The words ‘garden maintenance’ always make gardening sound like a chore, which it should not be. ‘Garden care’ might be more appropriate, as gardening is about nurturing your outdoor space; it should be a labour of love. Of course, it can be physically taxing if you want it to be, and your biceps and stomach muscles might ache, but exercise in fresh air is something to be embraced and enjoyed.
Having your own garden places responsibility on your shoulders, but in a good way. You become custodian of an outdoor living and breathing environment. There are plants that need your help and support to enable them to thrive. Your soil needs to be nurtured and there is an entire mini-ecosystem right on your doorstep, including an abundance of wildlife that depends on your gardening credentials for survival. If taking care of your garden feels like a chore with a list of maintenance jobs to do, then gardening probably is not for you. It should feel enlivening when you step outside, breathing the fresh air and feeling the soil on your hands.
Regular weeding among the bearded iris beds at The Courts Garden, ensures the plants aren’t competing for nutrients and water.
As a gardener for the National Trust I wake up every morning excited to see what has happened in the garden – which plants are thriving, which are struggling. There is always a palpable buzz in the garden mess room each morning when the team pull on their gardening boots and chat about what they are going to do that day. Depending on the season, I can admire the frost on the seedheads in the herbaceous border or a new rose about to burst into flower, a frond fern that is newly unfurled and glistening in the early morning sun, or a spider’s web that has been caught by the overnight dew. Every day is different, the garden moves at pace and it is important to adapt and change plans depending on the weather and how the plants are reacting. Like a lithe gymnast, the gardening mind has to be flexible, reading the evolving landscape like a book and prioritising a list of jobs that need to be done.
Andy Goodwin,
Senior Ranger at Polesden Lacey, Surrey
‘Do think twice about ripping out some traditional weeds – ivy, for example. Although it can affect and compete with some trees, it provides a nesting habitat for birds and a roost site for bats. It’s a great late-season nectar source for insects and its berries provide winter food for wildlife, including small mammals such as wood mice.’
Weeding is one of the main jobs that needs to be done throughout the year. As the climate gets warmer, weeding is becoming a job to be done almost every day in the year, but the main season is from spring until mid-summer. From late summer until early spring the weeding lessens considerably and gardeners are able to turn their hand to other jobs, just occasionally doing a spot of weeding in the milder spells.
A weed is simply an unwanted plant, and in many cases you can enjoy them just as much as the plants that you have bought and grown. Many of the beautiful plants in wildflower meadows could be considered weeds – it just depends on your outlook as to whether you see them as friend or foe. Working for the National Trust with both rangers and gardeners always highlights these differing opinions; the list of weeds that gardeners give to trainees so that they learn how to identify them in the herbaceous border or rockery often contains the same plants as the list that rangers use as highlights for their wildflower walks.
However, there are good reasons for removing weeds in some areas of the garden:
• Weeds will compete with your existing plants for water, nutrients and light. Tall weeds will cast shadows or sometimes completely smother smaller plants, while the root systems will suck moisture and nutrients from the soil, depriving your vegetable and ornamental plants of much-needed sustenance if they are to perform at their best.
• Weeds often look unsightly and scruffy in your garden. Ornamental plants are selected for their aesthetic qualities, and while some weeds can be beautiful, nature’s selection of plants focuses on their ability to survive and adapt to their environment.
• If ragwort is not controlled it will seed into nearby verges and grasslands. As it is toxic, this is a major concern if it spreads into fields being grazed by livestock, particularly horses. Although ragwort is host to the cinnabar moth, there is usually plenty of groundsel about that the larvae can feed on too.
• Most gardens have a design element to them, and weeds that encroach in your flower-beds will destroy carefully choreographed areas, including textures and colour combinations.
• Some of the most pernicious weeds such as ground elder, bindweed and perennial nettles can be a problem if their root systems intrude into the compost heap. The roots will make it impossible to use and if the compost is then spread onto beds, as the roots of the weed can take place there.
• Japanese knotweed is such an invasive ‘garden escape’ weed that it can destroy the foundations of the house. This weed is so serious and hard to eradicate that mortgage companies will often not lend to buyers if a surveyor reports that it is in the garden.
• Himalayan balsam loves moist conditions and smothers nearby wild flowers and ornamental plants. On riverbanks it causes erosion because it out-competes existing plants that have deeper root systems that would help to knit the soil together and prevent it washing away.
There are numerous methods to control weeds and your choice of which to use is partly down to the type of weed.
Perennial weeds are the type that remain in the ground all year round, usually dying back in winter but then re-emerging in spring to wreak havoc in your garden. Removing the leaves and only part of the root system does not kill them – to properly eradicate them, their whole root system has to be destroyed. Some of the more persistent perennials require more than one attack, such as bamboo, bindweed, couch grass, ground elder, horsetail, oxalis and speedwell.
Annual weeds are easier to control and have a shallower root system, but it is important to catch them before they seed everywhere. Ephemeral weeds produce several generations in a year and are treated in the same way as annuals.
Tim Parker,
Garden and Countryside Manager at Chartwell, Kent
‘Weeding is a time-consuming activity which is unpopular with most gardeners, so in our vegetable garden at Chartwell we have been experimenting with different techniques to offer us greater opportunities to concentrate on developing our crops and keeping our kitchen garden fully productive. We use green manures such as phacelia and red clover which will grow rapidly over exposed soil to suppress weeds. If dug in before flowering they will enrich the soil and improve its structure.
As well as green manure, we have been using companion planting as a repellent for unwanted pests around our vegetables depending on their specific requirement: herbs and strongly scented vegetables with our brassica family, marigolds and broad beans with our potatoes, sunflowers and tagetes with our roots, squash with our corn crop and calendula and nasturtiums with our legumes, which, in addition to repelling pests, provide a rich and vibrant spectacle within our walled garden.’
Left to right A daisy grubber is useful tool for removing weeds with tap roots; Hand shears can be used to cut back weeds in awkward places such as beneath benches; A long-handled hoe will save you from having to bend too much.
Daisy grubber A long, narrow, two-pronged hand tool used to pull out long-rooted daisies and weeds, this tool has the advantage that it can dig deep and cause little or no disturbance to the surrounding soil. It proved invaluable in the quest to banish unsightly daisies and weeds from the pristine lawns of the Edwardian country houses.
Hand-held trowels and forks Small hand-held trowels can be used to prise out annual weeds, or perennial weeds that are just establishing themselves with a small root system. Hand-held forks are just as effective, and better for heavy ground as they are easier to work the soil with. They are also useful for lightly cultivating small areas of the ground if you have trodden on areas during weeding, and for breaking up a capped surface.
Hand shears These can be used to cut back weeds around tricky, tight areas where a mower or strimmer cannot reach. Repeatedly cutting back herbaceous perennial weeds can sometimes weaken the plant.
Hoe Used for scraping through the surface of the soil to remove annual weeds, this is one of the most traditional gardening tools. The most popular type is the Dutch hoe, which has a long handle and is pushed back and forth through the soil, severing the plant from its roots. There is also a draw hoe which is used with more of a chopping action, bringing the hoe down behind the plant and drawing the blade towards the user.
Shorter-handled types such as the onion hoe are useful for scraping away weeds. This is best used on a dry day with a light wind to allow the weeds to desiccate on the surface in the sun. If used when the soil is slightly moist, the weeds should be picked up and removed to prevent them germinating again.
Knee protection If you are going to be spending a long time on your knees pulling out weeds, invest in a pair of knee pads. Alternatively, buy a kneeler, which is a cushioned pad to kneel on. The more elaborate ones have handles to help you get up and down and tool racks on which to hang your different weeding implements. Some can be inverted to double as a bench for working at a different height, such as when deadheading roses or collecting seed.
Pronged cultivators Used for loosening up the surface of the soil after it has been walked on when weeding, these usually have three prongs and may have either a long or short handle. They are good for breaking up capping on the surface of the soil, enabling water to penetrate to the roots of plants.
Pronged cultivators; Standard spade and smaller border shovel; Trug and strimmer.
Spade Deep-rooted weeds such as bindweed or ground elder will need digging out. Be warned though, roots of some perennials can go down as far as 1m (3¼ft) under the surface. Be careful not to slice through the roots as anything remaining will regrow. A border spade is slightly smaller than a standard spade, and is a useful tool for digging out smaller weeds or making lighter work of a job as it is not as heavy.
Strimmer A strimmer can be used to cut back invasive weeds but it will not kill them. It is possible to use battery-powered strimmers that are charged by solar panels if you want to avoid using fossil fuels.
Trugs and buckets These are indispensable for putting weeds or tools in. Plastic, colourful trugs can be bought cheaply and are light to carry.
Weed knife A tool that usually has a hooked edge, this is used to scrape between the gaps in paving slabs and in other narrow gaps to pull out weeds.
Wheelbarrow Where would gardeners be without their trusty wheelbarrows? They are ideal for shifting mulch, transporting tools or putting your weeds into. The standard traditional barrow has three wheels but there are other types available, such as the four-wheeled plastic barrows which are sturdier, very light and have a much bigger capacity. It is a good idea to ensure the barrow you prefer will fit down your garden paths before purchasing one.
Tip
Most people in the UK use a traditional short-handled spade with either a T-shaped or D-shaped handle. The reason for these short handles was so that people could work in confined spaces such as in the mines. However, the old-fashioned spade with a much longer handle and a pointed rather than square blade is far more effective. The long handle saves back-breaking work as the weight at the end of the spade can be counterbalanced by using your thigh to support it. It also means less strain on your back as there is no need to stretch into the trench. Finally, the sharp contour at the end of the blade means it slices into the soil far more effectively. It can be used as a shovel or spade.
‘Buy good tools and look after them. You can never have enough buckets to hand – one for annual weeds, one for stones, one for pernicious weeds, one for plants that you’ve lifted and so on.’
Martyn Pepper,
Senior Gardener
at Coleton Fishacre, Devon.
National Trust gardeners enjoy using some of the more traditional skills, reviving what could otherwise be a dying countryside craft. This bill hook is being used to sharpen the ends of hazel rods for training runner beans up.
Garden tools by Tracey Parker, Assistant House Steward at Polesden Lacey
Garden tools are not a modern invention and some of the oldest ones date back to around 10,000 years ago, when the microlith was developed in the Neolithic period. This was basically a small, sharp, stone blade set into a handle made of wood, bone or antler – the first multi-tool!
The Romans first developed the basic pattern for tools such as the shovels and spades we use today when they harnessed the technology of the forge and discovered the process of heating iron to its malleable point. As a result various crude tools began to be developed, but it was not until the middle of the fourteenth century that the smelting of iron made it possible to create lighter, more precisely shaped tools. By the mid-eighteenth century, when popular interest in gardens exploded and gardeners had to be well equipped, catalogues of the time have illustrations of a wide range of unusual and conventional tools and accessories made for specific purposes in the garden. They included hedge shears, pruning shears, cultivating forks and trowels – in fact, almost every non-mechanical gardening tool available today. With the coming of the Industrial Revolution, steel and alloys were developed and this led to the manufacture of tools that were lighter, finer and far more durable. Tools provide us with a direct link to our heritage and when you look at the history of some of the common garden tools that the National Trust gardeners use today you will find that not much has changed in hundreds of years. However, there are some tools that you are unlikely to spot in a National Trust gardening tool shed.
FOLDING TROWEL This is an early twentienth-century trowel and fork that was spring-loaded and made of steel with a coil spring.
RINGBARKING TOOL An Edwardian tool used to remove a complete strip of bark from the entire circumference of a branch or trunk of a tree or woody plant. This technique, known as girdling, was employed to yield larger fruit in the orchards of the country houses, though it resulted in the death of the entire tree over time.
SARCLOIR An early twentienth-century French tool, used for weeding between stones and rocks as well as harvesting crops such as cabbages and lettuces.
No gardener likes to see bare soil left for long in the garden. Except for the vegetable garden prior to sowing, bare soil looks out of keeping, makes the existing planting seem sparse and lessens the potential for wildlife habitats. Although farmers often leave an area to go fallow, or ‘rest’, for a season, bare soil will rapidly be colonised by weeds. It will also be far more susceptible to wind and rain erosion, which can mean all the goodness in your soil being washed away. The one time of year when it can be beneficial is during winter; if the soil has been dug and turned over, the frosts can help to break down large clods in the soil and expose and kill some weed seeds.
Applying a mulch over bare soil has many benefits. Acting like a permeable blanket, it improves the soil, helping it to retain the moisture during dry periods, and suppresses many annual weeds. It will also increase the worm activity in the soil as they come closer to the surface and drag organic material into the root zone.
The best time to put an annual mulch on the border is in early spring. This is when the plants need the biggest boost as they are starting their growing cycle. It is also when the weeds start to grow. Mulching in autumn can be a waste if nothing is being planted until spring as very often the material gets washed away before it is needed. However, newly planted trees and shrubs will benefit from mulching at whatever time of year they are being planted.
Gravel, slate, crushed shells or stones are perfect mulch for dry gardens or herb beds as they retain the moisture, suppress weeds and don’t add excessive nutrients to the soil. They’re unsuitable for vegetable gardens and traditional herbaceous borders which prefer a rich, organic supplement to the surface of the soil.
Manure and garden compost works well as a permeable cover allowing moisture and rain water to seep through, but at the same time, helping to retain it and slow down evaporation. Water the mulch after placing it down to encourage the worms to start taking material into the soil and to reduce having to irrigate later when the season gets drier.
Woodchip spread them around woodland plants but avoid using fresh material. Allow it to rot down a bit first. The chippings help to improve drainage.
Wool fleeces Wool is a natural by-product of the farming industry, and in some rural areas you can get hold of it very cheaply, or even for free. It is permeable yet thick enough to smother out weeds.
Ground-suppressing membranes are useful for smothering weeds in large areas at Sissinghurst, as is woodchip if not used fresh. Wool fleecing is used as a weed suppresent at Nunnington Hall, North Yorkshire.
• Cover up the soil – the best way is simply to get it planted. There is no mulch that can match the benefits of having garden plants in the soil. The foliage helps to shade the soil and cool the temperatures, which in turn will reduce water evaporation. The root systems should help to hold the soil structure together. Choose ground-cover plants to provide a dense, low canopy such as Euonymus, Ballota, Pachysandra, Vinca and Waldsternia.
• Hoe annual weeds or dig them out, ideally before they set seed and spread throughout the garden, otherwise your job will be much bigger next year. Some annual plants can be removed by hand, particularly on light soil – hold them at the base and pull. Groundsel and fat hen can be controlled effectively in this way.
• Dig out and remove the entire root system of perennial weeds to prevent them regenerating.
• Use fabric to cover up bare soil. You can buy black landscape fabrics, but old carpets will do the job. Avoid using carpet with a foam backing it can leach noxious chemicals that can later cause problems in the soil. Synthetic carpet is made of petroleum products that have been treated with chemicals and cleaners, so only use ones made of natural fibres such as wool, jute or cotton.
• A flame gun is a quick way of burning off annual weeds, but they are ineffective against perennials.
• You can use chemical weedkillers if you are not an organic gardener. The systemic chemical treatment containing glyphosate is a particularly effective treatment for herbaceous perennials as the plant absorbs it through the leaves and takes it down into its roots, killing the entire plant. It tends to be most successful on plants with big leaves and is not particularly effective on weeds such as horsetail (Equisetum arvense) which has a waxy surface and practically no leaf target to spray, although bruising or stamping on the stems prior to spraying helps. Do not use it on the lawn to kill weeds as it will wipe out the surrounding grass too. A ready-mixed spray or weed stick can be bought from garden centres. Always spray when there is no or little wind to prevent the weedkiller drifting onto your ornamental or edible plants.
Echinops and ornamental grasses growing in the borders at The Courts.
Euonymus phellomanus provides good ground cover.
Slugs are the bane of a gardener’s life as they can devour seedlings and even entire plants overnight, causing heartbreak for anyone who has worked hard to produce healthy plants only to see them destroyed. Beer traps are a simple and effective way to entice these slimy creatures away from your delicious vegetable patch and herbaceous border and into a cup of delicious beer buried in the soil. The slugs get one whiff of the heady brew, find it irresistible, slither into the container and never crawl out again.
1. Avoid containers with thin, sharp edges as slugs tend not to cross over them. You need a container that has a smooth lip to it, such as a pint glass. Alternatively, use a recycleable cardboard cup that can simply be covered over with soil and left to biodegrade in situ. It saves having to dispose of those slimy pests.
2. Fill the container with beer – it is said that slugs prefer darker stouts with a yeasty aroma, but in my experience cheap lager works just as well.
3. Bury the container in the soil near to the threatened plants. Leave the container just slightly proud of the ground level as this will prevent beneficial creatures such as ground beetles that love to devour slugs scurrying into it. If you are still worried about creatures falling in, put sticks into it as an escape route so that they can crawl out. Slugs will be too drunk to make the effort themselves.
4. Slugs tend to prefer damp moist conditions and will often be more persistent when it rains. To prevent your beer trap becoming diluted with rainwater, place a stone over it, leaving a gap for slugs to crawl under and plop into the beer.
Tip
Bindweed is one of the most invasive weeds in the garden. Because the roots are so difficult to dig out, sometimes the only effective method is to spray the plant with a systemic weedkiller containing glyphosate. However, it can be difficult if it is starting to scramble through your precious plants, as you risk spraying them too. To keep them separate, put bamboo canes in the ground and twist the bindweed on that. Let it grow for a week or two to maximise the amount of bindweed leaf canopy to treat. Spray on a dry day with no wind. This should prevent any of your plants getting hit by the chemical.
One of the essential tasks in the herbaceous border each spring is to prop up your plants to ensure that they do not flop over. The modern planting style often uses large herbaceous plants that will prop each other up, but traditional herbaceous perennials such as lupins and delphiniums will need support if they are not going to collapse, brought down by their profusion of flowers and foliage. Remember to put stakes in place early, otherwise you risk damaging the growing plant.
There are many different techniques to staking and which you choose partly depends on your personal preference but also on the type of plant you are trying to support. Here are a few of them.
Adam Cracknell,
Gardens and Estate Ranger at Ormesby Hall, North Yorkshire
‘After delphiniums have finished flowering in mid-summer, cut them right down to ground level, mulch and water them, and you can then enjoy a second flush of flowers in mid-September. This secondary flush is not usually as dramatic or tall but they are more compact and sturdy and will not need staking.’
• Individual plants with large flower heads such as delphiniums or sunflowers will need individual staking with a bamboo cane or hazel stick. Use a figure-of-eight knot so that the stem does not get damaged against the stake. Tomatoes and peppers are also given a similar support system.
• Garden twine can be used to tie plants up. This is often done on soft fruit bushes such as redcurrants and gooseberries. Push in four canes or hazel rods at each corner of the plant to make a square. Thread string around the four stakes to keep the bush upright throughout summer and prevent the branches snapping under the weight of fruit.
• Natural woven structures, often made from birch brushwood, make a beautiful support. The wood should be harvested in winter, prior to buds and leaves forming on the plants and the onset of the nesting season for birds. Store the brushwood in a dry place until you are ready to use it in the garden.
• Dahlias are often kept upright by running a 10cm (4in) black or green pea net between dahlia stakes, enabling the emerging shoots to grow between the mesh and disguise the sight of the support once fully in flower.
• There are many types of ornamental stakes available to buy from garden centres. Most are made from metal which should last for a few years. Choose brown or green ones as they will not show up in the display.
• Pea sticks are rustic twiggy sticks put next to peas to enable them to scramble up with their tendrils.
Garden and Countryside Manager at Chartwell, Kent
‘Rather than going to the garden centre and buying expensive canes that have been shipped around the world, you can harvest canes locally from overgrown bamboo plantings either in your own garden or from a friend’s planting. This means you can save time and cash which you can use for other parts of your garden. At Emmetts Garden we have a huge bamboo planting so there is no shortage of supply and we use the canes at our sister sites Chartwell and Quebec. Bamboo is a vigorous grower so harvesting some canes won’t leave you short in future years.’
Left and centre Lupins and dahlias both benefit from staking. Above, right Staking peas using hazel twigs.
‘Stake herbaceous plants early, when they are around 15–30cm (6–12in) high, because the taller they get the more difficult they are to control.’
Martyn Pepper, Senior Gardener at Coleton Fishacre, Devon
Staking emerging delphiniums using stout hazel sticks and garden twine.
Throughout the growing year, you can prolong flowering by constantly deadheading blooms as soon as they start to fade. If you allow the flowers to go completely to seed the plant believes it has done its job for the year and stops producing more blooms, so regularly check your borders and remove spent flowerheads to extend the season of interest right into autumn. Plants not to deadhead include vegetable and fruit crops because that will destroy your future harvests, plants that have thousands of small flowers, simply because it is not worth the effort, and plants that provide an attractive autumn display of berries.
Cutting back roses; Petunias should be pinched off; Sweet peas need to be cut regularly.
Bedding plants Most, such as busy lizzies, geraniums and petunias, should have their spent flowers simply pinched off between finger and thumb.
Bulbs Although you should not cut back the foliage until it has died back naturally, removing the flower head on large daffodils will ensure that the energy goes into the development of the bulb and not seed production. However, leave the flowerheads on smaller, naturalised bulbs as they will naturally spread their seed when ripe.
Delphiniums Cut back the flower stems to encourage new ones to grow.
Roses Cut back to a pair of healthy buds further down the stem.
Sweet peas Regularly cut the flowers when they are in full bloom to enjoy their heady scent in flower displays indoors.
One of the most popular techniques for cutting back used by National Trust gardeners is the Chelsea Chop. This means partially cutting back large herbaceous plants during mid-spring with a pair of secateurs or hand shears. There are three reasons for this apparently rather brutal treatment. First, it extends the flowering season of the plant; if you cut back half of a large perennial plant, the section that has been cut back will flower later in the year, while the part that was left will flower during the earlier part of the season.
The second reason is to create a greater depth to the planting scheme. Cutting back half the clump makes the border feel bigger and deeper. The second flush will flower lower down than the plants’ usual height, creating interesting tiers of floral displays.
The third reason is that it makes a much more compact, stouter plant. It is also worth trying this technique if you were plagued by a pest or disease the previous year, since tweaking the time of flowering could help to disrupt the life cycle of a fungus or aphid causing you problems.
The Chelsea Chop gained its name because it is usually carried out about the same time as the world-famous RHS Chelsea Flower Show in May. It is best suited to some of the larger herbaceous perennials such as Echinacea, Eupatorium, Helenium, Monarda and Sedum. Apply it only to healthy plants and avoid it in periods of drought.
Applying the Chelsea Chop to the front section of this vigorous Persicaria superba will make it flower at a lower height than the other part of the plant at the back, creating a more three-dimensional effect to this section of the flower border. Above right Pinching out a tomato plant.
Sometimes it is useful to pinch out the growing tip of a plant. This creates a bushier plant, which in turn should make it produce more laterals and therefore more flowers. This technique is usually carried out when a plant has reached about two-thirds of its intended natural height. It is often done with herbaceous plants such as asters, cosmos, cerinthe, penstemon, osteospermum, fuchsias and sweet peas. It is called pinching out because the shoots should be young and tender enough to pull them off just by squeezing them between your thumb and forefinger. Occasionally side shoots are pinched out too, such as on fuchsias, or on standard plants, like bay trees, to encourage them to bush out more.
A gardener has to keep a vigilant eye out for pests and diseases, which can strike at any moment and ruin a crop or floral display almost overnight. There is little that can be done with some of the more prevalent and virulent problems, but just as your body has built up a healthy immune system to deal with many common germs, a balanced garden can make your plants healthier and stronger, enabling them to combat some of the nastiest of attacks.
Regularly pruning shrubs will avoid congested canopies where the shrubs become susceptible to fungal diseases due to the restricted movement of air. It will also prevent wounds where branches have rubbed together, providing entry points for disease. Watering your plants will help to keep them strong and vigorous so that they can combat pest and disease attacks, while ensuring that plants are planted correctly in healthy soil will help to sustain them in the future.
The treatment of pests and diseases has turned almost full circle back to the practices of the eighteenth and nineteenth century before chemical pesticides and artificial fertilisers were used. Many National Trust gardeners avoid using commercial pesticides in the garden where possible and have returned to traditional, tried and tested natural methods of control.
The use of chemical controls developed apace during the mid-twentieth century, some of which were the results of laboratory testing during the two world wars. It was discovered that some of these deadly chemicals could also be used to kill garden pests, including DTT, nicotines and organophosphates. The treatment was indiscriminate, wiping out any creature that came into contact with the pesticides, including many of the beneficial insects. Thankfully horticultural practice has moved on. After all, destroying the environment and risking human health was hardly considered to be an enjoyable and sustainable outdoor experience.
Most gardeners nowadays focus on creating a balanced ecosystem – instead of chemical warfare in the garden, we tend to work with nature rather than against it. Good plant hygiene and horticultural practice enable many plants to help themselves in combating pests and diseases.
Digging organic matter into the soil creates a healthy environment for plants to grow in. Keep them watered during dry periods so as they are not under stress and susceptible to problems. Also, ensure that there is a good variation of plants to encourage natural predators such as hedgehogs, frogs, toads, shrews, birds and ground beetles to prey upon slugs and snails. This should also encourage natural pest control, such as ladybirds and lacewings which will feed on aphids, and in larger gardens foxes help to control rabbit populations. In many cases, if you let nature take care of itself, it leaves you free to relax and enjoy your garden. Having many different creatures in your garden should help to ensure that not one creature dominates, which is when the problems occur.
The wider the range of flowers that you grow, the wider diversity of habitats to provide insects with homes, food and of course a hunting ground. There will be a few pests in the mix, but they actually make up a tiny proportion of the overall population and number of species that are in the garden. Like a good film, a garden needs the baddies as well as the good guys; pests are an essential part of a balanced food chain and you get a better balance of predators and parasites, and less damage overall, than if you had just eradicated pests with a spray.
There will be times when the natural balance tips in one direction or the other, and when you do have to intervene there are plenty of gentle techniques to reduce the problems. Washing-up liquid can be sprayed to control aphid damage, while garlic sprays can be used for pest control, as a fungicide and to generally increase the health of a plant. Instead of using inorganic fertilisers which has led to the leaching of nitrates into the ground and the water supply, overstimulating algae growth in our rivers and lakes and choking aquatic plants, invertebrates and fish, many gardeners are using natural materials to feed their plants. These include compost tea, or homemade comfrey or nettle tea, supplemented with seaweed extracts, plant oils or plant invigorators. Extracts of citrus can be used to clean the greenhouse, ridding it of lingering pests and diseases before moving plants in over winter.
The Rose Garden at Polesden Lacey on a summer evening.
At Polesden Lacey we apply a three-in-one natural plant invigorator to our plants which helps to combat insect pests such as aphids, mealy bugs and woolly aphids while at the same time reducing fungal diseases. It also contains a foliar feed and leaves no harmful chemical residues.
One of the difficulties in maintaining gardens with historic collections of plants is that many of the older types are not as resistant to modern-day pests and disease, which have evolved in time into more virulent strains. Choosing modern resistant varieties is a good solution, but it could be argued that this compromises the integrity of the historic collections, so it needs to be done with care.
At Polesden Lacey the rose garden is considered to be one of the finest examples of an Edwardian rose design, but there were many problems with the older varieties being susceptible to traditional rose problems, such as black spot and mildew. A compromise was reached whereby newer disease-resistant varieties very similar to the original forms were planted. An example is the classic Edwardian rambling rose ‘Dorothy Perkins’, introduced in 1901 and named by the famous rose breeder Charles Perkins for his granddaughter Dorothy, which had pride of place in this classic Edwardian garden. The National Trust gardeners wishing to maintain the importance of the rose collection have combined some of these beautiful original roses, which had been struggling to grow on the thin, chalky soil of the North Downs, with more modern varieties with better resistance, making the overall display look much better for the 300,000 visitors walking under the rose-adorned pergolas each year.
It is a dog-eat-dog world out there, or rather a bug-eat-bug. There are natural predators that you can buy online and let loose to do the pest control for you, based on the natural order and food chain of life. Encarsia formosa is a parasitic wasp that can be introduced into greenhouses to control whitefly, while tiny microscopic nematodes can be used to control vine weevil which can wreak havoc on the root system of plants, particularly those grown in containers. Nematodes can also be used to control slugs, while the cannibalistic mite Phytoseiulus persimilis can control red spider mite in the greenhouse.
Ladybirds can be bought and introduced to help control aphids, but it is far easier and cheaper to simply make a home for them and you will discover that they find their own way there.
1. Recycle plastic bottles by cutting them in half with a pair of scissors.
2. Roll up corrugated cardboard and push it into the bottle halves.
3. Use a skewer to puncture two holes in the side and thread string through it.
4. Hang the bottles in trees from the string, so that the length of the bottle is parallel with the ground.
These days, fortunately, most of us have a more relaxed approach to plant pests and diseases. There are still some major sources of concern for the health of some of our most popular plants, such as the arrival of ash die-back and sudden oak death, and there will be many more in the future that will need controlling. However, we can have our own outdoor space rich in plantlife and wildlife and enjoy a healthy green environment in which to relax and and enjoy our gardening.
• Mulch around your plants to retain moisture.
• Plant out bulbs for an autumn display.
• Start to cut your lawn, keeping the blades high for the first few cuts.
• Divide herbaceous plants before they come into full growth.
• Cut back winter stems such as cornus or willow in early spring.
• Check your beehives to see how they have recovered from winter.
• Get your plant supports and stakes in place early to support herbaceous plants.
• Prune late-flowering shrubs.
• Sow vegetable seeds.
• Chelsea Chop some of the larger perennials to encourage flowering later in the year.
• Make bug ‘hotels’ for insects to nest in.
• Keep a vigilant eye out for pests and diseases.
• Cut hedges before the nesting season starts.
• Continue to mow the lawns, except for in periods of drought.
• Regularly deadhead flowers to encourage new blooms.
• Check if plants are drying out and water accordingly. New plantings, containers and hanging baskets most need an extra splash of water during dry periods.
• Stay on top of weeding. Try to catch annual weeds before they set seed and spread further.
• Pinch out young plants to encourage a bushier growth with more flowers.
• Feed plants with comfrey and nettle tea to encourage lush, green growth. Alternatively, use compost tea.
• Wherever you have bare soil, apply mulch to suppress the weeds.
• Put water out for birds and bugs – in mid-summer water supplies often dry out.
• If you are planning a redesign, label your herbaceous perennials now before they die back, so that you know what to save and what to get rid of.
Chickens
Just by following their natural habits, chickens do such useful work for the gardener that they can almost be regarded as a form of gardener’s tool. I recommend anybody with enough space to acquire some. Put them in a weedy patch of garden with a bit of chicken wire around it to contain them and they will happily peck away at the soil and even scratch up some of the roots of weeds – in fact their feet are shaped like a three-pronged cultivar. Many of our common weeds gained names such as chickweed and fat hen because chickens like to eat them.
Not only will chickens help you weed, they will provide you with eggs and strong chicken manure as well. However, do not expect an immaculate plot afterwards – you will still need to tidy up. Of course, chickens do not discriminate between weeds and the plants you want to keep, so take care where you put them.
• Scarify and aerate the lawn before the onset of winter.
• Divide herbaceous perennials to reinvigorate plants.
• Install a water butt in preparation for catching rainwater during winter.
• Sow winter green manures.
• Create homes for hedgehogs in your garden.
• This is the best season of the year to plant a tree, giving it enough time to establish before winter.
• Cover slightly tender plants with horticultural fleece.
• Alternatively, move them into a greenhouse, a conservatory or even a shed.
• Plant out bulbs such as daffodils and tulips for a floral display in spring.
• Collect up fallen leaves on the lawn and add them to the compost heap.
• Order vegetable seeds ready for the new growing year.
• Check tree stakes to make sure none have broken and ensure tree ties are not too tight on the trees.
• Plant bare-root fruit trees if the soil is not frozen or too wet.
• Install solar panels on your shed roof. They can be used for charging battery-operated hedge trimmers, mowers and strimmers.
• Put food out for birds to help sustain them during winter, and water bowls too in freezing conditions – even in winter they need to bathe.
• Take hardwood cuttings of fruit bushes.
• Prune soft fruit bushes and freestanding apple and pear trees.
• Mend things in the garden such as broken fences while the plants are dormant. Also consider laying paths, patios and decking or building a raised bed.
• Turn over the compost heap to encourage the material to break down.
• Move deciduous trees or shrubs while the plants are dormant.
• Restore hedges and overgrown trees.
Tip
Use stone, slate or wood to edge lawns that contain invasive weeds such as couch grass or speedwell to prevent them spreading into your flower borders. Ornamental plants that could potentially spread throughout your border quickly in a way you do not want should be planted in sturdy pots and plunged into the soil, leaving a slight lip above the surface of the ground to prevent surface roots spreading. Fast-spreading plants include non-clumping forming bamboos, mint and figs.
