Veg Plotting

It's been great to have some quality time on the patio this week culminating in yesterday's partial eclipse. With the live stream to hand, we had fun with our hastily made pinhole projector (a piece of card pierced with a paper clip), playing with the image on our hands, then NAH decided to carefully take a direct photo of the sun. 'That won't work', I said, and I was right... and wrong, with the sun behind its mackerel sky veil blazing forth as usual, but the camera lens flare revealing a perfect image of the sun bitten by the moon. * = I've had Midnight Oil's Earth and Sun and Moon on the brain all week; especially appropriate for yesterday's celestial event.

I have two huge pots either side of the central steps leading down off our patio which I decided a few weeks ago should be graced with Echinacea this year. This is a relatively short lived perennial* which sadly decided to leave my garden a few years ago, and it's lovely to welcome it back along with attendant butterflies, hoverflies and other insects in abundance. What I didn't expect was some rocket plants** to decide to join it to make a quite unusual planting combination. What do you think? I have no idea where the rocket has come from, though I'm pleased to add its leaves to my salads and sandwiches on a regular basis. I especially like how the yellow flowers echo the pollen rings that have appeared on the Echinacea's central cones. Sometimes it's good to go with the garden's flow and enjoy the unexpected items that appear in the gardening area 😊 Which combinations - planned or otherwise - do you enjoy in your garden? * = though Echinacea purpurea such as...

The snowdrops are finally coming to the fore this week, does anyone else think they're later this year? Of course I could be comparing them to years when they've been early 😉 Early, late or on time, they're still most welcome. The photo above shows some of the snowdrops I planted over twenty years ago - the first time I'd tried my hand at guerrilla gardening. They form a welcome to the shared space on our part of the estate and it gives me a warm feeling when I hear local walkers saying how pretty they are. Last year I was gifted two huge carrier bags full of snowdrops in the green, so I've taken the opportunity for some experimental planting in gravel having seen some of mine have self seeded themselves there elsewhere in the garden. We have two narrow strips of gravel which border our front drive and the path which leads through to the back. I planted lots of small clumps there and I'm thrilled they've come back this year to welcome us home. The rest I ad...

I've seen quite a lot of online chat about this striking plant lately. Firstly asking for an ID - it's Arum italicum subsp. italicum 'Marmoratum' by the way - quite a mouthful, eh? With the ID duly confirmed, the conversation then turns to its renowned thugish qualities, with many a resolution made for it to never darken the commenter's garden ever again. I can offer an alternative viewpoint. It's never been a problem here at VP Gardens . Its marbled foliage brightens many a winter's walk here and then it quietly starts to fade away into summer oblivion around about now.  I reckon the key to my success and higher regard is I've planted it in the wrong place. The commenters' dire warnings centre around the plant's spathe replete with tempting red berries poised ready for the birds to eat and distribute its seeds elsewhere. Mine has never done that and a quick check of the plant's requirements shows its preference for sand or loam soils. Mi...

My final twixt season post is a selection of new recipes I've enjoyed over the summer which have made the best of my garden's produce. No-one's told my vegetables it's autumn yet, in fact I'm only just coming up to peak tomato... First up is Good Food's Egyptian Courgettes with Dukkah Sprinkle . As you can see it makes good use of tomatoes as well as courgettes. The dukkah sprinkle on top was a revelation and the whole dish bursts with delicious flavours. I served this both hot and cold depending on the weather, and I expect the warm version will begin to hold sway as we head off into proper autumn. I omitted the recipe's butter beans (can't stand them) and peas (didn't have any) and increased the number of courgettes and tomatoes in the recipe to compensate and ensure it continued to deliver the recipe's claimed 4 out of 5 a day. I didn't have any almond flakes, so I substituted some roughly chopped whole, skin-on almonds instead. Th...

Travelling across Europe by train from the UK often means a change of stations in Paris. On the way to Switzerland our walk from the Gare du Nord to Gare de l'Est was uneventful. The return walk was different: it held a surprise. There's a choice of routes available: turn right out of the station and an elegant staircase and a five minute walk is one option. Turn left and and the sign says it's a ten minute walk. In view of our suitcases, we chose to turn left. I'm glad we did because otherwise I would have missed Patric Blanc 's green wall on the Rue d'Alsace. It's turned a dreary alley way into something spectacular. At the time of installation (2008), it was the largest he'd designed, with a surface area of 1,500 square metres. In his book, The Vertical Garden , Patric Blanc says: "When Fanny Giraud and Michel Piloquet invited me to visit the project site, I thought I was dreaming: an endless dark alley linking the Gare de l'E...

You may have spotted I've been a bit quiet lately. That's because my mum passed away a month ago and life's been quite hectic sorting everything out. So here are my final Flowers for Mum , not grown by me this time, but by Georgie of Common Farm Flowers instead. When I phoned her to discuss what I'd like for the funeral, her first thought was flowers from my garden, but I knew these were unsuitable for what I had in mind because I needed: Flowers important to mum in some way Scent, because she reacted to that strongly in her final years Organic because dad was a founding member and secretary of Birmingham Organic Gardeners Cutting material so I could give plants in mum's memory to everyone unable to come to the funeral  We both got very excited talking through the possibilities and as you can see Georgie did mum (and dad) proud. I love these photos Georgie posted on social media which give you a peep behind the scenes: her flower trolley parked ...

Most hanging basket guidance will give you a look that is burgeoning, beautiful, and relatively high maintenance. Last year's health woes meant I was not only later with planting up my hanging basket, there was also a limited choice of what I could actually put in there. Burgeoning was out and budget was in. Then I remembered the clever use of Bidens I'd seen on holiday at Bishop's Castle a few years ago. Luckily there was still some left for sale, and the pictured basket was the result of just one plant . Not only that, it flowered right up to December. I learned later that Bidens can be grown as a perennial in the UK, though we tend to use it as an annual. Sadly my plant didn't survive past the first hard frost, though if I'd moved it from its north facing position to a warmer spot in the back garden, I may have had more success with overwintering. Another accidental shortcut was my use of Dalefoot's Wool compost. Remember last year's drought?...

I love the cool greenery and strokeability of this simple arrangement.  Since I outlined my Flowers for Mum project, it's fair to say things have not gone to plan. I've been preoccupied instead with obtaining some specialist equipment and care for her, and despite Georgie 's reassurance that growing cut flowers can be broken down into manageable chunks of time, I failed to sow any flowers this spring. Thank goodness for Franks Plants  - still going strong -  who've supplied me with many of the plants on my original list (plus a couple of extras based on your comments on my previous post) at a reasonable cost. These are now safely planted out on the allotment as planned ~ more on these anon. Thank goodness too for my Wild and Woolly Lawn , whose self-sown flowers and leaves have yielded my first home-grown bunches of flowers, not only for mum but with a bonus bunch or three for me. I'd anticipated using the ox-eye daisies, but never the lemon balm nor the ...

I've stuck with Friday's windowsill theme for today's post, but moved upstairs this time. I've just rescued my tomatoes from the patio as I spotted the first signs of blight yesterday. Like most resistant tomatoes, my trial 'Mountain Magic' does eventually succumb to the dreaded disease, though at a much slower pace. It means I've had enough time to harvest the remaining fruit. I picked 6 large punnets: 2 each of 'ready to eat now' and 'needs a little more ripening', plus 1 each of  'needs a lot more ripening' and 'not sure if they have blight'. I've found tomatoes tend to develop a warning translucence before blight reveals itself. You can see some potential candidates I'm keeping an eye on in the above photo. At this point, most people would share their favourite recipe for green tomato chutney, but we're not great eaters of it here at VP Gardens . Instead, I spread out my tomatoes on windowsills on the s...

Patrick Blanc 's living wall at the Athenaeum Hotel , Piccadilly. Well worth making a detour to gawp at (that's a technical term).

Keith Wiley's colourful garden at Wildside on a rainy day in July. It's here I learned the importance of how green can provide balance in a colour scheme.  A photograph of blue and black dress which looked gold and white to some caused a storm of controversy and a top trending #TheDress hashtag across social media last week. It even made the national news. I put my thoughts to one side on how camera and computer settings, plus viewing angles can alter what we see, and had a think about the use of colour in our gardens. My interest in this subject started not long after I'd met Threadspider . We were looking at a piece of turquoise cloth one day, which she clearly saw as green and I as blue. In that instant I realised how a simple difference in our eyes could alter our perception of the world. This was also discussed in relation to #TheDress, particularly how the number of cones  * in the eye's structure can alter the range of colours we can see. Apparently C...

Just before Christmas last year, I was surprised to find 6 heads of garlic in my vegetable basket from 2013's harvest. The heads were much larger than last year's rust affected crop and so were easy to date. How on earth I missed them in there is a mystery. I was even more surprised to find some of the cloves were good enough for cooking - they had retained a strong flavour and were relatively firm. Chopping them ready for the casserole I was making revealed the beginnings of a green shoot inside... and that got me thinking. That green shoot suggests the cloves are still viable for growing and as they've survived over a year of storage (most garlic either shrivels away or starts to shoot at the start of the next growing season), I could have the potential for a very good strain on my hands. So I've gone through the pictured remaining 3 heads and selected the cloves which are firm. I composted many more, but I was left with 16 fat cloves and 21 slightly thinner ...

Picture courtesy of Charlotte at The   Galloping Gardener who had her camera to hand when I didn't :)

The blooms at VP Gardens are breaking all kinds of records this month, with all of my late season perennials hanging on and flowering in profusion. My garden's had just one slight frost so far this autumn, which hasn't been enough to bring these plants to their knees. I've been meaning to tell you all about my favourite fuchsia for quite a while, but I never imagined a November Blooms Day would be the ideal time to fulfil that promise. In most Novembers, the pictured blooms would be a soggy, brown looking mess by now. I adore the elegant simplicity of Fuchsia 'Hawkshead' . Its porcelain white flowers remind me of dainty ballerinas dancing across the stage. They're a more delicate looking form which belies their hardiness. I see the common name for this species is Lady's eardrops , and I've often thought the flowers would make great earrings. I forgot to prune the branches down to the ground in the spring and my neglect's been rewarded wit...

I saw this in the shop at Mount Usher Gardens last year. I'd never come across this saying before - a little light googling shows its origin goes back centuries. I must admit I found it a little confusing because water is a vital component of seed sowing as long as the soil is damp, not waterlogged. The source link above also says this was a traditional adage for March, because it's the month when seed sowing gets going in earnest. My seed tin is in agreement as I have the thickest bulge of packets filed away for this month. This is a perfect example of how a rule shouldn't be taken at face value, but the meaning behind it needs to be taken into account. I'm pretty sure the "sow dry" isn't about the soil needing to be bone dry, but referring to the land drying out after the winter wet.This would typically happen in March most years, when the other conditions most seeds need - warmth and longer daylength - are also present. However, as we know f...

 January's To Do list from last year's calendar, which sparked off today's musing I'm a firm believer in the To Do list - it's most satisfying to tick things off as the final nod to a job well done. It seems I'm not alone - monthly lists of gardening jobs are a regular feature in gardening magazines. Websites like the RHS feature them too - here's theirs for January . Pick any one of these you have to hand and look at it carefully. Does it bear any resemblance to what actually needs doing in your garden? No, it's nothing like mine either. Here's what I need to do this month: In the garden Clear up December's fallen leaves and use them to mulch borders (remember Compost Direct ?) Cut back fallen stems which no longer have seed heads Shred stems, plus the twigs etc brought down by December's storms Weed garden path See what I have on hand already for the  GQT border  (my new name for the front garden side border) - I'm thinki...

Look at any list of gardening jobs published for this month and I bet most of them - if not all - will have 'make leaf mould' on there. Now leaf mould is a very good thing, but the problem is I have more leaves than my leaf mould bin can take. And like many urban gardeners with a modest plot, I've run out of space to build another one. Besides, when I come to empty it next year, there'd only be a thimble full* of lovely crumbly stuff to use. This year I've decided to learn from my shady borders in my front and back garden. They're beneath the trees on the public land, so they quickly get covered with a thick layer of  leaves in autumn. It means I never have to mulch these borders and all the plants get snuggled down for winter with very little effort on my part. So I've decided to extend this principle of 'compost direct' to other areas of the garden. Many of my plants - like my dahlias - need mulching in the autumn to protect them from winter...

Back in Waterperry's orchard with Horticultural Manager Rob Jacobs - a very fine place to be In honour of today's Apple Day , I'm returning to last month's study day at Waterperry Gardens , where we learnt lots about the summer pruning of trained apple trees such as cordons and espaliers. Note this pruning does not apply to apples grown as bush or standard trees; their pruning is confined to the winter period . Summer pruning is carried out on the shoots growing out from the main branches. This is to increase the number of fruiting spurs on the tree for the following year and to let the sunlight through to ripen the current year's crop. The RHS guidance says that this pruning is best carried out in the third week in August in the south and around 10 days later in the north. This guidance also says the pruning should be done when the bottom third of the new shoot is firm and woody. This timing is judged according to the tree's vigour, its location an...

I've learnt recently lentils have a strong urge to keep on growing. I sprouted some as usual for my Salad Challenge , but last month's exceptionally cold weather turned our appetites away from salad. So this batch got shoved in the fridge for a couple of days until the weather warmed up. Except it didn't and a few days turned into a few weeks :o I knew beansprouts of the shop bought variety are grown in the dark (weighted down to keep them stumpy), but I thought the cool temperature of our fridge would stop the lentils growing. After all, the text books say a minimum temperature of around 5 o C is needed for plant growth. That puts them firmly into my Against the Odds series too ;) The shoots are etioliated as expected, but I'm surprised the tiny leaves are green rather than the chlorotic yellow usually seen when plants grow in the dark. Perhaps the occasional burst of light as we go to the fridge for milk or whatever is sufficient for chlorophyll producti...