The Garden Magazine

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April is definitely a month to be doing things with your Fruit and Vegetables.  We have had some very sharp frosts still so you need to protect the blossom of your stoned fruit trees such as Apricots, Peaches and Nectarines.  Whilst on the subject of fruit trees don’t forget to prune your Cherry and Plum trees once the leaf buds have cracked open.

You can start planting your Potatoes - remembering again to protect any early shoots from frost.  If you didn’t plant Asparagus last month that can go in along with root crops like Carrots, Turnips and Kohlrabi.  Salad crops such as  Spring Onions, Swiss Chard, Lettuce as well as Brassicas can be started now too.  I like to get some herbs such as Basil and Chives going to.  You will need to protect early sowings with fleece and/or polythene if you are still getting frosts.

In the greenhouse I am busy with Peppers, Aubergines (one of my favourites!) and Cucumbers - potting on your Tomatoes can be done as well.   I’m just beginning to increase the amount of ventilation in the greenhouse now that the days are warmer but do remember to close up at night or you could lose a lot.  I shall be doing some softwood cuttings from my beloved Fuschias as well as repotting and feeding some of the house plants.  My Orchids are doing particularly well at the moment and I am extremely pleased with the way they are responding to almost total neglect!

Earth Ponds: The Country Pond Maker’s Guide to Building, Maintenance and Restoration

There is nothing like a pond! What else can simultaneously increase your aesthetic pleasure, offer recreational opportunities, help the environment, and increase the value of your land? This is the recognized standard on ponds, now expanded to include a comprehensive guide to living happily with your completed pond and keeping it perpetually healthy. Here is everything you need to know about planning, digging, sculpting, and maintaining your pond.

Reader Reviews

“A great book for novice pond builders. If you are looking to move earth or refurbish an old pond or lake this book this book will give ideas and help to make a pond for livestock or pleasure. Some in picture detail but good basic writing in foundation.”

“A helpful guide for the pond owner with an easy to understand problem solving guide. It`s also a great book for the person attempting to construct their first earth pond or lake.”

“I bought this book for my husband, who has been planning the restoration for our 4+ acre pond. Many books on ponds seem to be focused on smaller water gardens, not on sizeable wetlands. This is the first truly helpful resource book that he’s found. The author writes from the perspective of a conservationist, but his passion for what he’s doing comes across as poetic. Extremely helpful guide for facts, resources, and the issues/challenges you’re likely to encounter, as well as key environmental considerations.”

Reviews are a little mixed with the emphasis being that this is a book about the joys of building a pond as well as the technicalities but at less than $10 I think it’s a steal.Earth Ponds is available from Amazon

Sometimes when using a weed killer  it can unintentionally get on to plants you don’t want to get rid of.  Occasionally when spraying a wind will carry the spray onto other plants and it won’t be until sometime later that the damage appears.  The first thing you should to do is wash it off with plenty of running water - a hosepipe is best.  The faster you do this the better the chance of your plant surviving.  You will know if you have this type of damage as leaves will become smaller, narrowed and probably  twisted.

Once this damage is spotted there is little that can be done other than to remove the damaged parts of the plant and trust that more damage will not become apparent over the next few days.  Sometimes a plant will recuperate if it has only had a scant amount of weed killer sprayed on it.  The amount of damage really does depend on how much weed killer it was exposed to and how strong the plant is.  Some plants are a great deal more susceptible than others and only a small amount will be enough to kill the plant.

You should always take great care if you must use chemical weed killers to make sure that none of it drifts to vulnerable areas.  Try to only use chemicals of this type when there is little or no wind and use a spray that will direct the liquid exactly where it is needed with little risk of overspray.  It is also sensible to have special containers for each spray that you use in the garden as residual weed killer left in a container that you might use for other things could kill your plants.

Chemical weed killers should really only be used in extreme circumstances, hand weeding before they take hold is the best defence.  If you do hand weed, remember not to put them in your compost if they are flowering or seeding as it is unlikely that a domestic compost heap will get hot enough to kill off the seeds and you could end up spreading them all over your garden again.

We see only a small proportion of them, but beneath the soil the humble Earthworm is one of the most important allies we have in the garden. In fact, it is no exaggeration to say that a garden without worms is a dead garden.

More often than not they burrow through the soil, aerating as they go, and breaking up clods of earth. Some varieties actaully eat their way through the soil, drawing out organic matter and excreting the rest. There are varieties that leave their ‘casts’ on the surface and if you break it up with your fingers you will see what a lovely fine soil it is after the worm has done his job. Worms are essential to a healthy garden as they improve the soil immensley, aeration and drainage beign their specialities. They continue this work at quite some depth into the soil with the larger species being able to burrow several metres down.

You will also find an abundance of worms in a good compost heap though these generally do not ‘transfer’ to the garden. Wormeries are becoming increasingly popular as a means of composting garden and domestic waste and can be bought relatively cheaply now. A friend of mine distributes vast quantities of ‘worms wee’ as she calls it, to anyone who wants a good organic fertiliser for the garden - mine certainly blooms well after an application!

The only downside to worms is that they can attract Moles which play havoc with your lawn, but personally I’ll live with a molehill or two in return for the benefits the worms bring.

I have a problem in my garden, and not a very nice one at that - Slugs. It has taken me years to get them under some sort of control. The previous owners of our house were not gardeners at all and pests ran rife which left us quite a legacy of hard work to bring them under control. The worst of the pests without doubt were the slugs. Now I realise it is perfectly possible to grow slug resistant plants but I don’t like being dictated to - and my husband loves Hostas - the result of that combination was all out war on slugs.

Some people like to use chemicals in their garden, and that is their choice, but I don’t if it can be avoided so traditional slug pellets were not an option. They also wreak havoc with birds and hedgehogs so they were out. We did, and still do, occasionally use the organic, bird and hedgehog friendly slug pellets but they are not always easy to get hold of, so we had to use other methods. I have a friend who is even more paranoid about slugs than I am but I haven’t resorted to her method of control yet.  At dead of night she dons Continue Reading »