Winter Colour

January 1, 2015 by Samantha Willis

Colour in the Garden

The Hellebores are great little flowers that are often hidden by their leaves and their drooping flowers. Look underneath and you find this wonderful flower from the white Christmas Rose Helleborus niger to the deep dark Helleborus x hybridus ‘Blue Lady’. The Christmas Rose flowers around Christmas time and then you can have flowers right through to March/April.

These plants are easy to look after and grow well in shady conditions. Ideally plant the paler flowers in the shadier spots to light up the darker corners. The darker flowers need to be seen and they won’t be stuck in a shady corner, so semi shade for them.

Another great little winter plant is the Cyclamen hederifolium, these hardy plants make lovely swathes of colour. If you plant them in semi-shade in a humus rich location that will not dry out in the summer they will thrive. I tend to plant mine underneath Cornus or Hydrangeas where they will get the shade in the summer to protect them.

If you’re wanting something a little more blousy and in your face the Bergenia cordifolia or Elephants Ears. This plant has wavy leaves that are about 30cms long with stems of 60cms with sprays of pink flowers. They are again an easy plant to grow and unlike the two above enjoy sunshine or semi shade. There are many varities, if you prefer white flowers Bergenia ‘Bressingham White‘ or purple leaves try B. cordifolia ‘Purpurea

Or a Bergenia that many plantsmen rate is the one raised by Eric Smith of ‘The Plantsmen’.

“Undoubtedly the best for winter effect; large, rounded, crinkled leaves have polished bronze-tinted surfaces while backs, caught in low sunlight, glow rich carmine-red. 46 cm.” BethChatto.co.uk

Lighting your garden

December 18, 2014 by Samantha Willis

Lighting your Garden

If you’re thinking of lighting your garden consider two things firstly there is the health and safety issue; can you actually get down steps or along your path and to a front door? Can you insert the keys in the lock without cursing that you can’t see a thing? Do you need lights for security reasons?

Once you’ve considered the functional aspects there is the aesthetics of lights. At this time of year lighting can really bring a little warmth and emphasises st ructure from lighting the path to focusing on key features. So whilst you may not want to sit out and enjoy your garden in mid winter you can still admire aspects of it and then in the summer you get to sit out and enjoy it.

Up-lighting trees is a beautiful feature, emphasizing the shape and texture in the winter where their branches reach into the darkness and in the summer evening it highlights the leaves gently dancing in the breeze. If you want to see a fantastic display of illuminated trees prior to Christmas visit Westonbirt Arboretum if you live near by.

Spot lighting some small shubs such as Cornus with it’s bold red or yellow stems adds some colour to the garden or focusing on statues where you can either throw light on the item or place the lighting behind it giving intrigue.

Lighting can give a magical element to the garden and enable you to focus on a particular object, in one garden we’ve used LED lights behind a water feature enabling it to float along the patio in the evening, where in the daylight it is a bold stone trough.

So now is the time to have a look at your garden, what would you like to see illuminated at this time of year? If you were looking out of your window what would you like to see?

The Allotment in Winter

December 4, 2013 by Samantha Willis

As we prepare for warm winter evenings in front of the fire there are just a few jobs you could do to on those lovely clear winter days.

In anticipation of frosts and winds, cover your root vegetables with straw or cardboard up to 30cms, to enable you to dig the ground when you want your vegetables. Also stake your sprouts and earth up your cabbages to prevent wind rock. If we have a hard frost coming you can protect your cauliflowers by wrapping a few of the outer leaves around them.
Plant garlic anytime before Christmas in well drained soil; do not plant on freshly manure sites as the garlic is prone to rot. There are varieties of onions that you can plant now which can be harvested in June.
Take hard wood cuttings of currants and gooseberries and indeed any other shrubs.
Protect any pots by wrapping them with bubble wrap and then if you think that is not aesthetically beautiful enough add a little hessian to the outside.
If you have existing apple and pear trees it is time to get out and prune them. You’re aiming for an open goblet shape, so remove any crossing branches, damaged and horizontal branches and prune to an outward facing bud. Do not prune your soft fruit trees at this time of year as you can damage them. Also leave trained apple and pear trees alone such as espaliers as these require summer pruning.
If you want Rhubarb now is the time to plant it, you may be lucky and get a crown off a neighbour. When you’re planting Rhubarb dig in a lot of manure around the crown and let the crown peek out and see the light it does not appreciate being buried.
Cut leaves from the crowns of kale to encourage side shoots for harvesting in late winter

Winter Colour

Lighting your garden

The Allotment in Winter

About

How does it work?

Start a project