Those of you who have been following the blog since London times will know that I am keen to attract wildlife to my garden, particularly birds (except herons and magpies), frogs and toads, bees, butterflies and moths.

Unless you have the space for a wildlife meadow (which I don’t) the best ways to achieve this are to add trees and shrubs, lots of planting for cover, add water (preferably a pond or stream but any water helps), and plant lots of scented flowers in different colours so that the garden is scented throughout the year (especially with open bells and single, flat faced or open flowers that can be visited easily). Feed the birds and leave a bit of mess around somewhere (piles of logs, old bits of wood, old canes etc.) in a discreet corner for the smaller insects to nest in, feed on or hibernate in. You can also leave a few nettles and brambles because lots of butterflies and moths like to lay their eggs on them but I don’t need to bother with that. The farmer is doing it for me.

My new garden design and planting plans are designed to achieve exactly this but, even though there is nothing here now, ever since arriving I have been keeping a keen eye on what wildlife is around anyway, before I add my pond, trees, shrubs and flowers. And the great news is that it is already wonderfully busy.

Moths and butterflies

July was moth month. The entire house was filled with moths of an amazing variety most of which I had not seen before. I would have preferred them to be in the garden (they filled baths, covered walls etc) but, with the windows open and lights on, the inevitable happened.

Moth Black Arches

Butterflies too were abundant, especially red admirals, tortoiseshells and painted ladies. One of them died gracefully beside my bed and is still there – a colourful and delicate reminder of sunnier days.

The beautiful small tortoiseshell butterfly that died beside my bed

I suspect that the prolific brambles and nettles that are trying to invade the garden from the neighbouring field are responsible for this plethora of dainties but clearly I want to keep these spikey and stinging invaders at bay. I am removing them from the end of the garden because they are obscuring the view and wish to do the same at the side. It will be interesting to see whether I shall be visited in the same numbers next year.

Leggy things

In August I was thrilled to be visited by an enormous cricket. He must have been 5-6cms long, was beautiful colours, had huge eyes and legs and spent some time watching me through the glass on a French door. I’ve certainly never seen anything like him before.

The profile and undrneath of the huge cricket shot on and through filthy glass

In my London garden September was spider month but every month here seems to be spider month and most of them are indoors or around the windows. I think the cricket was after one of the flies trapped in one of the millions of webs that are spun in seconds.

September here was actually crane fly month – also inside not out. They were everywhere and often became trapped in the spider webs despite my clearing these on a very regular basis.

Frogs and toads

They are around because next door’s garden has them but the only one I’ve actually seen to date was a small male who found himself stuck in a watering can so was gently released into some cover in the field.

Birds

Despite removing most of the existing vegetation in the garden the birds are plentiful. My neighbours feed them well and have trees (as do I now - but more of that another time), so the garden is full of birds whizzing from side to side. Many are the same as in London. We have our resident robins, blackbirds – one of whom has a white feather, tits, goldfinches, sparrows and wrens. There is a pair of doves and a few pigeons, though thankfully fewer than in London.

Check this video out - my garden creators are also musicians

It is somewhat apt that in September 2014 the new garden resembled the Marne 100 years on – all vegetation, trenches, rain, endless mud and tangled barbed wire. Though clearly incomparable, as I sport my red poppy, I remember and honour those who struggled, fought, died and prevailed with a new appreciation.

Thankfully, the weather outside September has been glorious but, almost since I moved in, the site has been full of men, each one striving, giving their best and “going in” where less valiant ones might fear to tread.

The vanguard arrived in July. They were Mark Hawes and his team of three from Hawes Arborists. They arrived in their protective uniforms, armed to the teeth with chain saws, long cutters and a tree chewing device.

They made short but noisy work of the willows et al in the left bed plus the extraneous shrubs, trees and overhanging branches from the right. They were a great bunch: knowledgeable, experienced, courteous, hard-working, efficient and very cost effective. Mark lives in the village so it was great to be able to give this work locally – and a fine job they did too. They even cut up the logs for me to add to the log pile, were sweet to the dogs (who tried to get involved of course), and tidied up beautifully after themselves. They come highly recommended.

Almost immediately after the tree and shrub removal two major characters in what will become an unfolding story arrived – Dermot West, my wonderful garden landscape creator and Syd, the digger, so called because she was hired from Sydenhams, a fantastic store near Gillingham which can supply almost everything you need for house and garden destruction and construction.


I found Dermot online whilst I was still in London and, despite getting other recommendations from people I knew in the area, on meeting him here, I knew he was the man for my garden. He is based in Frome (about half an hour away) and his company is Eclipse Garden Landscaping. He can do anything - build pergolas and walls, lay stones and paths, dig beds, do fencing, even put up curtain poles in the house when it is raining  - and play the banjo and guitar, as you can see in the video.

Dermot is intensely hard-working, a joy to work with, dedicated to the job and seems to care as much about the finished outcome as I do. Let’s face it, when you are going to spend every day with someone for many months, it matters that you get on and see eye to eye. Dermot is my garden’s star. Syd is his accomplice. And Dermot can work Syd like an artist. He has obviously had a much misspent youth in computer gaming. The way Dermot plays the levers to make Syd dig, mix, filter and smooth out the ground, even in minute areas, is like watching any other artist at work – spellbinding and awe inspiring.

Dermot also came with two right hand men – 'Chris 1' (only so named because he was shortly followed by another Chris dubbed 'Chris 2'). Chris 2, I have discovered, is also an actor and can play almost any musical instrument including the double bass (as you'll see in the video).

No garden redesign that Dermot is managing can exist without levelling tools and very many tins of red spray paint.

So, together, Dermot, his spray paint and I translated my computer design into real, red lines on the ground. I made a few small changes, but not many - one extra path.

Then Dermot, Chris 1 and Syd removed the gravel sea and old terrace, dug all the existing and new beds to two feet minimum, dug the new pond to over three feet, put loads of clay into multiple skips and made a pile to create the base for a rockery near the pond.

I sold the gravel, the old terrace tiles and the greenhouse on ebay to lovely people and one of my neighbours took the shed, so the house became full of things that should be stored in garden buildings - just as my new kitchen was being installed. Life was fairly hectic. At one point there were seven men on site in any given day, all doing different things and I was buying milk in multi litres to keep the tea and coffee flowing - from the utility room!

Working on clay is a serious issue – and this clay is very serious, very deep and very compact. The only reasonable top soil was on the veg bed. Everywhere else, and obviously under the gravel sea, near the house etc., had no good top soil. So my first challenge was to create a fertile environment for all the plants I want to plant. And let’s face it, good soil is the basis of everything. Creating it is money well spent. It doesn’t matter how good your design is if plants can’t thrive.

A view of the clay as the pond is dug

From a myriad of books, websites and BBC Gardeners' Question Time, I knew I had to incorporate lots of organic matter, preferably well-rotted horse manure, to break up the clay. All similar recent advice also said that putting grit in was useless unless you did it in vast proportions. So I decided I needed horse manure and I would add grit to planting holes for specific plants as needed.

At the same time Dermot swore by the cooked, black compost made from the green waste at the tip. So, to begin with, and because I was having great trouble finding well-rotted horse manure in time, I agreed to use it. Seven tons arrived early one morning to take up most of my front drive. It turned out to be fabulous, black, friable and steaming. It was used in an instant and another seven tons ordered and delivered.

I have never ordered anything in tons before. I have ordered bags or even dumpy bags in London, but tons? Suddenly my life became full of seven or ten ton trucks delivering things - especially skips. And, can you believe, the man who does the horrendously regular skip swapping knows this house well because his grandparents once lived here.

But I didn’t think this lovely black, compost stuff was enough. There were no worms in my garden or signs of organic life except deep down in the clay of the pond. Cooked compost doesn’t have worms. So I set out on my pre-determined quest to find well-rotted horse manure because it is deeply rich, highly textured and normally full of good orgamisms with which to enrich and break up the clay soil.

First I looked online - my normal, London-based, response to any search. All I found was people complaining they couldn’t find any. It seems that those who have well rotted horse manure around here don’t advertise online or use ebay.

So I rang all the local studs – there are lots in the neighbourhood – but everything was too fresh or used on their own fields.

I asked everyone I met locally and in the village shop. The shop is a community one and staffed by lots of well-connected 'volunteers' of which I shall become one in good time - to no avail.

So I set out in the car. I had a hunch I had seen signs on the roads locally. One of my more annoying habits is that I am observant and have a wont to comment out loud on signs I see from a car. However, in this case, my “sign observing” has proved useful. I knew I had seen two signs for horse manure in my exploratory drives within 20 miles of my new home. I also have a somewhat photographic memory. So I wracked it and set off, first to a place between Gillingham and Shaftesbury where I was pretty certain I had seen a sign.

Mum says she is very busy sorting out the new house (boring), working (even more boring) and planning the new garden (crazy!) - this one has a lovely, large, clover and daisy filled lawn for us to play on. We’ve waited five years for a lawn.


Admittedly the garden doesn’t have as many scented plants or a pond for us to fish in and there is a sea of horrid, sharp, Dorset stone gravel between the terrace and lawn (and out the front). We find it very difficult and painful to walk on so we might let her change it a bit. As long as she keeps some lawn for us and sensible paths we shall remain neutral and open-minded about her new design – but watch this space.

Anyway, because she thinks she is very busy, she has asked us to write a quick blog before she fills you in fully (though she has at least made a very short accompanying video – slacker!).

So, what can we tell you? It took lots of lovely people to bark our welcome to in London and lick the be-shorted legs of while they packed everything up in June, and then a fairly long drive to get us here, but now we have a fabulous new home and garden full of exciting new smells on the Wiltshire/Dorset border.

Sadly there are no urban foxes or multi-scented lamp posts and street trees. And we think it is very, very dark at night for our bedtime walk, despite the huge skies, stars and moonlight (which Mum seems to love), so we are finding this quite an adjustment.

However, by day we can scent and see hare and rat, horse (there are even people doing something called dressage out the front window on the church green), and lots and lots of very big, noisy, black and white, munching things called cows at the end of our back garden.


For the first three weeks these cows kept making little ones too – they woke up us at night and we even saw this by day. Luckily, as soon as we arrived, we managed to get through the old trellis fence into the field to bark at the big and little ones more effectively. Silly cows they took no notice, wouldn’t bark back and anyway Mum didn’t seem to think this was a good idea. She got very cross and put chicken wire across the bottom of the fence to stop us – spoilsport! Unhappily she happened to have it with her. What was she doing with chicken wire in Clapham? We need to know.

However, in the house next door there is a Westie who loves to chat with us across the fence – and can you believe she has the same name as Mum? It’s very funny hearing her parents screaming “shut up Rosie” to stop her barking. On the other side there is also a cat and big and little people. We like children and love chasing cats so this is great fun and makes up for the disinterest of the huge black and white cow thingies.

So, we are getting into a new routine. Every morning we walk Mum off the lead most of the way along the footpath, past Alan the blacksmith (who is making things for us), and across Church Green to the wonderful local shop to get milk and the paper (she often seems to buy much more than that too) but of course we put her on the lead to cross the road and go through the churchyard.


We’ve also got a very nice man called Reg who mows our lawn for us. He knows this garden well and Mum obviously didn’t have a lawnmower, so he is very useful. He specially wears shorts with braces so we can lick his legs when he comes.

Not nearly enough people in London wore shorts or had exposed toes, but everyone here seems to. For example, the very famous furniture restorer man (Ivo) who lives in the village and came to quote for mending Mum’s furniture broken in the move, wore flip flops especially for us, as did many builders, roofers, kitchen makers, painter/decorators, oil people and even delivery men who have visited – heaven!

So, overall we are pretty happy. We have tasted lots of new legs and feet but are not getting enough long walks – something we need to discuss seriously with Mum. Our woolly coats get full of seeds which she has to remove all the time – but that means lots of delicious grooming in the evening, so is a good thing overall.

We are still a bit uncertain about the deep, dark night on our last walk of the day - even though she is carrying larger and larger torches to light our way, but the house is now full of comfy chairs and beds and the lawn and carpets are great for rolling and scratching our backs on.

We’ll make her update you properly soon but, in the meantime, please watch her video of a new little cow thing being born, its first walking and feeding, all at the end of our new garden. It’s just a shame she stopped us being in the field with it. We could have added so much more with our conversation, being kicked by a cow or been shot by the farmer. It would have made a much more exciting video but we suppose it’s worth watching and, thankfully,  it’s very short.

Love, Pickle (5) and Lottie (4)

PS She still needs to update the website and welcome video which is all old hat now. Yet another thing on the list she promises she is dealing with while we don’t go on long walks in this fabulous countryside!

 

 

 

L to R: 'Woody' the sound man, Tom Mitchell of Evolution Plants, Kaz (sis-in-law), me, Izzy the researcher and Amy the A P/camerwoman for BBC1's 'Escape to the Country', on location in Wiltshire

So now for a bit of real news – I am moving house.  I am leaving London and moving to Wiltshire, just on the Dorset border – new home, new garden!

Obviously I shall be horribly sad to leave my lovely Clapham home, wonderful garden and the wildlife that shares it with me, especially Mr Blackbird and my robins, and also those who visit transiently - no amazing Jersey Tiger moths in Wiltshire I fear.

But my London garden has wonderful new owners who have always wanted to be gardeners - and now will have to be!  They don’t have children so don’t need a lawn/football pitch yet and they have also volunteered to “fish sit” Big Yellow and the others until I have built a suitable pond at the new house. How brilliant is that?

And, of course, I am terribly excited about my new home and garden which is obviously much larger and almost a blank canvas – but more about that later.

This is a roundabout way of telling those of you who saw my Tweet (and everyone else) that the reason I was lucky enough to spend a day with plant hunter Tom Mitchell of Evolution plants, in his private nursery, was because it was my “activity” whilst filming for ‘Escape to the Country’. If you don’t know it, this is a very popular BBC 1 programme that seeks to help people do what the title suggests. They show you three houses (including a mystery house), in your chosen county. You also have to do some sort of ‘local activity’ that matches your major interests – hence my visit to Tom’s place - but not the house move. I have found my new home separately.

However, it was a very special treat. How else was I going to spend a day with a plant hunter in his nursery which was not open to the public when I visited?

On the first day of our three day shoot for the Beeb, Kaz, my lovely sister-in-law (who was my accomplice and advisor on the house hunting), some of the crew, Kaz and I arrived at Evolution Plants and were welcomed and looked after wonderfully by Helen Bailey.

We had to spend the morning filming Tom showing us round, and Kaz and me having to divide and pot on a really rare plant, so I didn’t get to see much of the nursery. However, when Tom realised I was “Rosie’s back garden” and told me he reads this blog (you could have blown me down with a feather!), he invited me back, on my own, for a proper, private, afternoon tour. And what a place it is!

The BBC crew filming Evolution Plants with the, very appropriately alliterative, Ben Budd in the beds

The nursery is pretty huge with polytunnels and beds everywhere, looks onto a beautiful golf course and is right on the edge of a pretty Wiltshire village at the end of a dodgy lane. And it is full of the most amazing and beautiful plants. Tom  has an incredible Paeonia collection, most of which he inherited but the focus is on propagating from the seed he collects from all over the place: from the Balkans to the Caucasus; from Japan to the jungles of Vietnam; from the coastal sand dunes of southern Mozambique to the mountain ranges of western Europe ie all places where the plants are threatened by human activity ie us – deforestation, industrialisation, population growth and suburbanisation, climate change etc..

His mission is to protect these plants, mostly species varieties, by propagating them here and eventually selling them to us in favour of the mass-produced, Dutch grown varieties that fill our garden centres.

He wants us all to grow these purer varieties and turn our gardens into natural arks for the future. His ambition is to inspire enthusiasm for better, more interesting, more exciting garden plants.

If you could only see all the magical and glorious plants he has you would understand why.

Here are just a few photos of his versions of some plant species you will be familiar with. He has hundreds more you might recognise and thousands more you probably won’t.

 

I would die for this fabulous Paeony foliage - Paeonia tenuifolia

 

The better known Paeonia mlokosewitschii (Molly the witch)

 

Geranium Phaeum (wild and as yet un-named) but very stunning! Jo AJ you'd love it.

 

 And just wonder at the beauty of this daffodil - Narcisus nobilis

 

A very exotic grape hyacinth - Muscari Leopoldia comosa, better known as Muscari comosum

 

I am not a fan of double, over the top, Delphiniums. This is a delicate beauty, Delphinium tricron 'ruby falls'

 

And this beauty is Moraea pendula

I don’t know about you but I am becoming pretty familiar with many garden plant species, their hybrids and cultivars. The idea of being able to grow something completely different and unusual is very appealing. I understand that hybridisation can add to flower form and length of flowering time, hardiness etc and create lots of variety but there is something wonderfully exotic, yet simply beautiful, about the plants Tom is growing for us.

And I have discovered, in my 13 years of being a gardener, that I’m a plant addict. This means that overall garden design and planting schemes can suffer. But, for me, the plant variety is more important than the overall effect. It’s just one of those things you have decide about yourself - are you a plant lover or a garden design lover?

Obviously, I love to design with textures, foliage, colour and flowers together but I'd rather do it with rare or unusual plants than ones from a chain based, garden centre down the road.

I also think a good, well throught through, hard landscaping scheme, with designated beds, can help us plant lovers keep our enthusiasm in check whilst still creating great gardens. We’ll see. I am about to create my new garden!

Since my visit to Tom’s place in February this year, the great news is that his nursery has now been opened to the public, the dodgy lane has been re-surfaced and so you too can go and experience some of the joy I had.  Please do.  I promise you’ll love it if you are a ‘plantophile’. If you can’t, you can also buy a few of the plants online at evolution-plants.com.

So, I've finally met a real-life plant hunter whilst 'home hunting' with the BBC, a fabulous crew and the lovely, intelligent, Alistair Appleton as my presenter. I quickly (over an early breakfast) discovered that Alistair shares my love of proper ie cryptic, crosswords and my hatred of the sandwich - so we got on like a house on fire.

Back, from L to R: Izzy, Amy, Chris and 'Woody'.    Front, from L to R: Kaz, me, Alistair Appleton

Those three filming days were definitely a highlight of 2014. We had a ball and I think the final programme might be quite fun telly. Alistair and I sparred on camera.

Back to the move. The new garden offers huge potential and thus huge blog potential.  Essentially I am starting from scratch, so will be blogging on garden design, garden design software, plants choices, pond building, product choices (greenhouses, sheds, lawnmowers, pond pumps etc) and, this time, you’ll be able to share it with me as I create it and as it grows and matures.

Having spent months house hunting in Wiltshire, and thus expecting to newly garden on chalk/limestone, I can’t believe my chosen home is on a stream of Kimmeridge clay that comes up from the Dorset coast. Gosh, heavy clay again - but at least I know it and that my favourite plants (roses, clematis etc) thrive in it.

I also can’t believe that, having insisted on a South facing garden, my new back garden is North facing (though it has a front garden too).

As a result, this blog will also be full of North facing stuff, shade gardening, gravel gardening, and how to plant lots of trees and shrubs while still incorporating a stunning countryside view into your garden design, front and back etc. - so it will probably be much more useful to many of you. I am very excited about creating it and about blogging it.

Also, the updated website will make sure you can contribute and ask questions ie it will have much better functionality than it does now, I promise!

The big move is supposed to happen on 25 June. I can’t wait!

Wish me luck – and I’ll keep you updated. There are a few more blogs coming from here before I move.

PS Evolution Plants is now open to the public Thurs-Sunday, 11.00 – 6.00pm.

PPS The London element of this site will be saved for posterity under a separate tab, when brother Henry and I manage to do this. I am pretty busy at the moment with the move and work.

PPPS The Escape to the Country episode will be shown in Sept/Oct this year. I won’t know exactly when until about two weeks before but I shall keep you informed.

 

...de-mystifying this glorious, scented beauty.

As I write this evening, the scent from my amazing Wisteria ‘Alba’ that now drapes over the back end of the house and comes all the way from the hot bed (where it is not yet fully in flower) is flooding into the kitchen through the open French doors. Yes, it is mingled with the scent of the Lonicera x americana that grows with it, but the overall, intoxicating perfume is Wisteria. It’s something one only experiences for around a month a year but it’s all the more special for that. And it looks amazing!

Wisteria floribunda 'Alba' across the South facing kitchen wall

I know some people who think Wisteria is a nasty, common, plant like Buddleja. I disagree on both. As well as being a plant lover I am a wildlife lover and both plants attract myriad insects by day and night. That’s great in my book. Yes, they can both get big and ungainly but only if you don’t know how to handle them. And they are so simple to control that no one should worry, even in a small garden. I have three Wisteria (one of each main type) and two Buddleja in a 60ft back garden and they all perform marvellously.

Others are terrified of Wisteria because of the supposed very specific pruning requirements. But the truth is that Wisteria is really easy to handle and prune if you just know a few basic facts.

I don’t normally write “How to..” type stuff in this blog but, given there’s poetry and allsorts already, I don’t really see why not when the need seems to be there. I have met so many people in the last few weeks who are not confident about growing Wisteria that I think it deserves a blog – because the truth is it is a very easy plant to grow and look after, and is wonderfully rewarding. I seek to de-bunk its scary reputation.

So, this piece is written to encourage those of you without a Wisteria to go out now and buy one, in the complete confidence that you will have it in flower, be able to control it and enjoy it for many years to come if you follow some simple advice. It could also be of value to those of you who have recently bought or inherited one but are unsure which it is or how best to care for it.

 

On Tuesday, 18th February at precisely 2.41pm, under a bright blue sky and a warming sun following a heavy shower, I heard frogs.

As you know this thrills my soul after their obvious silence during their winter hibernation.  As I am well aware, following last year’s fiasco of a similar occasion on 26th February, sadly this does not herald the start of Spring. We have to wait for the toads to tell us exactly when we can start vernal celebrations proper.

But it is the start of activity in the garden for 2014. A few lone bees have been buzzing around over the last couple of weeks and the birds have been feeding and singing, despite the horrendous winds and torrential rains. But frogs mean something different. A new noise, a new activity in the garden that at least indicates the beginning of the end of Winter?

On hearing their songs, I rushed to the pond, camera in hand and found six, two of whom were already mating – or at least starting the close-coupled, piggyback, wooing preliminaries because there is no spawn yet. I’ve tried to record one for the video but I doubt you can hear it above the noise of the stream, the aeroplanes and the birds. I turned the pond pump off but they seem to stop croaking when I do this which is very unhelpful because frogs are not happy to be miked up individually.

It’s pretty mixed in the garden just now. It still looks very bare as most of the deciduous trees and shrubs are still leafless but this moment in the year seems to combine past, present and future more than any other time in the garden. Some plants have continued to flower from Autumn through ‘til now such as the odd rose, Cobea scandens, Abutilon 'Kentish Belle', and the daisy. Those that should be flowering at this time like Daphne bholua, Sarcoccoca, Chaenomeles, Mahonia, hellebores and snowdrops are doing it exhuberantly, and those that herald the start of Spring, like daffodils, are opening, the tulips are just pushing up, the Camelias are in good bud or springing into glorious flower and even lots of mid season Clematis are in bud.

And I have more fish than I thought which is great news. I knew Big Yellow was still in there but there were no signs of any others until yesterday. The fish at least have decided it’s the beginning of Spring and come up from the murky depths of the pond to feed. So I discovered I still have at least six. Silver Rocket, the shabunkins and some goldfish have survived the winter and the heron. 

So now I shall keep my eyes peeled for the toads. We could do with an early Spring this year after the prolonged misery of last year’s Winter and this year’s rains and floods.

I use this opportunity to express my sincere sympathies with those across the country whose land, gardens and homes have been flooded this Winter. I can’t imagine what it must be like to see a beloved garden submerged but even worse to have one’s farmlands and home invaded by water, and dirty water at that, with all it means for lack of income, future home saleability, impossible insurances and asset devaluation. My thoughts are with you.

We are lucky here. In Clapham we are high above the Thames though the ‘Honey Brook’ which goes to the River Wandle, runs under my street. The floods have shown up in my cellar in the form of rising water table but I am prepared for that and it is only a few inches of water. The cellar floor is six feet below anything important so I have not been affected like many of you outside London.

I fear we have to be prepared for more similar weather over winters to come but, for me, a tiny consolation and ray of hope has come from this year’s first appearance of the frogs in the pond.

Can you guess what these beauties are?

They are one of the most lovely things I have seen in my garden this autumn - bar the flowers and the pests I blogged on recently.

And they have made me very happy that I bought three Asclepias from the new garden centre I found earlier in the year.


Online details of the Asclepias plants (if you remember the labels were useless) promised me colourful flowers, seed pods and then seeds with 'parachutes'. And this is exactly what they have delivered. The individual flowers (above) are quite small but they have a large 'flower head' effect. I couldn’t imagine what the seed pods would be like.

It turns out that they are enormous, at least 4-5 cms long, almost as long as the leaves. The seed pods start green.


Then they harden, fade and the outer layer curls back to expose lots of brown seeds in what looks like the most intricate French plait every invented.


Then they mature, the wind blows and the seeds expose their electric filament-like parachutes which shimmer in the sunshine and will take them wherever. They are completely amazing to watch – best seen in the video at the top of the page.

They may, of course, cause me lots of problems if they “take” where they shouldn’t ie in the pink bed, but the prevailing winds have blown them towards the pond, greenhouse and not very fertile gravel paths. We’ll see next year and I have decided to harvest some and plant in the greenhouse because they are quite tender and so that I can recognise the seedlings as they grow. I'll have no idea what they’ll look like otherwise and they could easily be scooped up in general weeding.

These beautiful seeds have made me focus on other seed heads and my garden is full of them at this time of year. The rose hips are obvious and seldom create a new rose (though I have a small rose I didn’t plant in a pot by the house).

Nigella seed heads are everywhere, larger than their flowers and luckily are usually successful in self-seeding.


The Convolvulus seeds are much more ‘normal’ in relation to their flower size and are also very successful at creating new plants.


The large seed pods of the Wisteria seem sensible given the size of their flower clusters (I have never let them mature)….


… but the boomerang-shaped Tracleospermum jasminoides seed pods are far larger than the flowers they come from.


My new Solanum laciniatum has very large seed fruits too. They are changing colour from green to yellow - like plums.


And the Crocosmia Lucifer seeds are now about ready to burst from their pods...

..as are those of the Ceratostigma...

..while the Agapanthus seeds have almost all already set flight.

But there is one plant that will keep me mesmerised by its seeds for a long while yet. That's the Miscanthus sinensus around the pond. Most of its heads are still in their early stages. This one below is opening to produce its seeds. And they look wonderful, whether the light is on them or through them. They are a perfect plant for the lower lights of autumn and winter.


So, which of this wonderful haul of seeds am I going to use?

Sadly, my garden and greenhouse are too small for me to need to propagate much - so bring on the gorgeous man with lots of acres and greenhouses that need looking after!

Most of these seeds will go to waste but I do propagate special plants and easy annuals including Begonia, Nicotiana of all sorts, and Cosmos. But mostly there isn't enough room to multiply what I already have.

Some years back I had some wonderful, exotic-looking, Begonias. I bought them from a specialist at The Malvern Show and they were in pots outside.  Each winter I took stem cuttings from them, ensuring I had leaf buds on two junctions, then simply stuck one end in jam jars of water and put them on a kitchen window sill over winter. They all sprouted new roots in the water within weeks and turned into new plants very easily, came true, and flourished. This went on for about seven years - until I got bored. One year I let the cuttings dry out. Inevitably they died. I really regret this lack of care because I miss them - and have not seen them since at flower shows.

I am not fond of the little, boring, yellow and red ones with dark green leaves that live in shade. Nor do I favour the huge, blousy, double ones in a range of garish colours. But I loved these little, tender ones, in pink and white which look like orchids.

They were great value because they flowered from mid Summer until the snows. I must seek them out again at the next Malvern show.

So, I shan’t be collecting or saving many of these seeds. I shall see where the wind blows them - and then probably do a lot of weeding next year!

 

It was 'Wild about Gardens' week in the last week of October and, even though I didn’t do much about it because I had just published ‘Reflections on water and wildlife’, it did make me study the wildlife in and around the house again. I filmed foxes around my streets at night and a sawfly larva eating leaves on my Graham Thomas rose – both classed as garden pests, but both beautiful in their own way.

This has caused me to reflect on beauty in the garden. A perfectly formed, scented  rose is an obvious beauty.

Indeed, any perfect example of a flower or plant would have to fall into this category. But I contend there are other, less obvious, beauties too - like the fox.

Foxes can be aggressive, destructive and what they leave behind stinks to high heaven. But I admire their looks and agility and admit I find them beautiful. I just don’t want them in my garden.

In 2003 I had a major war with foxes when I first moved into this house and garden. I won, of course, eventually but only after a series of major battles.  They became so bold that they were facing me off in between the beds. They dug up my newly planted plants (I’ve not used bonemeal since), they poo-ed everywhere and two of the younger ones tried to make a den in my hot bed.

I tried all the known remedies including a disgusting smelling tar put on rags and sticks, and dried lion poo (because the fox is more closely related to cats than dogs and is supposed to shy away from larger cats). None of these had any effect whatsoever. Eventually, with the agreement of most of my neighbours, I had to resort to a professional fox man, baited humane traps and daily morning removal.  12 foxes were removed from our gardens over 14 days.

Like any well-waged war it was meticulously planned, expensive and effective – with some casualties. Quite rightly, foxes are not allowed to be in a trap for more than 24 hours. I bought the meat (cost) and baited the trap every night. In the morning, before going to work, there was almost always a fox in it. The man had to be called, arrive, deal with the fox and go, before I left for work. Each fox cost £45 to be removed and the humane trap had a rental cost for the 14 days. The major casualty was my outdoor lighting. Whilst in the trap, the foxes decimated the wiring which ran underneath, so that cost a pretty penny too to replace.

Anyway, they were gone. I sorted it. Even now they are few and far between and I am sure that having dogs now helps to keep them away. I see the occasional one looking over the fence at the end of the garden but they are no longer a problem.


But all this doesn’t mean that I don’t appreciate the beauty of the urban fox.  Pickle, Lottie and I meet them almost every night as we do our ‘final pee and poo’ walk around the nearby streets before bed.

So, the other night I went out and filmed them in the dark. Fabulously healthy foxes are all over the streets and especially around the bins of a nearby housing estate – as you’ll see in the video. And they are beautiful to watch. I just don’t want them in my garden.

In complete size contrast, but also a pest, I have also been fascinated by the sawfly larvae that are now eating the leaves of my Graham Thomas rose.

They too are destructive, but they’re easily removable by hand unless you have a serious invasion. No major war needs to be waged. No humane traps or sawfly men are required – just remove the leaves with them on, and take them away to the dump.

But, like the garden-destructive fox, the leaf-stripping sawfly larva is also beautiful  - as you’ll see in the video. I watched them first with a magnifying glass. To begin with I wasn’t sure which was the front and which the back but, under the camera, it has become clear where the eyes and munching mandibles are. The roses are still repeating but they are also going over. They are deciduous. The leaves will fall so I don’t really care if sawfly larvae take their fill now. Perhaps I should – for next year - but I doubt it.

Both these creatures are characterised as pests but they also have a beauty, all of their own, which I can’t help revelling in and I hope you will too.

Coming to appreciate the beauty of your garden pests is an interesting place to be, but one I am getting to. The macro lens on the camera is helping.

October is a mellow month in my garden – the roses are gently repeating, some Clematis, Alstromeria and Geraniums are too. Everything is looking large and green after the rains and much will be cut back soon. The Dahlias are at their best, as are the Cosmos and Abutilons. My A. ‘Kentish Belle’ grows through my now overgrown ball of Pittosporum ‘Tandara Gold’ making it look like a Christmas tree hung with colourful knickerbockers. The Camelias, Daphnes and Viburnums are in bud getting ready for winter and spring and the weather is still warmish at 10 degrees C, but we’ve more rain and chiller winds.

My herbs continue to provide taste in the cooking pot, despite looking a bit straggly but they are not the only tasty things in the garden. This is also the perfect month for me to indulge in what was, up ‘til now, my very secret pleasure – drinking my scented roses.

After it has rained I urge you to wander into your garden and drink the rainwater off your roses. It tastes sublime. Only when you have done this can you really appreciate why all the insects are intoxicated by flowers. I know taste is 70-80% smell but who cares? Rainwater sucked off the petals of roses tastes like their scent, even if you hold your nose while doing it. It is just another way to fully appreciate the wonder of their perfume and to commune with your garden. 

If you are not sure how to do this, watch the very short video. And I promise you, each rose type tastes different, in the same way they smell different. You’ll be amazed. So please, take this opportunity to really taste your roses  - and enjoy! I promise you it is worth it. Just don’t tell anyone, or they’ll think you’re a little nuts. You can tell me of course. Just add a comment to the blog to let me know how it was for you.

 

So it’s all change again. Last week I was gardening bare-legged in sandals, rolled up jeans and skimpy tops. Today I am firmly back in full length jeans, socks, boots and wool.

And I’m not alone in thinking it’s colder. The fish have moved lower down in the pond and are swimming and feeding more slowly. The abundant berries on the Sorbus (Rowan tree) are being devoured by the blackbirds, and the mice are coming out to forage before winter. I have just been watching the latter doing acrobatics in the plants around the bird feeders and stealing the bird food (see the video). Then today, in broad daylight, one mouse even dragged the remains of a snail I stood on accidentally last night across my terrace and merrily fed on it behind my pots. The bird food stealing didn’t shock me, the dead snail eating did. But mice are mammals and omnivores. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised.

So, as we all prepare to bunker down again for the cold months, I have pruned the Wisteria, dead-headed the roses, buddlejas, dahlias and cosmos for the umpteenth time and thus find I have a moment to reflect on the year in the garden, and what I’ve learned. And lots of it seems to be about water and wildlife.

For example, the spray water scarer is the only effective device I’ve tried for keeping the heron, fox and cats away from the fish in my pond. Its major downside is that regularly the dogs and I get drenched when I forget to turn it off. That’s fine at 27 degrees C, less fun at 12 degrees C or when I’m in my glad rags, about to go out.

On the plants side, the abundant rain and long period of cold led to extraordinary combinations as everything rushed into flower at once. And I have discovered that Leonotis ‘Leonora’ is a manky dead nettle (when in my garden - it might be quite wonderful in yours) and it is not required to still have a wonderful array of butterflies and moths throughout the summer - the Buddleja are key. Aquilegia ‘Tequila Sunrise’ does not like being moved (RIP) and Physalis, the Cape Gooseberry, is actually a pernicious weed of the very worst type. Please don’t plant it anywhere except in a pot - unless you want acres of it. In addition, incredibly, cherry trees will send their roots up, above ground, to feed on the goodies in your baseless compost bin - amazing but true.

Top: Fremontadendron 'California Glory'.
Bottom left: Amelchanchier 'Snowfalkes'. Bottom right: Solanum laciniatum

And, despite its brash, orangey-yellow flowers and skin/eye irritating leaves and seed pods, I realise I really miss my Fremontadendron ‘California Glory’. It was in flower for so long each year – from spring to early winter. It was an unruly, wild, wonderful plant, somewhat like a teenager. It was determined to be independent, grow itself into a tree by splitting its pot aggressively and burying its roots underground. It had a vigour and character that the Amelanchier ‘Snowflakes’ I tried to replace it with couldn’t even think of matching. The latter lasted five months and has now been replaced by a semi-tender, Solanum laciniatum which has grown profusely and flowered since planted, so might become a reasonable alternative. We’ll see. It may not survive the winter – which the garden tells me will be hard again. There are lots of berries and hips already and these usually predict a hard winter. I can even see the ivy and Mahonia japonica preparing themselves to be the last season’s food for the birds and insects.

As an aside, many people don’t realise that ivy has flowers and berries but it does, and they are a really important source of late nectar and food for all manner of bees, birds and other insects, so please keep some ivy. It comes in many varieties, variegated or plain, small or large leaved, and is great for covering fences and walls and for harbouring and feeding a myriad of wildlife in winter.

I’ve also learned that many roses will grow very happily north-facing, as long as they are out in the open, and that other plants deemed OK for north facing sites, really are. This year’s project, my miniscule (2m x 42 cms) new front bed, has been fabulously successful against all expectations. It has been in flower constantly. In spring it bore two Camelia ‘Silver Anniversary’, then two Aquilegia vulgaris ‘Munstead White’ and one Astrantia ‘ Hidcote Shaggy Hybrid’ and two A. ‘Orlando’. These were joined by two Geranium ‘Brookside’ and G. 'Sabani Blue’. Then the three standard roses (two ‘Cream Abundance’ and one ‘Champagne Moment’) flowered profusely in June and they have been repeating ever since. The white Hydrangeas (‘Annabelle’ and ‘Steel Black Zebra’) started to add drama to this display in August and now the two Anenome ‘Honorine Jobert’ are in flower, the Astrantia are re-flowering, the Camelias are in bud again and the Sarcococca Confusa is getting ready to scent the path through winter.

Top: the front bed in September. Mid L: Rosa 'Cream Abundance'. Mid R: Rosa 'Champagne Moment'
Bottom L: Aquilegia vulgaris 'Munstead White'. Bottom R: Geranium 'Brookside'

This tiny, new, north-facing bed is looking luscious, green and gorgeous and is very happy making. It’s been a mini project but a major triumph this year. Complete strangers have stopped to thank me for making their walk along the road that bit more enjoyable and sweetly scented. I feel properly vindicated by my risky decision to buck the trend in the street and try to have flowering plants by my front wall and railings instead of the ubiquitous privet hedge.

One of the keys things I also did in the complete front re-vamp was to add a water butt on the side of the bay window. I had no water out there, so this has revolutionised my approach to watering it – i.e. I do it now! It was a neglected desert early last year.

Generally, I very seldom water my plants unless they are in pots or newly planted. In my London clay, once they are established, I reckon they should be able to find water deeper down – and for goodness sake, I live on a road with “brook” in its name for good reason - there was once a stream flowing under here. It occasionally appears in the cellar and so the least it can do is also look after the majority of the garden.

On the wildlife front, I have a major apology to make. I predicted the start of spring far too early, based on the frogs. I realise now that frogs know nothing about the start of spring. Early in the year they will come to the pond in a frenzy of excitement, sing their hearts out all night and mate, far too early. Their spawn gets frozen by late frosts and even snow and ice. The wiser toads wait in their warm beds amongst the leaves under my shed and in the stones around the pond “waterfall” until warmer times.  I’ve learned this year that the day the toads come out to mate is the day good temperatures are really here to stay. Henceforth, I shall ignore the frogs as portents of spring, however sweetly they sing at night.

And, when I think about the garden and what makes it special to me, it is the pond that is at the heart of it. Its pump-driven waterfall means the garden is full of the sound of moving water, 24 hours a day. This detracts from the surrounding noises of London – the inevitable emergency sirens, aeroplanes, traffic - and neighbours. But more importantly, it provides a drinking and washing place for a huge variety of insects and birds as well as a home for the fish, frogs, toads and numerous insects and other organisms.

So, as I reflect, given that the garden is 10 years old now, and despite my abiding passion for plants and scent, I think that what’s given me the greatest pleasure this year is the myriad wildlife attracted to it.

Top Left: Jersey Tiger moth. Top right: Speckled Wood butterfly
Bottom left: Peacock butterfly. Bottom right: Frog

I’ve had Peacock, Red Admiral, Comma and Speckled Wood butterflies feeding here as well the expected blues and whites. I’ve had an Old Lady moth, a Vapourer moth, a Lime Hawk moth and, recently, at least three exotic Jersey Tiger moths.

The birds and bees are many, and lacewings, ladybirds, damsel flies, crane flies and spiders just add to the mix. The ladybirds and tits do fairly well controlling the aphids, and the blackbirds and toads pretty much keep the snails and slugs under control. I’m sure this plethora of life is not just down to the planting. I’m certain the water, and more specifically the pond, is key. It makes the regular chore of cleaning its pump, elbow deep in sludge, eminently worthwhile – as well as being strangely satisfying.

So my advice to any new garden owner would be ‘add water’. Even if it is just a wall fountain, the sound will be relaxing and create an atmosphere away from the surrounding noises. A pond, however small, will encourage a wonderful array of wildlife. If you don’t have fish you’ll probably get newts (the two cannot co-exist because fish eat the newt eggs). Fish add colour, movement, character and noise (as they leap - which they do!) and lots of poo. They can also cause heartache if they die or are eaten by the heron – so get a water spray gismo and fear not. Be bold, put water in. You won’t regret it. Just remember to turn the heron scarer off before you walk past.

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