yardz

BLUEBERRIES

 

On the BBC's 'One Show' this week there was a report on the benefit of eating blueberries to improve memory especially in old age.

Blueberries have been used for centuries as a treatment for a wide range of ailments from bladder stones to mouth ulcers. In WW2 it was reported that pilots nighttime vision was improved after eating blueberry jam!

Blueberries can be easily grown in 30-40cm containers using an ericaceous compost that contains no lime. Plants are available in pots now ready to plant and should cost about £12.00.

The berries are produced in two crops and one bush should produce 2-5kg of fruit. For the best crops it is advised to grow more than one plant to improve pollination.

There are compact varieties of blueberry that are perfect for growing in small spaces - Toro and Bluetta are possibly the ones to look out for.

www.dorset-blueberry.com

www.rhs.org.uk

JUST DO IT

 

I'm talking about 'grow your own'. So much has been written about it, the Sunday paper magazines are full of how to grow this and that, with all the resulting health and financial benefits. Book shops are now full of tomes on self-sufficiency and organic gardening. But how many of us are actually getting out of our chairs and into the garden centre to buy seed potatoes, onion sets and vegetable seeds. Very few I think.

Make a start today, not tomorrow, not at the weekend, today!

Plan what you want to grow in your yard. Work out what will be most productive and what crops fit in with your lifestyle. Do you want to grow small quantities of veg that are very seasonal with a low return yet are rewarding in exceptional flavour such as new potatoes or grow salad crops such as salad leaves that can keep you in salad greens for almost twelve months of the year.

Whatever you decide to grow there are a myriad of solutions waiting for you at your garden centres and DIY stores. Mini polythene greenhouses, raised beds (available in pre-pack form), cold frames and cloches, growing bags and even specialist crop bags designed to grow a specific crop from planting to fruiting with only the task of regular watering. So go and check it all out.

No excuses your 'grow it yourself' starts today!

WINTER WARMERS FOR PERENNIALS

 

Growing perennials in containers is great in a small space. They give long periods of foliage interest from spring through to the frosts of late autumn and offer a  great range of flower and colour. In these hard times they are also very cost effective especially if you buy the low price pre-packs available in shops and garden centres over the next few weeks.

The only problem with growing perennials in containers is that they don't like their roots being frozen for long periods in the winter and cooked in the heat of summer.

The Lindesburg Pot from www.madebyfragerdala.comhas in built insulation that makes them frostproof as well as being light and virtually unbreakable. The design insulates the roots from cold and heat, yet lets them breath. The pot comes in three styles and a selection of colours. Cost around £60

TWITE AS NICE.........

 

Having lived on a new build for nearly two and a half years we have struggled to attract any wild birds. No matter how stylish the feeder or tempting the food, birds just past us by. This winter though with the harder weather at last we have had some feathered visitors. At first pigeons, then blackbirds and starlings but in the last few weeks we have been visited by a 'twitchers' dream - the elusive TWITE.

I had never heard of a Twite before it dropped in. Not usually found in our area it must have drifted south from Somerset.

'The twite is a small, brown bird, similar in size to a linnet but with a longer tail and stubbier bill. Its back is tawny, heavily streaked with dark brown, its flanks have dark-brown streaks and its belly is white. In breeding plumage the male's rump is pink. It forms large flocks in winter when it spends most of the time feeding on the ground.'

http://www.rspb.org.uk/wildlife/birdguide/name/t/twite/index.asp

WINTER GREENS

 

Despite temperatures down to -8 my salad leaves have survived unscathed with only the protection of a basic polythene grow house.

Seed was sown in early winter with the hope that I could start cropping by Christmas but the low temperatures have delayed this. I sowed a mixture of salad greens in a basic multipurpose compost in extra large seed trays. The grow house is positioned handy for the back door so it is quick and easy to just cut when required.

I will be sowing another tray this week which should be ready for cropping when the present one has finished. It is simple and very cost effective when you consider the price of supermarket pre-packed salad.

A SPRING GARNET

 

Yesterdays Telegraph gardening section had an interesting feature on growing Euphorbia Whistleberry Garnet. This is a stunning evergreen Euphorbia that produces a low mound of foliage that is tinged red. By late spring the red centred acid-yellow flowers are produced in abundance to brighten dull days.

Clump forming euphorbias are generally easy to grow and can make good container plants. The acid-yellow flower colouring is a great foil to spring flowering bulbs and the mounded foliage not only gives year round easy maintenance foliage but also looks amazing when frosted.

www.crocus.co.uk     £6.84 2ltr

http://www.crocus.co.uk/plants/_/perennials/mediterranean-plants/euphorbia-whistleberry-garnet/itemno.PL30000897/

PURE STYLE IN A WATERING CAN

 

Watering cans are an everyday item that has been refined over hundreds of years to achieve the practical tool that it has become. Today we have a wide variety of designs available, from the cheap and cheerful plastic to the galvanised traditional but none surpass the graceful style of the Aguo watering can from www.blomus.com.

http://www.blomus.com/blomus.php?l=en&a=detail&i=65208

Made from stainless steel the can is available in three sizes - 1.4ltr £49.43  3ltr £65.57  5ltr £83.69

Available from several outlets including www.moobarb.com

MAKING THE MOST OF FROST

 

The beauty of frost on foliage shows the importance in small spaces to plant for all year round interest. Ground cover plants such as heuchera and liriope, which tend to hold their foliage through the generally mild winters that we now have, give us a bonus when decorated by hard frosts.

Look around at gardens and pick out the best plants that show off in this weather and try to use them in your ground cover planting or winter containers.

   

Some of the best plants are Heuchera esecially the dark leaved varieties, Liriope muscari, Euphorbia griffithii, Euphorbia martinii, and Buxus.

GOLDEN DEW

 

I saw these amazing flower sculptures on Alice Bowe's great blog www.greengardendesign.blogspot.com.

Golden Dew from www.fionaheron.com

They are a range of individually made flower sculpture, hand blown glass heads on steel stems. £75 for a group of 5.

 

THE HEIGHT OF TWEENESS

 

www.burgonandball.com are well known for their stylish garden tools and now they have introduced for 2009 a range of raised beds under their Home Allotment banner.

Strong planting bags in a range of sizes can be surrounded with willow sides which are available in natural willow or whitewash finish. They have produced different sizes for herbs, salads, potatoes and vegetables.

I must say I'm not mad about them - rather twee, OK for cottage gardens but out of place in the urban yard.