News - Page 138
Plant early flowering clematis for a truly delicious spring display, clothing walls and fences in a cascade of blossom through April and May.
The early-flowering clematis, like C. alpina, start producing fresh green leaves in late winter, followed by beautiful nodding flowers. You'll find several different varieties in our garden centre, from popular 'Frances Rivis' with twisted, floppy blue flowers, to dusky pink 'Jacqueline du Pre' and pure white 'Albiflora...
Read more...
Get your cloches ready to provide a little extra protection this month, as the weather can still be unpredictable and with vulnerable veg seedlings just planted out it can really catch you on the hop.
Choose from a simple to use polythene cloche you can just concertina out over your plants whenever you need it, or one of our more sophisticated range of longrow and barn cloches in durable clear plastic. They can be a godsend in a sharp frost, keeping out bitin...
Read more...
April's plant of the month is the rhododendron, one of the most spectacular plants you'll plant in your garden. A majestic large shrub of large, glossy, evergreen leaves for most of the year, in April and May it erupts into a positive explosion of huge blooms in brilliant carmine, pink or pure white.
Among a huge range of really wonderful varieties are 'Cynthia', with rose-pink flowers; Rhododendron luteum which is deciduous and has sce...
It's hard to know where to start when everything is bursting into life and flower all at once. Start with these jobs and you won't go far wrong. Don't forget to stop for a moment occasionally, though, just to enjoy.
General tasks:
Tackle bindweed the moment it pokes above ground. Dig it out by the roots, or paint each new shoot with glyphosate-based weedkiller.
Store seeds carefully after sowing and they'll last for next yea...
It's Mothering Sunday soon and we've got lots of treats in store for you and your mum to have a really special day! Make the garden centre your venue for a slap-up lunch in our cafe, chosen from our special Mother's Day menu, or a mouthwatering afternoon tea with some of our home-made cakes to try.
Then take her shopping - or pop in a few days ahead of time to surprise her with a gift you've chosen yourself. Here are a few ideas:
Da...
Move hardy seedlings gradually outdoors from their cosy quarters in the greenhouse or cold frame from this week, ready for transplanting into their final growing positions in the open garden.
Don't do the job in too much of a hurry, though. March can be a chilly month, and it's worth remembering that if you don't relish stepping from your nice warm house out into the freezing cold, your seedlings won't be too keen either. In fact, taking seedlings out o...
Sow a meadow full of annual wildflowers for a glorious show of colour, even on poor, gravelly soil. Try centaury (Centaurium erythraea), marigolds, corncockle, field poppies, larkspur, wild pansies and lovely red anemone-like pheasant's eye (Adonis annua). You'll find mixes of these and many other wildflowers already selected for you in seed packs in our garden centre: just choose the one that's best suited to your soil and situation.
Prepare the ground...
Plant edible hanging baskets for a delicious twist on the usual fare of begonias and busy lizzies. A basket packed with a well-chosen mix of tumbling tomatoes and herbs, or smothered in strawberries or chillies makes a display every bit as fragrant and colourful as bedding – and much more tasty!
Choose about 8-10 of our ready-grown vegetable plug plants for each 35cm (14”) basket. Pairing plants that go together in your cooking works well – tumbling tom...
Just a week to go till Garden Re-Leaf Day, so block out the whole day on your calendar as we've got an action packed day for you here at the garden centre!
Garden Re-Leaf is our way of giving a little back to the wonderful gardeners doing so much for sick children at hospices around the country. We've joined forces with garden centres across the country for the last two years to raise a whopping £116,000 to give to the children's hospice charity Greenfi...
Sow little and often to iron out the boom-and-bust patterns of veg gardening, when one moment you've got nothing to eat and the next, 20 lettuces are ready to eat at once. Harvest them all and you're back to square one, having to wait a month or so before the next crop is ready.
Successional sowing, as it's known, avoids this cycle of glut and gloom, providing a steady supply of just the amount you need over a long period. The trick is to sow just what...