by Nic Wilson | Nov 9, 2018 | Gardening Posts, Winter gardening
Red berries look glorious against a variegated silver leaf for the winter season
Image: dogwooddays
Once the last of summer’s flowers have faded, it’s tempting to discard the plants, store the hanging baskets behind the shed, and give up until spring. But that would be to miss out on the colour, texture and form offered by dwarf evergreen shrubs and winter perennials, annuals and bulbs.
My own hanging baskets are limping sadly towards the end of autumn. The trailing Nasturtium ‘Milkmaid’ is still blooming bravely in the face of the chill November breeze, but my petunias are disintegrating and the verbena has just closed its final flower spike. Replacing these fading blooms is a quick and easy November task that will ensure cheerful colour and interest during the chill months to come. Here are two of my favourite winter hanging basket colour schemes for inspiration.
Browse the full range of winter bedding plants at T&M for even more ideas.
Lime green and gold hanging basket
The striking dwarf lemon cypress adds structure and texture
Image: dogwooddays
Create a warm atmosphere on even the coldest day with bright lime green and variegated gold foliage. Dwarf Lemon Cypress (Cupressus ‘Goldcrest’) adds height to the centre of a hanging basket with striking lime green foliage and a conical shape. Slender sweet flag grass (Acorus gramineus ‘Ogon’) is another option to add height to a container display. Its soft semi-evergreen lime leaves cascade from the centre of the basket and blend beautifully with other lime foliage or darker colours, like the smaller black mondo grass (Ophiopogon planiscapus ‘Nigrescens’.)
Add heuchera foliage for interesting shapes and colours – one of my favourite varieties is ‘Marmalade’ which has lime green and brown leaves that mature to warm oranges and pinks. Or try the heucherella trailing collection for a mix of lime, red and purple leaves that will cover the edges of the basket and soften the display.
Ivy is also ideal to trail over the edges of any hanging basket and Hedera helix ‘Goldchild’, with its olive-green lobed leaves edged in gold, will pick out the lime and gold highlights elsewhere in the display. You can add more colour for early spring by planting some Crocus ‘Yellow Mammoth’ bulbs now for a hanging basket that will really light up your entrance until the warmer weather returns.
Red, white and silver hanging basket
A winning combination of red, white and silver
Image: Thompson & Morgan
This vibrant colour combination spreads a little Christmas cheer throughout the entire holiday season. As a central focus, choose the evergreen Checkerberry (Gaultheria procumbens) whose bright scarlet berries follow delicate white bell-shaped flowers. Or try Skimmia japonica ‘Rubella’ – another dwarf shrub with red berries and glossy dark green leaves. Both of these shrubs prefer acid conditions, so fill the basket with peat-free ericaceous compost and water with rainwater where possible.
Red cyclamen complements the scarlet berries of the shrubs perfectly, or go for a mix of white and red to create more variety. Snowdrops bring a touch of class to this display and have the advantage that you can look up into the exquisite flowers rather than having to lie on the ground to explore their intricate patterning! Finally, add the shimmering beauty of Heuchera ‘Prince of Silver’ to enjoy its large silver-green leaves patterned with dark purple veining.
For a flash of excitement come the spring, try adding lesser periwinkle (Vinca minor f.alba ‘Gertrude Jekyll’) with evergreen foliage and starry white flowers for trailing interest. Or choose another ivy – Hedera helix ‘Glacier’ with dark green and silvery grey leaves.
Selecting primarily shrubs, perennials and bulbs for your container displays is a sustainable option as, in late spring, the baskets can be put to one side to rest until the following autumn. Alternatively, transplant the plants and bulbs to a position elsewhere in the garden for another burst of seasonal colour next winter.
Find hanging basket care guides and planting tips at our dedicated hub page, but if you’re not confident in your ability to put together a cohesive colour scheme, simply order one of our high quality pre-planted hanging baskets. No-one will ever know! For more ideas on how to brighten up your garden over winter, visit our winter flowers hub.
Nic Wilson is a writer, garden designer and Garden Media Guilds Awards nominee (Beth Chatto Environmental Award, 2019). She enjoys growing flowers and unusual fruit, vegetables and herbs, and loves to encourage nature into the garden. She blogs at www.dogwooddays.net, and Guardian Country Diarist based in North Hertfordshire.
She works for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine and her writing has featured in anthologies, journals and magazines including The English Garden, The Garden (RHS Magazine), BBC Wildlife Magazine and the John Clare Society Journal.
by Nic Wilson | Oct 18, 2018 | Gardening Posts
The top of Nic’s green-roof bin store in all its glory.
Image source: dogwooddays
So your flowerbeds are full, the greenhouse is overflowing, there’s no more room for pots on the patio and every vertical surface in the garden is covered in foliage. How do you find space for new plants and enjoy the thrill of a fresh challenge in the garden?
The answer? A green roof bin store. As well as screening your unsightly plastic monstrosities from view, a custom-made green-roof bin store provides the perfect place to grow attractive, scented and edible plants for instant kerb appeal and a lasting first impression. Here’s how I designed mine…
How to build a green roof bin store
Nic’s bin store was inspired by this version in the RHS Community Garden at Hampton Court.
Image source: dogwooddays
Inspired by the RHS Greening the Grey Community Garden at Hampton Court Flower Show back in 2015, I fell in love with their fabulous bin store with a thyme and wild strawberry green roof.
Working with a local carpenter, I created my own version of a green roof store that would accommodate two bins and give me room to grow plants on the top and up the trellis sides. I also planned a selection of different sized holes in the side panel for solitary bees. Over the last three years these holes have been used regularly. I often see bees going in and out with their mud pellets blocking the holes.
Once the bin store was complete, I lined the top with heavy duty plastic sheeting and covered this with 20mm gravel to improve the drainage. I left a hole at the back through which the water could drain down a hose to the ground and screwed an upturned tea strainer over the hole to prevent blockages. I filled the rest of the top with a low-nutrient green roof substrate based on crushed recycled brick and green waste compost – and I was ready to plant it up.
Best plants for a green roof
Miniature succulents look stunning on a sunny ‘green roof’.
Image source: dinodentist
The bin store is in full sun, so I chose plants that prefer sunny, well-drained conditions like alpines, succulents and herbs. The sunniest side is filled with lemon thyme (Thymus x citriodorus) and Thymus ‘Silver Queen’, salad burnet (Sanguisorba minor), French tarragon (Artemisia dracunculus var. sativa) and winter savoury (Satureja montana). All have thrived and they are self-seeding on the roof, so I know that the conditions are right for them. Thrift (Armeria maritima) has also done well and self-seeds all over, but perhaps the most successful planting has been the succulents. I positioned them at the front so their delicate foliage and tiny flowers are at eye-level when I pass to empty the bins or get in the car.
In the spring, Sedum ‘Cape Blanco’ and Sedum spathulifolium ‘Purpureum’ have small starry yellow flowers and Saxifraga ‘Buttercream’ adds its soft milky flowers to the mix. During the summer months, Sempervivum arachnoideum sends up pink starry blossom spikelets and I grow annual climbers up the sides of the bin store – this year the trellis has been covered in the apricot shades of Thunbergia ‘African Sunset’ mixed with the deep purple bells of Rhodochiton atrosanguineum.
More than just a screen
Holes for solitary bees have been put to good use.
Image source: dogwooddays
The bin store has been a practical success, but it’s added more than just a screen to the garden. I’ve been able to include plants which struggle in the shadier conditions of the back garden and bring some miniature succulent treasures into the limelight.
Although sedum matting is a great way to cover a green roof, if you’re hankering after extra growing room I’d encourage you to be ambitious and experiment with a range of species – perhaps herbs, alpines and different succulents, or even an elevated wildflower meadow – the sky really is the limit!
If you’ve been inspired by Nic’s green roof and want to try planting up one of your own, visit our hub page for info and advice on growing alpine and rockery plants.
Nic Wilson is a writer, garden designer and Garden Media Guilds Awards nominee (Beth Chatto Environmental Award, 2019). She enjoys growing flowers and unusual fruit, vegetables and herbs, and loves to encourage nature into the garden. She blogs at www.dogwooddays.net, and Guardian Country Diarist based in North Hertfordshire.
She works for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine and her writing has featured in anthologies, journals and magazines including The English Garden, The Garden (RHS Magazine), BBC Wildlife Magazine and the John Clare Society Journal.
by Mark Delaney | Jul 26, 2018 | Blogs we love, Gardening Posts, Gardening Tips
Cotoneaster berries feed birds through even the bleakest winters.
Image source: Artush
If you’d love to encourage wildlife to visit your garden but aren’t sure what plants to grow, this is the place for you. We asked some of our favourite wildlife gardening bloggers for their planting tips and here’s what they came up with – what to grow to encourage birds, bees, moths and butterflies to share your outside space.
Moths
Willowherb is loved by moths and butterflies.
Image source: Real Moment
Nocturnal insects love plants whose scent makes them easy to locate in the darkness. Wildlife blogger Dan Rouse says:
“Plants like lavender are great for attracting moths, which in turn will attract their predators: bats!
Nic who writes Dogwood Days was just a two-year-old in red wellies when her father introduced her to banks of rosebay willowherb alongside the vegetable beds. She says:
“Willowherb brings in moths and butterflies – especially the beautiful elephant hawk moth caterpillars with their extendable snouts.
Another favourite for attracting moths is honeysuckle. Bill at Frodsham Marsh Bird Blog says: “A large potted Honeysuckle is brilliant for attracting many types of moth species on those sultry warm summer evenings, and they in turn provide food for the local bats.”
Butterflies
Attracting butterflies to flutter about your garden is all about planting the right blooming plants whose nectar they’ll sup. Remember – the greater the variety of plants and fungi you grow in your garden, the great the range of butterflies, and other insects you’ll get to see.
Lisa at Edulis Wild Food says encouraging wildlife to thrive is all about “Mimicking nature in her timing and choice of habitat.” In her garden she grows:
“Alexanders, sweet cicely, japonica quince, wild raspberry, wild garlic, primroses, sweet violets, horse mushrooms, chicken of the woods, oyster mushrooms and scarlet elf cups.
Emma at Never Mind the Burdocks, meanwhile favours “ground elder, wild mints, and Galium species such as odorata which fill a borders edges perfectly and are easy to maintain.”
Providing myriad food sources is a great way to garden for wildlife, but if there’s a particular butterfly you’d like to see gracing your patch, often you’ll need to provide a specific food source. Dave at Why Watch Wildlife shares this example:
“A Brimstone is looking for Alder Buckthorn, so think about planting it. Not only will it benefit the butterfly, but in autumn birds will eat the berries too.
Birds and bees
Forget-me-nots are a vital early source of nectar for bees.
Image source: Ian Grainger
As well as enjoying the host of tasty insects living on your wildflowers, birds need winter foodstuffs to keep them going when the nights draw in and the temperature plummets. To help out our feathered friends, Bill says he planted Cotoneaster. He says it’s quite mature now:
“In the winter it retains enough berries to entice the local Blackbirds, wintering Blackcaps and once a small flock of Waxwing to feast on its berries.
Bill says the bees and hoverflies love the alliums he buried last year, and Julie of Garden Without Doors is a great advocate of early wildflowers like: “forget-me-nots, green alkanet and deadnettle”. She says the great advantage of spring flowers is that they’re: “beloved by bees and available to them before other flowers start blooming.”
Worried that by filling your borders with spring wildflowers, you’ll have less blooms to enjoy during the summer months? Don’t be. Julie says:
“Your spring wildflowers will die back in time for other flowers to take over.
Do you have any wildlife-friendly planting suggestions to share? If so we’d love to hear from you. Just pop over to our Facebook page and leave us a message.
In the meantime, we’ll leave the last word to Alan at the Scottish Wildlife Garden who, once the butterflies have enjoyed his thistles, finds they “have delicious, tender, juicy hearts that are quite easy to prepare once you have the knack.” As he says, that’s one way to “Have your garden and eat it”.
by Amanda Davies | Jul 25, 2018 | Gardening Posts
Welcome to Baking Blog. Each month will feature an in-season fruit or vegetable dish to make with a little bit of grow-your-own information on the side.
July is perfect for making Egg-cellent Potato Salad.
With second-lates and main-crop potatoes in abundance grown either in sacks or the ground, why not keep July simple and just enjoy an easy Egg and New Potato salad. This month we are back off to The New Forest in the motorhome for a few days, so a few tubs of of Egg and Potato salad, will make handy lunches for the first few days.
Note – I have not used Salt in the list of ingredients as I do not cook with it, however you may wish to use it, therefore just season to taste.
Prep Time 15 minutes. Cooking Time 20-25 Minutes. Cooling Time 20- 40 minutes or overnight if need be.
Skills Level Easy Peasy.
Utensils.
- Chopping Board.
- Vegetable Knife.
- Electric Steamer.
- Colander.
- Egg Slicer.
- Teaspoon.
- Dessert Spoon.
- 3 Various size bowls.
Ingredients.
- 400g of New potatoes.
- 1/2 Small Onion.
- 150g Fresh or Frozen peas.
- 2 Large Eggs.
- 1/4 Teaspoon of Black Pepper.
- 1/2 Teaspoon of Mixed Herbs.
- 2 Dessert Spoons of Salad Cream.
- 2 Dessert Spoons of Mayonnaise.
Method.
- Wash the soil off the skin of the potatoes then chop them into bite-sized cubes and place in a single
layer on the bottom tray of the steamer, and steam for 20-25minutes. (Or place in a saucepan of cold water, bring to the boil and simmer until tender.)
- Place the eggs in the lower tray of the steamer 15 minutes from the end of cooking the potatoes. (Or boil in a small saucepan for at least ten minutes.)
- Place the peas in the top layer of the steamer for the last 7 minutes. ( Boil a small saucepan of hot water, reduce heat, add peas and simmer for a few minutes until just soft.)
- Drain everything, run the eggs under cold water and peel immediately, before allowing everything to cool fully with n appropriate sized bowls.
- Slice the onion and and mix it with the peas, season with black pepper and herbs.
- Place a spoonful of both Salad Cream and Mayonnaise onto the cold potatoes and mix thoroughly, add the onions/peas gently combine, then add another spoonful of salad dressings.
- Season with more herbs and pepper. Slice the eggs and place on top. Refrigerate until use. Will last about three days.
Serving Suggestions.
- Add some turmeric and paprika and eat as a side dish at a hot and spicy BBQ.
- Mix dried mango, dried apricots a small apple and raisins with cream cheese in a baguette, pack it along with the potato salad and eat it out on n the fresh air watching the sunset.
- Morning munchies – eat with leftover cold sausages, and a cup of coffee/tea for breakfast.
Grow Your Own.
It’s not too late to grow potatoes now with plenty of late varieties available, I even start potatoes off in September to have new ones on Christmas Day.
Potatoes do best on open sunny ground, but I grow mine in deep sacks. They will grow in an old plastic or metal dustbin so long as there are sufficient drainage holes. Place 4 inches of compost in the bottom of the sack, add three seed potatoes, sprinkle over some fertiliser, (according to the packet directions) then cover with another 4 inches of soil. Each time the stalks grow through the soil, add more compost (earth up) until the sack is 3/4 full. Water regularly. Potatoes do not like to dry out, but neither do they like to sit in wet soil.
Once the potatoes have flowered (12-16 weeks) cut the stalks to soil level, then dig up the potatoes after ten days.
Leave them to dry then wash the skins, dry again and store in a cold dark place.
*Easy Peasy – Basic techniques/Suitable for Children with adult supervision/help.
**Treat as Tender – Intermediate Skills required/Children may need more help with this.
***Seasoned Kitchen Gardener – Confident Baker/Children might not be suited to this.
My name is Amanda and I live in Pembrokeshire with my fiancé and our garden is approximately 116 meters square. I want to share with you my love for gardening and the reasons behind it, from the good to the bad and ugly. I want to do this for my own personal pleasure. If you would like to take the journey with me then please read my blogs and share with me your gardening stories.
by Nic Wilson | Jul 24, 2018 | Gardening Posts
Discovering the wonder of nature is a lifelong journey.
Image source: Oksana Kuzmina
My own childhood memories of high summer are filled with light, scent and taste: my dad’s mesembryanthemums with their candy-coloured faces following the sun, honeysuckle perfume saturating the evening air and summer raspberries still warm as I popped them in my mouth.
I was lucky enough to spend my childhood summers playing in a third-of-an-acre garden with apple trees, flower borders, a vegetable plot and a wild area where I was often to be found, at the top of the Scots pine, with an apple and a book.
Modern gardens are getting smaller, and more families are living in urban settings, often with only a balcony or window ledge for outside space. So how can we engage today’s youngsters with plants, nature and the outdoors, especially during the long summer holidays?
How to create a natural den
The Scots pine canopy of my childhood was a special private place – the kind of secret outdoor space that many children like to create around themselves. But there are no mature trees in our small garden, so I planted a willow den for my kids as a place where they could be alone with nature. Willow dens are created by using whips (young, thin willow rods) that will root when driven into the ground and kits can be purchased from specialist suppliers to train into wigwams, domes and tunnels. As they mature, the foliage cover develops and entirely screens the centre of the den from the outside.
My children loved their den. We have fond memories of eager faces appearing from the entrance playing ‘peepo’ and small hands thrust through the foliage to wave at us from within. Willow likes fairly damp ground and our den finally perished after six years as the soil is a little too dry, but in ideal conditions these dens will last for years.
How to sow the magic of seeds
Tomatoes you’ve grown yourself are the best tasting tomatoes in the world.
Image source: Romrodphoto
There’s nothing like the magic of watching seeds germinate and develop bright blooms for flower pressing or tasty salad leaves. Getting kids involved in growing from seed can be the start of a lifetime’s fascination with gardening and it’s easy to grow plants like marigolds, lettuce leaves or tomatoes in a container or on a windowsill. If you haven’t sown seeds with the kids yet, it’s not too late. French beans, radishes and beetroot seeds can be sown as late as July, or alternatively you can buy tomato, courgette and pepper plants which will bear fruit throughout the summer.
This year we’ve been growing nasturtiums, calendula, cherry tomatoes and peas so the children can make simple salads garnished with edible petals. We also pickle the nasturtium pods as an alternative to capers – a peppery addition to pasta and pizza. As they eat their way through the vegetable bed, the kids are definitely developing more adventurous tastes and learning about where their food comes from.
How to get up close with wildlife
Nature is filled with beauty when you take time to observe.
Image source: altanaka
There’s a whole world in even the tiniest patch of grass or flowerbed: spiders, woodlice, ants and hoverflies are all easy to spot when you stop and observe the garden close up. We’ve had tawny mining bees in our small lawn this summer, exciting visitors that we’ve been watching as a family and the kids have a magnifying pot so they can examine the patterns on a snail shell or the detail of a ladybird’s wing.
A container in a sunny spot filled with lavender, salvia, agastache, dwarf buddleja or herbs like oregano and thyme will encourage pollinators into the garden or onto a balcony. Putting food and water out for the birds adds another dimension to the garden, allowing kids to learn more about local wildlife.
One of my favourite garden moments was watching fledgling great tits emerge from the bird box by the shed with my five year old son. He’d watched the adults feeding their young for days and was fascinated by the way the fluffy fledglings kept poking their heads out of the hole before finally flying the nest. When the last great tit left the nesting box, to our amazement, it landed briefly on my shoulder and then headed off over the shed – this kind of experience is a fabulous way to ignite a child’s interest, creating the gardeners and naturalists of the future.
Disclaimer: The author and publisher take no responsibility for any adverse effects from the use of plants. Not everyone reacts positively to all edible plants or other plant uses. Seek advice from a professional before using a plant for culinary or medicinal uses.
About the author:
Nic Wilson is a writer, garden designer and Garden Media Guilds Awards nominee (Best Blog, 2017). She enjoys growing flowers and unusual fruit, vegetables and herbs, and loves to encourage nature into the garden. She also blogs at www.dogwooddays.net
Nic Wilson is a writer, garden designer and Garden Media Guilds Awards nominee (Beth Chatto Environmental Award, 2019). She enjoys growing flowers and unusual fruit, vegetables and herbs, and loves to encourage nature into the garden. She blogs at www.dogwooddays.net, and Guardian Country Diarist based in North Hertfordshire.
She works for BBC Gardeners’ World Magazine and her writing has featured in anthologies, journals and magazines including The English Garden, The Garden (RHS Magazine), BBC Wildlife Magazine and the John Clare Society Journal.
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