Make the most of these tried and tested tips from experienced gardeners.
Image source: welcomia
A great way to get the most from your garden is to follow the advice and guidance of generous gardeners who’ve already been there and done it. Here we bring you some top growing tips from expert gardeners and bloggers – green fingered folk who know their onions.
Keep your veg plot brimming over with delicious produce with these handy tips!
Image: Steffi Pereira
From one man who likes his veg Tudor style to another who loves to grow Tomatillos, and on to other green fingered folk with handy hints to share, here we bring you awesome veg growing tips from people in the know – veg gardeners and bloggers from across the country.
Swiss Chard “Bright Light”
Image source: London Plantology
Your greens no longer have to be green! Recent research indicates that some of the healthiest “greens” are actually purple, red and yellow. With new varieties of tasty salads and vegetables increasingly available, it’s so easy to create a feast for your eyes at the same time as excitement for the palate.
Spring is the ideal time to grow a range of vegetables for delicious salads. The temperature is not too hot and and the soil is just warm enough for seeds to germinate. This year I’m growing quick crops like radishes, spring onions, lettuce and all year round vegetables like Swiss chard, kale and Mexican tree spinach.
Lettuce is always on my list. I love fresh leaves, picked with my own hands, and they taste so much more delicious than any shop-bought greens. Lettuce grows well in containers making it an ideal crop for a small urban garden, balcony or windowsill. I prefer loose-leaf varieties as they’re quicker to mature and I can harvest a few individual leaves at a time – just enough for my lunch or a sandwich.
I start my growing season in early spring by sowing “Salad Bowl Mixed” lettuce. One of the fastest to grow, it takes only eight weeks from sowing to cutting and has beautiful green and purple oak-shaped leaves.
My other favourite lettuce is Lollo Rossa, a decorative loose-leaf variety from Italy. Crisp deep red leaves have a nutty flavour and look great on the plate when combined with wild rocket, purple basil and fan-shaped “Reine de Glace” lettuce. I sow both varieties in April and they supply me with tasty leaves throughout the summer.
I can’t imagine my kitchen garden without Swiss chard and kale. These greens are winter-hardy and started in the middle of summer will produce leaves well into the next spring helping to avoid a dreadful “hungry gap”. There are many colourful varieties to choose from and I like to experiment with a new variety every season. Swiss Chard “Bright Lights”, “Scarlet” kale and “Midnight Sun” kale are among my favourites.
Yellow Radish “Zlata”
Image source: London Plantology
Bringing a variety of flavour, texture and colour, root vegetables like radishes, beetroot and carrots are a great addition to the summer salads.
Radishes are one of the first vegetables I sow directly in the soil. The secret to a good radish? Grow them in a cool location with plenty of water – perfect for the British spring. “Rainbow Mix” radish can be sown as early as March and harvested in 4 weeks. It’s a fun variety to try with kids and contains purple, red, yellow and white coloured radishes in one packet. You never know what colour your next one will be! Gold “Zlata” and “Pink Slipper” are summer radishes that are slow to bolt. Their roots are juicy and radiant, even in the hot weather, and I start them every couple of weeks from May to September. Pale yellow and bright pink radishes mixed with green and purple lettuce look stunning and taste refreshing on warm days.
Beetroot is another great vegetable to begin your gardening adventures with. Performing well in any soil, it’s easy to grow, packed with antioxidants and gives you two delicious crops from the same plant. Beet leaves with bright red stems not only bring colour to the kitchen but many health benefits too. They are high in iron, magnesium and vitamins B6 and K. Purple-red roots have an earthy taste produced by the organic compound geosmin. Some people like it and some don’t, but I personally find this flavour adds an extra dimension to summer dishes. Try the yellow beet “Boldor”; the non-staining, white heritage variety “Albina Vereduna”; or beetroot “Chioggia” with its red and white ‘bullseye’ rings for a tasty alternative to traditional purple beets.
When I was a child, carrots were orange. Boring and orange. Nowadays carrots in my veg patch are nothing like that. From red and yellow to almost black, I’m discovering new varieties to get excited about all the time. The soil in my garden is a heavy clay with lots of stones, so not ideal for carrots. I use containers half-filled with compost and half-filled with sand, instead. Carrot “Sweet Imperator Mix” with thin long roots can be sown thickly in the container and comes in a variety of colours – white, cream, golden, red and purple. Other colourful varieties I like are “Red Samurai” and “Cosmic Purple”.
Nasturtium ‘Strawberries and Cream’
Image source: London Plantology
Plants must work hard and provide multiple benefits to earn their place in small gardens. Edible flowers are pretty, attract pollinators and bring a bit of zing to summer salads. There are many edible flowers available: Borage, Calendula, Viola, Bee balm, pea and bean flowers and many kind of herbs. I grow nasturtium and chives year after year in my London garden.
Nasturtium is a truly versatile plant whose leaves, flowers and seed pods are all edible. The leaves and flowers have a peppery taste that is ideal for spicing up salads. This year I’m trying the ‘Strawberries and Cream’ variety with big peach cream flowers. Nasturtium is a magnet for aphids and blackfly and I planted it among peas, beans and courgettes to keep my veg safe and improve pollination. Around August, I’ll collect the unripe green seed pods for pickling. Pickled in white wine vinegar they make great capers – sharp and salty – but don’t forget to leave some seeds for next growing season!
Nasturtium seeds
Image source: London Plantology
Chives are a low-maintenance perennial herb forming neat clumps of green shoots as early as February. The leaves have a mild onion-like flavour and are delicious served in butter with new potatoes. The flowers are also edible and buzz with bees throughout the summer. Purple and pink in colour, they’re an attractive garnish for salads and fish dishes. Like nasturtium, chives are good companion plants in the kitchen garden. The onion smell repels carrot flies which improves both the growth and taste of your carrots.
With a regular sowing of colourful vegetables every few weeks, you can have a rainbow of “greens” to fill your plate all summer long! Keep discovering new exciting varieties to grow and eat, and share your favourites in the comments below.
How do you enjoy your colourful salads? Are there any veggies you like to include that we’ve missed? Be sure to let us know on our Facebook page – we’d love to hear from you! In the meantime, check out what else you can grow by visiting our salad hub page for crop recommendations and growing advice. Find specific beetroot and chard growing tips at our dedicated hub page.
About the author
Sasha Ivanova is an urban gardener, blogger, and martial artist. Passionate about propagation and growing from seed, she grows all her plants in a small London back yard. Her research has led her to cultivate unusual edible plants, as well as experimenting with fruit trees in what she describes as a ‘garden without trees’. Read more at her blog, londonplantology.substack.com
Sasha Ivanova is an urban gardener, blogger, and martial artist. Passionate about propagation and growing from seed, she grows all her plants in a small London back yard. Her research has led her to cultivate unusual edible plants, as well as experimenting with fruit trees in what she describes as a ‘garden without trees’. Read more at her blog, londonplantology.substack.com
Ponds are great way to attract wildlife to your garden.
Image source: Svetlana Foote
A pond will attract a variety of wildlife into the garden such as frogs, damselflies, dragonflies, water boatman and pond skaters. Many different types of birds will visit for a bath and a dip; I even had a kingfisher dive in for a fish.
But what should you do if your pond looks like a bowl of green soup? The good news is that this can be fixed. Here’s how.
Don’t despair if your pond looks like pea soup.
Image source: Carol Bartlett
The cause of this greening is algae. Usually a pond is fairly clear over winter until spring arrives and the ecology starts to change. As temperature and sunlight levels increase, the water warms up, blooms of algae appear, and your pond turns green.
For algae to thrive in your pond it needs sun, minerals and nutrients to feed on. The key to maintaining clear water is to create an ecological balance which reduces these elements, in turn, inhibiting the algae.
Use plants to reduce the amount of sunlight that reaches the water.
Image source: Dirk Ott
Cutting down the amount of sun on your pond will make the conditions less suitable for algae. This may seem counterintuitive since most pond plants like a good amount of sun. So to keep algae in check you’ll need to come up with a clever way to reduce the amount of sunlight to the water without shading the plants.
The answer is to cover a good part of the pond’s surface with plants that will act as a shield to the water underneath. Floating plants, submerged plants and water lilies are ideal. You should aim to cover about half of the pond’s surface.
Scoop any fallen leaves from your pond to reduce nutrients in the water.
Image source: Sinica Kover
Algae feed on the nutrients in your pond, so reducing nutrients in the water will inhibit algae growth. Avoid constructing a pond near deciduous trees and shrubs. When leaves fall into a pond they sink to the bottom, rot down and make the water more nutrient rich. In addition they also release toxins which pollute the water and endanger pond life. If leaves do fall into the pond, it’s best to skim them off with a net and remove.
It may be tempting to use ordinary compost when planting into a pond, but it’s full of nutrients. It’s better to use sterile aquatic compost which is free from peat and nutrients wherever possible.
There is also the thorny issue of whether to introduce fish. Fish are attractive, but they excrete, which adds nutrients to the pond and feeds the algae.
Water Crowfoot is a good oxygenating plant.
Image source: Zoltan Major
Algae grows fast and can rapidly deplete the water of oxygen. It’s important to oxygenate the water to support the plants and wildlife which in turn keep the water clear. Submerged oxygenating plants are invaluable to the natural balance of the pond. Try things like ranunculus aquatilis (water crowfoot), hottonia palustris (water violet), potamogeton crispus (curly pondweed), and myriophyllum verticillatum (milfoil). They will also help support the algae-eating animals, such as water snails and tadpoles.
Most oxygenating plants grow well, but depending on your local conditions, you may have to try several to establish which grow best. Most are easy to control so they shouldn’t get out of hand. However, do bear in mind that some oxygenating plants are invasive. Things like parrots feather, have the potential to escape and overwhelm native plants.
A fountain or a waterfall makes a lovely water feature. They look good and serve a practical purpose – adding more oxygen to the water. Installing a waterfall or fountain will require a pump which can be combined with a filter and a UV clarifier. These also help to keep the water clearer.
If planting water lilies, remember that they don’t like being splashed, so arrange fountains accordingly.
This pond has a concealed pump and filter system.
Image source: Del Boy
It’s part of the natural pond cycle that early in the season there will be an algae bloom, when the water first warms up. Then the oxygenating plants start to work, the vegetation grows and the lily pads will spread over the pond surface. Within a week or two the green bloom fades and the water becomes clear. The period of green should be limited to a couple of weeks early in the season. If it continues beyond a few weeks, here are some other things to bear in mind.
The size of a pond can affect its natural balance. A larger pond will maintain its natural balance more easily while small, shallow, under-planted ponds will heat up faster and suffer more from algae.
I have found barley straw effective, although it doesn’t seem to work for everyone. The straw decomposes in the water inhibiting the growth of algae.
A pond filter can be very helpful to remove algae. If you have a significant number of fish, a filter is essential to maintain good quality water and to ensure that fish excreta doesn’t feed the algae. It is important to buy the right size of filter for the volume of water (determined by the size and depth of the pond), and number of fish to be stocked in the pond. Specialist suppliers offer advice on this.
There are chemicals which can be added to the water, but I’m not happy to add them to a pond which is full of wildlife. It is a matter of personal choice. The sustainable way forward is to build up the ecological balance in the pond so that it naturally takes away the algae.
With a little effort, it is possible to have an algae free pond. Apart from the early spring bloom, algae is not inevitable as long as you have a few tricks up your sleeve to keep it at bay.
Carol Bartlett has been gardening for over 30 years creating many different types of gardens. Her website, The Sunday Gardener, was set up over 10 years ago to provide practical down-to-earth advice, especially for new gardeners, no matter what size their garden or vegetable plot. She also aims to inspire others to enjoy gardening and reap the benefits of being outside with nature.
Carol writes the website information herself, and most of the images have been taken in her gardens or those she has visited. The idea is to show plants in an authentic garden setting. Her philosophy is that gardening is a great combination of the therapeutic and practical. It is a cliché, but still true, the garden is a haven in which to escape day-to-day pressures. You can follow Carol on Facebook and Instagram and watch her helpful videos over on YouTube.
This ornamental garden consists of flowers and leafy vegetables.
Image: Arjuna Kodisinghe
Picking your own fruit, vegetables and herbs is one of the highlights of the gardening year, but you don’t have to turn your garden into an allotment in order to grow and harvest your own food. There are many ways to grow crops within an ornamental framework, so that your garden – whatever its size – can be a beautiful and productive space.
Rosemary hedges can be left natural or kept low and trimmed neatly.
Image source: Shutterstock
Native edible hedges create valuable habitats for wildlife and provide a range of crops like cherry plums, hazelnuts, sloes, elderberries and rosehips. Even if you don’t have room for a large hedge you can try edging beds and borders with step-over apple trees which will create low boundaries and provide fruit within the first few years.
Rosemary and lavender can be used as edible hedging to give definition to different areas of the garden. My narrow front garden is trisected by a rosemary hedge (Rosmarinus officinalis) to create three distinct gravel planting areas. In the winter the hedge provides evergreen structure and during the summer months, perennials fill the space and the hedge all but disappears beneath a colourful meadow. We use the rosemary leaves in soups, stews, on the barbecue and to garnish homemade chips.
If you like the idea of a low edible hedge with a box-like appearance, you could try growing a myrtle relative – the Chilean guava (Ugni molinae). This evergreen shrub likes a sheltered spot in acid soil and is hardy down to around -10°C . It has small dark green leaves which develop a deep red autumn colour and has deliciously fragrant white bell flowers in summer, followed by small red berries. Not only are the berries one of the tastiest fruits in our garden (they were Queen Victoria’s favourite fruit), they also ripen in October offering fresh flavour at a time when all the other fruit has passed into winter hibernation.
A row of contemporary pots planted with cavolo nero would make a striking statement.
Image source: Ruud Morijn Photographer
We tend to focus on the productivity and taste of our fruit and vegetables, but many also have ornamental flowers and foliage which can add beauty to a garden. Blueberries thrive in pots and if your soil is alkaline like mine, growing blueberries in containers is a practical way to grow this acid-loving shrub. In addition to their delicious, healthy fruits, blueberries have delicate white flowers in late spring and the foliage turns a rich red in autumn, meaning this is a plant which combines beauty and utility throughout the seasons.
Colourful vegetables like Swiss chard ‘Bright Lights’, purple kohl rabi ‘Kolibri’ and cavolo nero will grow well in containers – you can grow one type repeated in individual contemporary pots for the minimalist look or add them all to one large pot with an underplanting of thyme or edible annual flowers, for a more cottage garden effect.
Calendula ‘Snow Princess’ is a popular edible plant.
Image source: Nic Wilson
Most annuals are easy to grow and fit well into small spaces in borders, containers and vegetable beds. Nothing looks and tastes better on hot summer days than a fresh salad decorated with edible petals. One of our favourite edible flowers is the nasturtium with its peppery leaves and seed pods which we pickle as an alternative to capers. We grew Nasturtium majus ‘Cream Troika’ last year alongside tumbling tomatoes in hanging baskets – the buttery yellow flowers with red centres trailed lazily over the edges, lasting all through the summer.
English marigold (Calendula officinale) is another easy annual. The flowers range from the vivid orange and yellow ‘Power Daisy Orange/Yellow’ to the muted tones of two of my favourite varieties – ‘Snow Princess’ and ‘Sherbert Fizz’. The petals look appealing in salads, adding a light peppery flavour. Calendula readily self-seeds, so not only will you have edible flowers in the future, but each year brings different colours and shades as the plants readily cross-pollinate.
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.
We hope this article has inspired your ornamental-edible planting scheme. If you’re keen to discover more information and advice on growing blueberries, visit our helpful hub page. And if you like the idea of using brightly-coloured stems of chard to bring your borders to life, head to our dedicated page of beetroot and chard-growing information.
