-one was ever tempted to stick the leaves in their mouth so there was no problem.

Dumb cane

Similarly the host of plant poisons is seldom a problem as there is little reason to eat something that would taste horrible. When looking into garden plants with poisons I was just amazed at the long list, (the Royal Horticultural Society has a list of over two hundred plants) and so many are our every day plants grown in gardens and house plants. Rhododendrons, daffodils, aconites outdoors and indoors we grow poinsettias at Christmas and forced hyacinths as well as dumb which if ingested can cause immobility of the mouth and tongue, difficulty in breathing and asphyxiation. Aconites have powerful toxin, aconitine, which can kill people who come into contact with it.  All parts of the plant are toxic but the sap in particular is a skin irritant, causing burning of the lips and mouth, vomiting, diarrhoea and spasms.

Winter aconites

cane

Over time plants have developed numerous ways to aid survival from thorns on stems to poisons in leaves, stems, bark, seeds, flowers and roots to discourage other animals from eating them.

Arisaema sikokianum

Outdoor public landscapes contain laurels, rhododendrons, snowberry and yew trees. Every part of the yew tree is poisonous The stems, leaves and seeds contain the toxic alkaloid taxine. Monks would use them to mark and protect the routes of their pilgrimages. They would collect the yew seeds as a food source and eat the aril, but spit out the seed as they travelled on their pilgrimages.

except the fleshy aril around the seed.

Brugmansia Angels Trumpets

Euphorbia griffithii Fireglow has a milky sap, which is extremely irritating to the skin and eyes.

Deadly nightshade

English Yew with berries

Arisaema sikokianum, an attractive bog plant produces fleshy seed coats contain oxalic acid in the sap. Opium poppies are quite commonly found in gardens brought in by birds, but the sap in the seed head contains opium. Another garden plant used in tubs to flower in summer is the Angels Trumpets, Datura stramonium. It has attractive large scented tubular white flowers, but every part of this plant is toxic. South American native Indians use it as a drug because of its hypnotic and hallucinogenic affects, but in the wrong dose it can be fatal. However to keep matter in perspective, very few folk suffer from plant poisons as we usually only eat those foods that we know and like, but then you find that some of our everyday foods contain poisons. Take apples, tomatoes and potatoes and look a bit deeper into their properties. We eat apples right down to the core which gets discarded. Just as well as apple seeds contain cyanogenic glycosides, a cyanide compound that could be fatal in high enough doses, but that means eating an awful lot of apples in one sitting. The potato and tomato belong to the solanacae family that contains some very poisonous members including the deadly nightshade. In the kitchen we all know to discard any potatoes where the skin has turned green on exposure to light. It contains the toxin glycoalkaloid solanine. This toxin is also present in tomato leaves, stems and unripe fruits as well as tobacco and peppers. These alkaloids in tobacco can be addictive and in belladonna fatal as it contains tropane.

Winter garden

Wee jobs to do this week

The winter garden has been the centre of attraction since early December once all the leaves dropped

to the ground. Cornus, Kerria, Salix Britzensis and the Japanese maple Acer Sangokaku have all got very brightly coloured stems, adding winter colour up to the end of March. However remove all the fallen leaves and any weeds that may spoil the show. This also lets the early snowdrops grow up into the light to add some colour contrast.

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