Growing plants inside – the easy way
1 DAY AGO - Having green fingers is not as complicated as you might thinkAfter months of self-isolating, this Expand
1 DAY AGO - Having green fingers is not as complicated as you might thinkAfter months of self-isolating, this weekend I masked-up and joined the queue for my garden centre. As someone who normally visits nurseries or plant shops at least twice a week, it was a huge relief to be surrounded by all the greenery. But perhaps what was even more exciting were the enormous numbers of young people waiting patiently in line to get a houseplant fix. Working in an industry that has struggled for decades to figure out how to make itself relevant and accessible to those under 50, it’s wonderful to finally see a new generation discovering the joys of the natural world through indoor gardening.But with so much frankly terrible advice on houseplants out there (ironically on the very social media platforms that have created this new flowering of interest), I also had to repress the desperate compulsion to advise the 20-somethings on the plants they were buying. However, doling out unsolicited advice is a bit Collapse
What can I do with a glut of broad beans? | Kitchen aide
6 DAYS AGO - If your green fingers have been busy during lockdown, you may well now have a sackful more broad Expand
6 DAYS AGO - If your green fingers have been busy during lockdown, you may well now have a sackful more broad beans than you bargained for. Here are some creative, storable, freezable ideas to deal with the glut• Do you have a culinary dilemma? Email feast@theguardian.comThis is my first year growing broad beans, and I’ve got so many. Any ideas what I can do with them?Liz, NorthamptonshireNothing says summer quite like the unzipping of those fluffy jackets, so this is a nice problem to have, Liz. The good news is that, whatever their age, broad beans always have a use. Chef Henrietta Inman, who cooks and bakes using only natural, locally-sourced ingredients, eats the young pods whole, raw with butter and salt (you could add chopped mint, too), with bagna cauda or a pulse-based dip. That doesn’t automatically mean chickpeas, though: “There are so many other interesting beans and pulses growing in the UK,” she says. Her favourites come from Hodmedods, pioneer of UK-grown pulses, from quinoa to Collapse
How to grow Mexican fleabane | Alys Fowler
04/07/2020 - These daisy-like flowers will happily self-seed to bring beautiful disorderThe delicate, Expand
04/07/2020 - These daisy-like flowers will happily self-seed to bring beautiful disorderThe delicate, daisy-like flowers of Mexican fleabane, Erigeron karvinskianus, need little introduction. It’s the plant of walls and pavement cracks that, if happy, will seed itself effortlessly into improbably small spots. The first time I became aware of it was when I had to mow the ridiculously perfect strips of lawn that sit either side of Wisley’s formal pond – a task I was always going to fail, because I am not the sort to make straight lines. I wasn’t doing badly at the start, but veered off wildly when I saw this little daisy spilling out down the steps: after all the restrained formality of rectangles, planes and lines, here was a wild thing cascading with gay abandon. Related: How to grow cucurbits: pumpkins, courgettes and cucumbers | Alys Fowler Continue reading... Collapse
To grow the tastiest herbs, treat ’em mean
28/06/2020 - Be lazy, water and feed far less, they will thank you for itWhen it comes to growing your own, Expand
28/06/2020 - Be lazy, water and feed far less, they will thank you for itWhen it comes to growing your own, it’s hard to find a better bang for your buck than with herbs. Not only are they gram-for-gram the most expensive crops in the fruit and veg aisle, but in most cases they are also hands down the easiest to grow. And, for a range of solid, scientific reasons, they will have measurably stronger flavour than almost anything you can buy in the supermarket. So here are a botanist’s simple tricks to grow herbs for truly unbuyable flavour.To improve the flavour in herbs, you have to understand why the plants produce it in the first place Continue reading... Collapse
I've decided what to do with the rest of my life: grow a lemon tree
24/06/2020 - My first attempt at nurturing one from seed looked promising, but ultimately failed. Armed with Expand
24/06/2020 - My first attempt at nurturing one from seed looked promising, but ultimately failed. Armed with expert advice – and hopefully enough years – I’m trying againYou know you’re getting on a bit when you find yourself paying attention to Gardeners’ Question Time on Radio 4. I’ve been dimly aware of it for ever, but never actually listened properly, other than to gently scorn the twee Britishness of it. And, of course, to wonder at the name of one panellist: Bob Flowerdew.I’ve turned the corner from fond mockery to rapt attention in a surprisingly short amount of time – a matter of minutes. It happened on a Sunday last month when I had left the radio on by mistake. Someone had written in with a question about what might grow well in a pot on a terrace facing north-west. At this, my ears pricked up like a pair of bamboo shoots. Hang on a minute, I thought, I’ve got a terrace on which some azaleas are thriving. Before I knew it, I was out there with a compass. And, yes, it turns out it is Collapse
‘I’ve felt supported by my plants’: how one exotic garden burst into life in lockdown
20/06/2020 - Visitors are the lifeblood of Jimi Blake’s exotic Irish garden, so what did he do when they had to Expand
20/06/2020 - Visitors are the lifeblood of Jimi Blake’s exotic Irish garden, so what did he do when they had to be kept out?When Jimi Blake closed Hunting Brook Gardens, in County Wicklow, Ireland, at the end of March, he went into a frenzy of propagating. “I’ve grown 1,000 plants from seed,” he says, including the rare umbel, Monizia edulis (a tree carrot that comes from the cliffs of Madeira), squash, sweetcorn, peas and Florence fennel. “I’ve had time to start a vegetable garden, which I hadn’t done in years. I usually spend a lot on plants, but I’ve realised I don’t need to. My polytunnels and greenhouse are as good as a plant fair.” Continue reading... Collapse
The best new outdoors design – in pictures
14/06/2020 - Let’s step outside with some design ideas for your green space or patio Continue reading...
Country diary: last dance of a long-legged mayfly
10/06/2020 - Abbeydale, Sheffield: As it nears the end of its extraordinary life cycle, time is running out for Expand
10/06/2020 - Abbeydale, Sheffield: As it nears the end of its extraordinary life cycle, time is running out for this delicate, short-lived creature to find a mateWhere nature is concerned, expect the unexpected. One day I was listening for cuckoos on the moors above my home, the next I was having surgery on a part of my body I didn’t know existed. After a week in hospital, I was returned to my garden, quietly grateful and as weak as an infant, to lie on the grass in a blissful daze and watch insects busying themselves among the flowers. I had never properly stopped to notice how many and what kinds our little patch supports: bumblebees, among them common carders, miner bees, butterflies, solitary wasps, ants marching over my legs, beetles muscling through the wild strawberries.One small drama in particular held my attention: a single male mayfly, pulsing up into the air and drifting back down. As it floated towards my feet, the mayfly’s elongated front legs, used for grasping the female during Collapse
Doorstep delights: why front gardens matter
07/06/2020 - A place to socialise, an oasis for wildlife, a gift to our neighbours – a front garden can be all Expand
07/06/2020 - A place to socialise, an oasis for wildlife, a gift to our neighbours – a front garden can be all of these things. Isn’t it about time we showed them some love,asks Clare CoulsonLast month, with more time at home than usual, Charlotte Harris, one half of the landscape design duo Harris Bugg, decided to dig up her paved front garden in Newham, east London. “It was a discussion we’d been having for a while,” says Harris, who gardens with her girlfriend Catriona Knox. They’d already removed the paving from the back garden of their house, which is in a densely populated area of the city undergoing vast amounts of regeneration. “Around here every bit of green space feels precious,” she says. “Obviously there are parks, but I think each of us has to take responsibility for any space we have.”As you’d expect in a city, the new front garden needs to work hard to accommodate bins, bikes and a composting hot bin, but Harris is determined to plant as much as possible in the rest of the space, Collapse
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Midsummer daisies to cheer the soul
1 DAY AGO - Summer brings comfort and colour during an anxious tripBack at the beach house. It’s midsummer: Expand
1 DAY AGO - Summer brings comfort and colour during an anxious tripBack at the beach house. It’s midsummer: high sun, quiet Scandinavian sea; a sort of paradise, but also disquieting like in a film. Perfection masking fear.My mother-in-law lives close by. She is 95, recently self-discharged from hospital, the only treatment now tramadol and tea. We bring her to recline on the terrace. Her sick bed, a sun bed; we talk and listen to the reassuring chatter of birds. Continue reading... Collapse
How to be an evolutionary gardener | James Wong
05/07/2020 - Creating a pleasing garden is a matter of following your instinctsI’ve been forever fascinated not Expand
05/07/2020 - Creating a pleasing garden is a matter of following your instinctsI’ve been forever fascinated not just by the natural beauty of plants, but by how arranging them can have a profound effect on the overall aesthetics and, by extension, how they make us feel. As an ethnobotanist, I am obsessed by the evolutionary theories that have attempted to explain what appear to be universal rules underpinning garden design. Once you understand the underlying instincts, becoming a better garden designer is suddenly far more straightforward. We talk about gardens as natural spaces, but they’re the exact opposite: human-made environments engineered using natural ingredients. If they were truly “natural”, we could leave the ecosystem to take its course, letting our plots revert to a wild state – twisted brambles, boggy puddles and all. Ironically, the second we do that these plots stop being real “gardens”. For when you set out to try and define the word “garden”, management is one of the defining Collapse
Country diary: preparing the garden for a much-loved mammal
03/07/2020 - Langstone, Hampshire: Britain’s hedgehog population has declined by a third in urban areas – but Expand
03/07/2020 - Langstone, Hampshire: Britain’s hedgehog population has declined by a third in urban areas – but it’s not too late to take actionFor the past decade, my garden has been enclosed to provide a home for non-releasable blind and amputee hedgehogs. A six-foot perimeter fence kept them safely contained, but presented an impenetrable barrier to their wild kin, so when my last resident, Poppet, passed away at the grand old age of 10 (a hedgehog’s average life expectancy in the wild is two to three years), I signed up to participate in Hedgehog Street, a nationwide conservation initiative empowering people to improve their neighbourhood for these much-loved mammals.Since the millennium, Britain’s hedgehog population has declined by a third in urban areas, but the appearance on my driveway of glistening black droppings packed full of invertebrate exoskeletons gave me hope that I wasn’t too late to take action. A foraging hedgehog can roam up to a mile a night, so ensuring they can travel Collapse
Summer’s high point in the garden | Allan Jenkins
28/06/2020 - Bees are drunk on pollen, flowers are in full bloom, and veg are ready to harvest – it’s time to Expand
28/06/2020 - Bees are drunk on pollen, flowers are in full bloom, and veg are ready to harvest – it’s time to reap the rewards of all your workMore than halfway through the year. The sun soon dipping, just off its high. It is hard at first to see it in the glory of the growth.These are the perfect garden days. Everything exultant; here in its summer splendour. All the work – the digging, the sowing, the hoeing, the weeding, the feeding – paid off. Continue reading... Collapse
Refreshing the rooftop roses | Allan Jenkins
21/06/2020 - Fragrant flowers on the terrace keep the air sweet and scentedI have re-homed some roses. I never Expand
21/06/2020 - Fragrant flowers on the terrace keep the air sweet and scentedI have re-homed some roses. I never keep records so cannot say what they are, beyond one was bought at the Chelsea Flower Show a few years ago: deep-pinked orange, deeply fragrant; the other’s a lemony English shrub rose, name unknown but classic David Austin.They had outgrown their pots and were showing small signs of fatigue. So both are now homed in Kala’s border garden where they will have more room to expand. Continue reading... Collapse
Plantlife: one man went to mow … but maybe he should wait
16/06/2020 - Lawns that are only cut once a month can give low-growing plants a chance to flower, letting Expand
16/06/2020 - Lawns that are only cut once a month can give low-growing plants a chance to flower, letting insects thriveLawn mowers are back in action now that June is wet and the grass is growing again after the spring drought, but it’s worth mowing less often to let wildflowers and their insect pollinators thrive.A survey by volunteers for the charity Plantlife found that 80% of lawns supported the equivalent of about 400 bees a day, attracted to nectar–rich flowers. But lawns cut only once a month gave low-growing plants a chance to flower in profusion, boosting nectar production 10-fold and attracting up to about 4,000 bees a day. Plants such as the daisy, white clover and bird’s-foot trefoil are superbly adapted to growing in short grass, with stems well out of the way of mower blades, but carry on producing lots of flowers every few weeks. If these flowers are cut off, the plants produce more flowers, boosting nectar production. Lawns left completely uncut for several months had an even Collapse
Weeding out horticulture’s race problem
14/06/2020 - Even in the garden, there’s bigotry to be foundOne of the things I love most about gardening is Expand
14/06/2020 - Even in the garden, there’s bigotry to be foundOne of the things I love most about gardening is its ability to cut through social divisions. Tapping into the universal human desire to nurture, as well as our instinctive fascination with the natural world, gardening has the unique ability to transcend gender, class, race, sexuality and political persuasions.So, it may come as a surprise to many people how much of a systemic problem racism is within the seemingly friendly, mild-mannered world of UK horticulture. When one of my best mates recently asked me if I had ever experienced it in our industry, we were both genuinely shocked at each other’s reactions. He to know how frequently it happens to me, and me to discover he had absolutely no idea that this wasn’t something that was wholly confined to the 1970s. But his reaction was totally understandable: it’s not something I enjoy talking about, to be honest. It is not fun, in fact I find it both uncomfortable and tedious to relive, as Collapse
The first chimes of a British summer | Brief letters
08/06/2020 - Labour’s free broadband policy | MP ankle tags | Hand sanitiser | Gardening | Ice-cream vansWhat Expand
08/06/2020 - Labour’s free broadband policy | MP ankle tags | Hand sanitiser | Gardening | Ice-cream vansWhat if Labour had won the last election and implemented its free broadband policy? Would this have gone some way to providing for the “60,000 children in the UK [who] have no internet at home”, and whose schooling has suffered? (Covid-19 makes it clearer than ever: access to the internet should be a universal right, 4 June).Richard BullWoodbridge, Suffolk• With the number of MPs and advisers breaking their own lockdown rules, surely it’s time to impose the wearing of ankle tags on all of them. They could be emblazoned with parliament’s portcullis logo to make them a fashion statement.Richard CoxGroby, Leicester Continue reading... Collapse
Gardens of the galaxy: can you grow vegetables on Mars?
07/06/2020 - With a mission to Mars on the horizon and astronauts spending longer than ever in orbit, Expand
07/06/2020 - With a mission to Mars on the horizon and astronauts spending longer than ever in orbit, scientists are looking for ways to grow vegetables in space...In The Martian, the 2015 film directed by Ridley Scott, astronaut Mark Watney (Matt Damon) is accidentally abandoned alone on Mars by his crewmates after an emergency evacuation, without enough food to survive. Mars is a tricky prospect for even the most red- fingered gardener: there’s almost no air, the “soil” has few nutrients and lots of heavy metals, and the temperature is typically around -60C. “I’m going to have to science the shit out of this,” Watney, a botanist, declares. He decides to grow potatoes, jerry-rigging a climate-controlled dome, burning hydrazine to make water and creating a growth medium from Mars dust supplemented by his crewmates’ faeces.In Star Trek they just replicate food out of pure energyMy husband actually teaches science fiction and fantasy at a local university Continue reading... Collapse
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How to sow Chinese mustard greens for winter salads | Alys Fowler
2 DAYS AGO - Want spicy greens in November? Then act nowIt is my lot in life to be always thinking of the next Expand
2 DAYS AGO - Want spicy greens in November? Then act nowIt is my lot in life to be always thinking of the next season. As you start to get excited about tomatoes, or are becoming ingenious with courgettes, as basil is bursting forth and the jam pan is bubbling over, I want to persuade you to think of the dark, wet nights of November, or those moody slate-grey days in February. I want your summer self to think of your winter one and give it a gift.My present is Chinese mustards. Last year, I fell deeply in love with ‘Nine Headed Bird’ and ‘Dragon’s Tongue’, both from the Real Seed Catalogue), two large mustard greens that brought a sweet, spicy heat to many a meal over winter. I would go so far as to say I feel evangelical about them. Related: How to grow berries | Alys Fowler Continue reading... Collapse
The sowing never seems to stop | Allan Jenkins
05/07/2020 - Although the summer harvest has started, July might be your final chance to plant crops for Expand
05/07/2020 - Although the summer harvest has started, July might be your final chance to plant crops for autumnJuly. The first loss of light – an hour a day by the month’s end. Time for high summer harvest and watering. Time for some urgency amid the satisfaction. Time to plan for winter.Our autumn arrived in the post. Rosa chicories, red and white treviso, puntarelle, and more chervil and parsley to be sown in paper strips and also scattered. A last rush of rocket. Continue reading... Collapse
Tooting's Share Garden reopens!
02/07/2020 - We’re also delighted to welcome back some of our students for respite and therapeutic Expand
02/07/2020 - We’re also delighted to welcome back some of our students for respite and therapeutic gardening. Our priority is their safety and wellbeing and our reduced opening hours reflect this as currently we can only welcome customers when we’re not running student sessions.
Lockdown has been particularly difficult for those with learning disabilities, autism, and other sensory needs. Routine and structure have been disrupted, causing stress and anxiety as people haven’t been able ..... Collapse
How to grow linarias | Alys Fowler
27/06/2020 - These lofty spires of tiny flowers stand tall in the sunniest, driest spotsPurple toadflax came Expand
27/06/2020 - These lofty spires of tiny flowers stand tall in the sunniest, driest spotsPurple toadflax came uninvited to my allotment, as it is wont to do, and got to stay because the bees were so pleased. Linaria purpurea is not native – it hails from Italy. It is, however, widely naturalised and a fan of railway edges, stone walls, concrete cracks and other dry, free-draining spots from which it manages to create lofty spires of tiny purple flowers that look like snapdragons. Continue reading... Collapse
The hidden gardens of lockdown
20/06/2020 - As some of the UK’s best-loved gardens prepare to reopen to the public, we ask the head gardeners Expand
20/06/2020 - As some of the UK’s best-loved gardens prepare to reopen to the public, we ask the head gardeners what has been happening behind their closed gatesThere are benches in the grounds of Knightshayes, a National Trust property in Devon, that head gardener Jess Evans has never sat on. During a normal spring, she’d be busy overseeing a team of six gardeners and 50 volunteers as they tend the walled kitchen garden and 25 acres of formal garden and woodland that surround this grand Gothic Revival house. But this has not been a normal spring. When lockdown was announced, the garden closed its gates and the rest of the team were asked to stay at home.For the next three months, Evans continued to work in the grounds with the help of just one other gardener. And while the lack of helpers meant that she was busier than ever, the absence of visitors also allowed for some moments of reflection, a chance to sit on one of those benches – albeit briefly – or to wander the woodland paths through banks Collapse
The best garden spades to buy today
16/06/2020 - Looking for a new garden spade but don't know which to choose? We've rounded up our favourite Expand
16/06/2020 - Looking for a new garden spade but don't know which to choose? We've rounded up our favourite garden spades to help you choose the right one for you and your garden Collapse
Look up from the garden and enjoy summer | Allan Jenkins
14/06/2020 - It’s not only about sowing and weeding – from sky to pond, life is bursting forthLockdown days Expand
14/06/2020 - It’s not only about sowing and weeding – from sky to pond, life is bursting forthLockdown days mostly start (very) early at the allotment. A walk up the hill, sometimes with Howard and Rose. Usually, though, I am on my own. Just me and the wild things.It has always been quiet here on the crest of the heath but never more than now. The young, handsome fox stands in my way on the path. Alert, mostly unperturbed. As a gesture I will sometimes take a step back. Its ears will flatten happily until it gets bored and slinks away. Continue reading... Collapse
‘I feel as if my garden has finally come of age’ | Nigel Slater
07/06/2020 - After 20 years, three incarnations and some hedge heartbreak, Nigel Slater at long last has his Expand
07/06/2020 - After 20 years, three incarnations and some hedge heartbreak, Nigel Slater at long last has his perfect sanctuary – and without a blade of grass in sightI could barely wait to dig up the lawn. Getting rid of the rectangle of mown grass that passed for a garden was almost the first thing I did when I moved into my new home on a bitterly cold New Year’s Day, 20 years ago. An act of vandalism to some, but to me the patch of brown earth, chips of broken china and old, soil-filled medicine bottles it left behind was just the blank canvas I needed.The wielding of the spade must have been symbolic, because I did nothing more outside for months. I wanted to create a place to think. A green space in which to clear my head in between recipes, or to untangle a knotted sentence. A lawn has its uses as a safe place for children to play, somewhere to kick a ball around or to sunbathe, but it wasn’t the right garden for me. I don’t find inspiration or peace in a neatly edged rectangle of grass. All Collapse
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