- 6 hours ago
Gardeners' World Season 59 Episode 2
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00:11You coming? Come on then.
00:25Come on then, come on.
00:27Good boy, you are a good boy.
00:42Hello, welcome to Gardener's World.
00:45And welcome to a lovely spring day here at Longmeadow.
00:48And a brand new piece of the garden.
00:50This used to be one side of the copse.
00:53And I planted it over 30 years ago from hazelnuts that I gathered.
00:58I planted some trees in here.
01:00And underplanted it with all the lovely primroses and bluebells that you get in coppice woodland.
01:04But the trees grew very big.
01:07And they sucked all the moisture from the soil.
01:09Blocked all the light.
01:10And for the last five years it really hasn't been very good on any level.
01:15But no longer.
01:16Because I have begun the transformation into making this area into a really beautiful woodland garden.
01:40BUZZER
01:44now the essence of any woodland garden is shade of some sort but shade is not a problem you will
01:51find plants that will thrive in almost every variation of the shade theme whoa hang on it
02:00that's ned ned what are you doing come on come here okay good boy would you like a little
02:08something that make you feel better now please don't bark when we're filming right what i'm going
02:15to plant today are two modest plants but they are charming they all grow in shade and they spread
02:23really easily but not out of control so what's not to like now first one is tiarella this is tiarella
02:31spring symphony and tiarella has these tiny white little starbursts of flower carried on long stems
02:39and flower from now through till may and they are happiest with dappled shade that doesn't dry out too
02:48much this is telema telema grandiflora and you can see the foliage is quite similar but the firs are
02:55rather different because they are born on long thin stems but they're pale primrose yellow tiny
03:01little bells i love them they'll last into june and they are the perfect ground cover woodland plant
03:08that also looks really good they're not just filling a space they're performing as well
03:14both these plants come from the damp woodlands or forest of the west of america so don't stick it in
03:21very dry shade it's gardening convention that plants look better placed in odd numbers than even if
03:37you plant in threes five sevens even nines it tends to look more natural than if you do it in
03:44twos or
03:44fours or sixes so i tend to plant in triangles in groups of three
03:53if you want a mass defect of any kind it's nearly always more economic and more successful
03:59to buy lots of small plants than a few really big ones small plants establish much more easily and
04:15they're much cheaper
04:17although i absolutely love the creativity of making a new garden the thing i love most in the world
04:25is actually planting on a spring day with the sun shining the birds are selling
04:31putting plants in the ground knowing that they're going to grow that sense of hope
04:35and satisfaction all comes together and it's just as joyous now as it ever has been in my life
04:43now we're going to visit mary keen now mary keen over a long period of time has been one of
04:49our
04:49our best known garden designers and writers and she's made gardens all over the world but joe
04:56has been to see her in her own garden at home
05:02when i think of gardening royalty mary keen is right up there and what sets her apart is her instinct
05:10for planting
05:13from grand british gardens to designs across the world mary's work is about atmosphere and emotion
05:20and she designs gardens that are to be loved lived in and feel truly alive but down this path is
05:28something even more personal it's her own sanctuary and it's not somewhere that she shares very often so
05:35this is a real treat
05:42so mary you design gardens for oh the rich and famous royalty some very high profile clients quite
05:50high profile i'm not allowed to talk about any of them i know we're not going to talk about any
05:54of
05:54them but what i'm interested in is how different it is designing their gardens and designing your own
06:01garden garden it's completely different i like small flowered plants that you see through and that
06:07are ephemeral i'm not doing display i'm doing atmosphere and it's for me to potter and wander about
06:14in the morning and in the evening and the middle of the day it's just a lovely place to be
06:19not a place
06:20to look at not a place to show off and the actual layout did you draw it out on piece
06:25of paper no i didn't
06:26it's two rectangles like two tennis courts end on end and i knew i wanted some flower beds for
06:33conventional plants and then i wanted two-thirds which we're in now to be wild with wildflowers all
06:42year and i made this s line of beauty path through it to make the garden seem longer and more
06:49mysterious
06:50if you've got a small garden you want to be able to walk around it and to feel like a
06:54sort of adventure
07:00oh this is energizing mary i gotta say what style of planting would you call this border then mixed
07:07can we call it mixed it sounds a bit boring it's got lots of stuff in like snowdrops and hellebores
07:12underneath so it goes on all the time and then these sort of bursts of color like the henry lily
07:19and the agapanthus don't ask me i think it's a headborne hybrid but it's just a good dark form
07:25i love the orange some people don't like orange i love orange i love it there really is a lot
07:32to
07:32see because you're planting in small groups here like you said not large brush strokes no and it's
07:37got a sort of wild feel and the more you look the more you see you could stand here for
07:41hours and just
07:42look at the detail a plants woman at her core mary has filled her garden with plants that bring her
07:53joy not as you might expect in the usual arrangements of threes or fives more like an artist playing with
08:00color on a canvas
08:04mary's really got me thinking because i've been reticent to use purple foliage plants in my garden
08:11mainly going for greens but she inherited that purple berberis which is on the boundary and she's
08:17picked it up in colors and stems of other plants like the thalictrum there has got dark stems we've got
08:24the hollyhop
08:24with those purple flowers really deep colors and over here we've got the foliage of the dahlias and
08:31that red sanguisorba in the back there as well and it's really got me thinking it has a lovely depth
08:37to
08:38the planting color wise and a nice rhythm as well i have to use it so this border got a
08:52name well that
08:54border beyond that we've just looked at is wild and high and shrubby and this one is the transition
09:01between wild and high and shrubby not totally working and a much more gardened flowery look
09:08against the wall so that's the floweriest traddest bed catchy names you got there for them
09:14i love the hollyhocks i love the heights because a lot of people think oh tall plants you've got to
09:20put them at the back of the border but you're bringing them to the foreground and and you're
09:24looking through them well i love the looking through tall plants that's my aim always to look through
09:30i love this euphorbia it's seguiriana what is it you love about euphorbias mary oh well i like their
09:38greenness you like euphorbias too don't you love them i love their leaves i love the fact that they
09:44perform all year it's the zinginess isn't it they say they set off other plants in the garden so well
09:51and the dianthus carthusian aurum that is my favorite plant your favorite plant of all time
09:58i've got a lot of favorite plants but that is currently my favorite plant yeah okay
10:03desert island plants desert island i'm allowed eight no that's records okay no but it's fabulous
10:10thing about it is it grows in shade it grows in gravel it grows in the border and it flowers
10:15for a long
10:16long time i mean it's just a brilliant brilliant airy graceful lovely plant
10:26as well as being a great designer she obviously loves her plants too does mary because look from
10:32the front of the garden all you see is plants you've got an apple tree we're planting all the
10:37way around it no voids whatsoever and before i came i thought oh there's going to be some unusual
10:42stuff some rare things i better gem up a little bit but actually what's lovely is they're mainly
10:48cottage garden style plants and things that we can all get our hands on nurseries and garden centers
10:54things like the pinks the oregano there we've got crocosmere here peonies iris fennel agapanthus
11:05and it's all put together so effortlessly too
11:12this is idyllic this courtyard it's beautiful well i rather love it because it's got a lot of rarities
11:18you said there weren't any rarities in the rest of the garden this is the rarity corner here well
11:23i can see this is more unusual it's more exotic yeah i like a challenge i've got the fuchsia climbing
11:29lady boothby that's lovely and melianthus which joe likes i like well i think it looks great there
11:35yeah i know i think it's lovely actually and what about the one by the door over there oh that's
11:40begonia albopictorosia it'll stay out all summer and then it'll go in the kitchen in the winter so
11:48of all the gardens that you've created how does this one rate when people ask me what's my favorite
11:54garden i always say mine of course and they're quite surprised but of course it's isn't yours
12:00your favorite garden most definitely because that's where you can garden and that's what we
12:04want to do it just is the place where i feel completely at home and myself the passion comes
12:12across from you so strongly oh joe thank you so much this has been amazing seeing it was lovely
12:19having you here thank you for coming thanks for inviting us
12:40come on
12:51many many years ago i visited mary keen's previous garden in berkshire it was wonderful and she was
12:58the very first person to come and see my garden in london 43 years ago and she wrote an article
13:05about
13:05it and arguably started my career as a garden writer and broadcaster so it's fascinating to see her garden
13:13now now now i'm just gathering one or two of these scented leaf pelargoniums which i'm going to take
13:19down to the end because it's time to give them a bit of attention
13:30come on panty boy hot panty boy
13:39the thing about these scented leaf pelargoniums is obviously as the name suggests they're fragrance
13:46now this is tormentosum and you rub the leaf and it releases this strong odor of peppermint it's
13:55really powerful now this is a new variety called torrento which rather weirdly smells of those little cola
14:03sweets it is slightly weird i have to confess but interesting and there are lots and lots of
14:12fragrances from the slightly weird to the absolutely delicious but whatever type of pelargonium you have
14:19now is the time to get them ready for spring
14:27this is a much more familiar zonal pelargonium it comes from south africa and rather than these
14:35these relatively compact plants with big flowers when you see them growing wild they are they can
14:42be big shrubs big woody shrubs sort of six foot tall with smaller flowers which are then pruned by fire
14:51but from it they regrow and i don't necessarily suggest getting a blow torch to prune this
14:57but prune it you must if you don't want it to get really leggy these have been in the greenhouse
15:03all
15:03winter so they've flowered all winter however you've got to be bold and cut them off now or else you
15:10won't have any in the summer it's exhausted and it needs a rest so if we take off those flowers
15:16and
15:16cut back refresh the compost water it feed it we'll get vigorous new growth and that will give us a
15:23really good display later on in summer you can cut these really hard or if you like a little bit
15:30of
15:30legginess and i do then you include that so what i'm going to do is just cut here which leaves
15:37a bit
15:37of stem and then here
15:45and that can come off there
15:49now this one the one that smells of cola bottles i'm going to be much more ruthless
15:58take that off that there now can you see there is new growth right at the base and that's where
16:06i'm going back to now that is radical but because it's a young plant i'm doing that to really encourage
16:15a fresh flush of growth from the base and finally this one tormentosum i like the way that it spills
16:24down
16:25i don't really want to reduce this at all all i'm going to do is take off any spent leaves
16:33however this one here this zonal pelargonium needs repotting and i'll show you how to do that
16:38so i'm going to take it out of the pot like this
16:45what i'm going to do is take off the bottom third so we're taking off quite a lot of the
16:53compost there
16:58i've put the crocks back in the bottom
17:04and i've got some fresh compost here now this is a wood-based compost a little bit of garden compost
17:11added and quite a lot of grit
17:15just look at the roots on that great in you go
17:28and i'm going to wiggle it to work the soil around the roots and then address that with some grit
17:35which just makes it look better
17:40give it a drink but make sure it drains thoroughly
17:48and then feed it liquid seaweed once a week and you should start to see healthy new growth and keep
17:55feeding it until it starts flowering i will go through all the pelargoniums particularly zonal ones
18:02and set them up for fresh growth and of course a really fresh good display in the summer months
18:14now last september we went to visit karim habibi in his nursery in kent and his incredible collection
18:23of heritage apples
18:31we have 700 varieties of apples what i'm doing is actually preserving lots of the old varieties
18:37it's important that these are available for people to grow in their gardens because they're not
18:42available in shops and people forget what very nice heirloom varieties taste like
18:48each apple is like rehearing a song you've not heard for a while because i'll instantly remember
18:53the other times i've tried the apple so i'm quite passionate to keep these apples going
19:00i'm very glad when people do come to the nursery try an apple for the first time and they say
19:05goodness
19:05i never knew apples could taste like this this is sweet society it's a lovely dessert apple with quite
19:17an intense flavor quite crisp as well this is jumbo one of my favorite cooking apples and it cooks down
19:29to
19:29a lovely apple sauce very very easily
19:36this is captain kidd a lovely sweet apple with a pear drops flavor
19:45caring for all these trees is a huge operation i'll be producing 7 000 or so new trees a year
19:52i am obsessed with the apples i'm obsessed with looking after fruit trees and maintaining the
19:58collection it is a sort of labor of love
20:03right now we're amongst the mother trees so there's about a thousand trees here and every single tree
20:08is actually a different variety and that's essential to have so that i can harvest cyan wood
20:13and cyan wood is essentially new growth on that tree which i can use for cloning
20:19just above each leaf stalk there is a bud and each one of these buds has the potential to produce
20:26a new
20:26tree if you look at older growth on a tree those active buds aren't there so that's why you can't
20:32use older wood and you need new growth
20:36so right now i'm taking the leaves off the cyan wood so that it doesn't actually dry out i'll also
20:44take the top off because that is actually too thin to work with
20:48so now that's ready and the next stage is to graft this onto some rootstock
20:59right now we're amongst the rootstocks the rootstock obviously determines the vigor of the tree and so
21:06every apple tree that is in this country is actually made in this way where it's actually made up of
21:12two
21:13parts the rootstock and the scion which is above that and you can usually see the graft union where
21:18it's actually going to have different bark it's going to look quite different so that's the part
21:22where you know that any flowers on the top part of the tree will produce let's say your bramlees or
21:29your cox's orange pippins so this ironwood that i collected from the mother tree i'm going to graft this
21:35onto this rootstock right here using a technique called chip budding
21:38i'm making a shallow cut on the sandwood
21:45the next stage is to make the exact same incision on the rootstock
21:56i'll then tape this up
22:02and that's now done so that bud that is now on there that will fuse
22:07to the rootstock and next year in next season's growth that will grow into a one-year maiden
22:12so it might put five six foot of growth on
22:22so every summer i'll be out here chip budding in late july through till august it's a lot of work
22:28i will probably be spending the best part of 10 12 hours a day both collecting cyanwood and chip budding
22:35i'll probably aim to do 500 of these a day i'll work well into the night some nights with head
22:41torch on
22:41and that's just because there is a shortish period where you have to get quite a lot of work done
22:50once you grow an old variety like ashmead's kernel for example it's such an unforgettable variety that you
22:58become quite excited and passionate about preserving more and more old varieties because you realize
23:03that these apples are some of the best fruits in the world you can go back through time and see
23:10how
23:10important a certain apple was to a certain area because that apple is cloned you can actually taste
23:17exactly what people were tasting sort of 200 300 400 years ago and you can't really do that with a
23:23lot of other fruits
23:28in the early 90s when my parents started things here britain was actually losing lots of its old
23:34orchards my parents were quite passionate about actually sourcing old material and creating a
23:40collection things like margill or pitmast and pineapple these old varieties which were such lovely
23:47apples to actually grow and try yourself they really wanted you know everyone to have that experience
23:57i really wanted to experiment and try and create my own varieties eventually i persuaded my dad to let me
24:04have a sort of a small nook of the nursery where i actually sort of planted seedling varieties grafted
24:10those out and eventually i have actually produced some of my own varieties unfortunately my father
24:16passed away before trying any of the seedling apples and one of the first apples which was an
24:21exceptional apple i've actually now named that variety after my father i've called it hamid's red pippin
24:28i think he would have been very interested to try that it's quite sad he never did but it's it's
24:33very
24:33nice to every time i see that apple to sort of think of my dad
24:40right now we're amongst the maidens in the nursery to get to the point where your one-year-old
24:46tree is going to start to thrive and produce apples firstly you want to plant the tree in the
24:51winter time and let the tree establish so that means plant the tree well so the roots are happy
24:55and water the tree quite a lot so in that very first winter time whilst it's dormant you probably
25:01want to cut some branches off lower down so these lower branches in the long term are not going to
25:07be very useful perhaps if you are going to sort of try and train in espalier or step over but
25:11for a
25:11freestanding tree which generally is what most people plant you really want a clear trunk lower
25:16down so that maintenance is quite easy and then at the top of the tree most people actually want
25:21quite a sort of three-dimensional crown so imagine a goblet-shaped tree and those are where you want
25:26your fruit so that the tree is able to sort of hold itself up whilst carrying heavy fruits you can
25:32essentially choose where you want the crown of the tree to be by cutting the leader off at a certain
25:38point because what happens is if you cut the leader off all the buds below the certain point where you
25:44cut the tree they're going to compete for apical dominance which means they're going to try and grow
25:49as much as they can so you end up with a large sort of cluster of branches coming out and
25:55from that you
25:56can actually select some that will form a balanced crown of about sort of four branches five branches
26:03i would like to think that in a few hundred years time people might have a hamid's red pippin tree
26:09in their garden and they will look up who was this person where did this apple come from oh i
26:15live in
26:15kent oh okay i know where that you know where that town is it's something that i'm very fortunate to
26:22be able to do and i certainly would love it if one day one of my children wants to continue
26:28this i
26:29can't think of anything nicer than working alongside one of them or all of them if they all want to
26:35join
26:35in so many apples yummy
26:52when i planted this orchard so many years ago i carefully hunted out and chose heritage local
27:00varieties i wanted to build up something that could only represent this area so therefore of
27:06course i really admire what kareem is doing and he's doing it so well it wouldn't be marvelous if his
27:12children carried that on his grandchildren what a fantastic project now it's time to visit one of
27:19your gardens we're going down to dorset to visit the garden of james baker hello i'm james off of the
27:28traders welcome to weymouth i do this for a living gardening so i thought i'd show you my humble abode
27:34this is like a patio area obviously it's a bit early in the year but your tulips are coming up
27:39now
27:39it's constantly experimenting daily i might move something around whatever tickles my fancy that's
27:44part of the fun of gardening you know you're never right and you're never wrong everyone's a busker me
27:49included structurally functional down the middle i have a family i don't have any please keep off the
27:57grass business i just like to fill the beds with everything just go wild and i like to let the
28:02periwinkle cascade down a bit like a waterfall the hebe just goes wild and what i love about this you
28:09get the purple and i've got a climbing rose that comes through and the pink and purple intertwine
28:15beautiful now this is my pièce de résistance my favorite bit of the garden this pear tree so basically
28:20this pear tree was swamped with ivy and it was on its last legs i had one little pear on
28:25it we
28:25replanted that seed and that is growing down there that scraping sound you hear in the background is
28:32uh my son hello rake up the leaves good man and i let the kids do what i used to
28:37do in my granddad's
28:38garden is just learn on the spot watch learn experiment trial and error my great granddad was
28:43an incredible gardener lived to 102 uh so you know there's something to be said to be outdoors you know
28:49breathing in the air it's good for the soul gardening master and apprentice i think you're
28:55the master though in this area i'm gonna put onions down here carrots in the front row radishes
29:03lettuce plants uh potentially a cucumber plant running up that you've got the job now it's yours
29:10so this little area i salvaged what i could from the wreckage of a hedgerow this bay was put in
29:15and it was a twig when we cut it back but it's you know been shaped now no edward scissor
29:20hands but
29:21you know good enough the little hack i've got is sedum stone crop it's good ground cover it's great
29:25weed suppressor this came from one clipping i got which is incredible they're up there with periwinkle
29:31for me for beautiful almost like forest floor carpet coverage here's my bravery award for gardening
29:38this aeonium was left out all year kind of as an experiment really it was a success story so i
29:44will be
29:44trying that again i hate to chatter the illusion it is trial and error gardening gardening adds years to
29:50your life and life to your years and that is like the best quote i think i've ever heard i
29:54want that on
29:55a t-shirt that's my garden thank you for watching
30:24i like the fact that james's son was growing vegetables
30:30well it's time that i started to sow some vegetables too long meadow had such a soaking
30:36all winter now the raised beds make a difference and actually now they're not too bad they're ready
30:42the rule of thumb if you're sowing seeds or indeed planting anything out is if the soil feels cold to
30:49your hand don't do it but if it doesn't feel cold doesn't feel warm it just doesn't feel cold then
30:54you're
30:55away and you can get going and what i'm actually going to put in here is for me a bit
31:00unusual
31:02this is garlic and nine years out of ten i plant garlic directly into the bed usually in september
31:11but certainly no later than october but i couldn't get the bulbs to plant until october late october and
31:18by then the ground was too wet so what i did is i planted them up into these plugs i
31:24bought them on
31:24in the greenhouse for about the first month and then they've been outside all winter because for
31:29garlic to form cloves rather than just a single bulb it needs a period of cold weather
31:41if you've planted bulbs and they've rotted in the wet or if you've just got ground that stays wet
31:45all winter this system of planting the garlic in deep plugs or three inch pots and then planting
31:51out when the ground is ready i think can work very well
32:05now last august carol went to rhs rosemore to see their vegetable garden and potager and of course i'm
32:13sure they produce delicious food and i'm pretty sure that all of it gets eaten but it also looks fantastic
32:26as far as i'm concerned nothing beats growing your own fruit and veg and eating it here there's so
32:35much to inspire you to grow your own
32:41this is a huge space the sort we might all dream of mind you with a veg garden this big
32:47we'd have to
32:48feed the whole street there are so many ideas here we can take away and use in any size garden
32:55or even
32:56without one there are examples all around of veg herbs and fruit growing in containers there are
33:03tomatoes chilies aubergines basil parsley an array of herbs and even a glorious apple tree traditionally
33:13in larger gardens fruit and veg are separated from flower borders to be more productive
33:20but that's not practical in smaller spaces so if you want to grow a bit of both and have limited
33:28space
33:28there's a perfect solution well this is another of rosemore's beautiful gardens this one is called the
33:37potager there are vegetables galore here but it has a whole different aesthetic from the vegetable garden
33:44in the vegetable garden everything's grown in serried ranks here everything's grown because it looks
33:51beautiful next to its neighbor the whole idea is about design using vegetables ornamentally and making
34:00them look utterly beautiful the overall design in this garden is important it's based on a circle there's a
34:09circular herb garden in the center and around it are arranged four symmetrical beds although everything's
34:17edible it's all about what plants look like together so you've got beautiful chard here with these pink
34:25stems but over there another swiss chard but this time with golden stems with the sunlight streaming
34:32through it it's hugely versatile and what's more you can eat it right the way through the year it'll
34:39overwinter wonderfully it's very very hardy i love the addition of these tagetes all around the edge of this
34:47bed there's the tall one here which is one called cinnamon but the point is it's single which means it's
34:54hugely attractive to pollinating insects and of course that's just what you need to pollinate your beans and
35:01lots of your other flowering plants and then for a bit of drama in the background we've got this amaranth
35:08this is one called red army with these very dark stems and dark flowers and seed heads
35:15amaranth is a wonderful vegetable it's grown all around the world for its leaves here it's grown both to eat
35:23but also decoratively now everything's set against each other here to give interest in texture and
35:29color but also there's height from these beans growing up an obelisk in the corner and next door
35:37to them another vertical emphasis that great big orac looking gorgeous in seed against the blue sky
35:44and then right in the middle these two sentinels these great big plants of bronze fennel another
35:52interesting texture to add to what already exists right the way through the bed and in fact right the
35:59way through the garden how about this for a novel idea if you've got a fence separating one bit of
36:07the
36:07garden from the other don't just leave it grow something up it grow something like this beautiful
36:13plant this is an ornamental good and it's just using the fence as support all along these stems flowers
36:22are produced both male and female and when the bees have moved the pollen onto the female flowers they'll
36:28turn into fruit now on this plant they're ornamental good so they're not edible but there are so many
36:35members of the coco bit family that grow in exactly the same way that are utterly delicious squash and
36:42pumpkins for a start all they need to grow successfully is loads of sun and lots of water beautiful
36:56not only is this garden packed with beautiful vegetables but there are so many fruit trees too
37:03and so many good examples of how to grow them here's a step over apple the whole idea is it
37:10makes a
37:11really really low plant and yet it's extremely productive just look at the apples here and all
37:18that happens is as the apple comes up two big shoots are trained horizontally along wires the wires are just
37:26a
37:26a couple of feet off the ground and it's tied in and keeps making progress all the time and each
37:33time
37:33it sends out a side shoot that's cut back to a couple of buds which is when it makes these
37:39fruiting spurs
37:40and eventually these lovely delicious apples too but another wonderful way of training apples is this
37:49this is an espalier and it's a beautiful example of this technique so here's the central trunk
37:56and this time these branches have been trained out horizontally these ones first obviously the plant
38:03has grown up a couple of feet and then two more are trained out sideways again that happens third one
38:12and probably you'd end up with a fourth one you have here and all the way up you've got this
38:17bountiful crop
38:18of apples so even in a tiny space or on a flat wall or in between two parts of a
38:26garden you can produce
38:28a plant which gives you loads and loads of fruit
38:34throughout the veg garden there are glorious examples of companion planting
38:39as here with this wonderful archway full of fig leaf gourds look at those beautiful fruits but at
38:47their feet are growing tagetes and they are supposed to deter white flies and other kinds of apis
38:54they've got a really strong pungent smell and they bring in all sorts of pollinating insects
39:01the potager and the vegetable garden show us all that with a little bit of creativity
39:07we can put vegetables and flowers together to produce something which is just as beautiful
39:14as any bed or border
39:40now here's another change that we made over the winter this is the mound and for the last
39:46six or seven years these have been big beds on either side of the path with
39:52roses and quite big planting but the space was awkward so taking them out
40:00and this has been laid as a terrace here you're raised up I'm looking down on the
40:06new woodland garden which is pleasing and so I'm very happy with the result
40:22this is proved to be the perfect place to keep houseplants and they're happy in here for three
40:28reasons the first is the light is good it's bright but it's not glaring it's never very direct sunlight
40:37the second reason is that the temperature in here is pretty constant and houseplants like that whereas
40:43in the modern centrally heated house the temperature can fluctuate by 20 degrees and thirdly the reason
40:50why they're happy in here because they're neglected and neglect is the secret of the happy house plant
41:07when I say they thrive on neglect what I mean is is that you can really damage them by too
41:14much of
41:14anything too much watering too much feeding too much warmth too much light is going to do far more damage
41:21to house plants than a bit of benign neglect I'm going to go through each of these and do what
41:28I
41:28would do in spring as we enter the growing season now I'm going to start with the cheese plant because
41:33this poor thing is not in a good state look it's fallen completely over it's lost its support and if
41:40I
41:40put it on the table for a minute you can see what's happened this here has broken away so the
41:47first thing
41:48to do is to prune it now is the time to prune a cheese plant too big reduce it in
41:55size if it's
41:57damaged take off the damaged part by and large it's actually not at all unhealthy you see me through the
42:04leaves it's looking quite happy so the first thing I need to do is to support it make sure they're
42:13strong
42:13and make sure they're tied in well when you're tying up any plant always use soft twine so it doesn't
42:21damage the plant there we go if the leaves get at all dusty just wipe them with a damp cloth
42:31with
42:33your fingers just remove some of the compost maybe the top inch and then top it up so a soil
42:41-based compost
42:42or a bark based compost with plenty of drainage this just gives it a little bit of extra goodness to
42:51kick off this fresh growing season the next thing to do is to give this a good drink what I
42:58have is a
42:59very weak solution of seaweed feed and I'm going to water that in until it's running out of the bottom
43:06let it be sodden and then let it really drain well
43:12now this spider plant is moderately happy and spider plants are one of the few house plants
43:20actually can be a bit wetter than most because they're very forgiving so if you do overwater them
43:25you're unlikely to kill them but once a week is plenty with house plants you may experience little
43:32flies these are fungus nuts and they are living off decaying organic matter in the compost and one of
43:40the reasons why it's decaying is because it's too wet so the quickest way to get rid of it is
43:44take off
43:45the top layer of compost replace it with fresh give it a soak and then only water it again when
43:51it's bone dry
43:52what I'm going to do with this now is give it an immersive soak hold it down until it stays
43:59under
43:59the water can you see the bubbles coming up there it's bubbling like a man who's had Jerusalem artichokes
44:06before his bar you've got a good way of watering house plants that have become so dry that the water
44:13just seems to bounce off the top now while that's having a soak I'm going to deal with the Chinese
44:19money
44:20plant and what I'm going to do with this is repot it that's pretty firmly in there a little trick
44:27is to use a cane in the bottom and just push like that now you can see that that is
44:33essentially pot
44:34bound if you can see more roots than compost it needs repotting now I'm going to put it back in
44:40the same pot rather than putting it in a bigger pot so I'm going to remove some of the existing
44:46roots and
44:46compost I'm just going to use my fingers I'm just going to scrape away a bit like this creating room
44:54for some fresh compost and therefore fresh roots to grow into we'll put a little bit of compost in
45:02the bottom push that down in having repotted I will give this a water and a feed let it drain
45:15thoroughly and then put it back now your best friend with any houseplant is this a mister if
45:23you're not sure how much to water or when to water you can never go wrong by increasing the humidity
45:30so
45:31place them somewhere where you can spray them so their leaves are distinctly damp and sometimes running
45:36with water without damaging carpets or curtains or cushions and having watered them if any is
45:42accumulated in the saucer that's beneath them throw that away don't let them sit in the wet and that
45:49will do for most houseplants of course it doesn't apply to cacti or succulents which are another whole
45:56thing altogether now the whole point of houseplants is that they deliver all the year round but out in
46:06the garden there are some plants that are absolutely of the season and only perform for a few brief bright
46:14weeks but really special when they do and we went down to Cornwall to visit a grower of camellias which
46:22of course are at their best now and I think you might truly say that he does love a camellia
46:38I'm described by my missus as a serial obsessive and my current obsessions are camellias really in
46:47it deep with camellias the Italians used to call them perfectus there's a perfection in the arrangement
46:56of the flower that is pretty much unrivalled my name is Jim Stevens I've been in professional
47:08waterculture all my life this is my garden in doubles in southeast Cornwall and we've been
47:13here for about 35 years now camellias give me interest in the garden from late autumn right through
47:21to spring when not much else is happening being evergreen shrubs providing greenery through the
47:26winter and form a background for everything else that's going on they're beautiful look at that
47:38there are over 30,000 varieties of camellias it's about 300 species there are camellias with beautiful
47:46foliage right through to the other extreme where you've got flowers six inches diameter in vivid pink
47:53and everything in between you've got perfume you've got big growers you've got small growers there's got
47:59to be a camellia for everybody I've got a couple of dozen here when I'm showing you them all I
48:05want
48:05you to put your hand on your heart and say you don't like any of them this is camellia Annette
48:12carol which has long been one of my favorites it always performs really well every year I love the
48:18way it opens from a fairly deep pink bud and then fades so at any one time you've got a
48:22sort of range
48:23of different colors across the bush well this is one called camellia japonica bob hope as good a deep
48:35rich red camellia as you'll get but a very typical japonica type camellia so it's a fairly solid presence in
48:42the garden this one has been here probably 12 or 15 years and I've kept it around about the same
48:47size
48:47by taking a couple of years growth off every second year when you read gardening books they'll often tell
48:56you that camellias don't need pruning but if you don't prune them they'll grow into small trees and
49:02are much too big for a small garden and you can prune them they respond extremely well to pruning
49:13so if you're wanting a really good starter camellia I've got a variety called Debbie this
49:19is a Williamsii camellia it's a good rigorous grower has lots and lots of flowers over a long period of
49:26time one of the characteristics of the Williamsii is is that they generally speaking drop the flowers
49:31before they go brown one of the reasons that they're so popular the japonica varieties which
49:37comprise the majority tend to hold on to the flowers and they go brown on the bush this one's
49:44one called minato no aki bono which means harbour at dawn and this is a luchuensis hybrid which means
49:52that it's beautifully perfumed right beside that towering above it is camellia reticulata mystique
49:59which is very very different it's a very blousy pretty pink thing
50:05camellia reticulata is the prima donna of the camellia world and this I guess is what most people
50:11would associate with camellias this is what they would be thinking of beauty is in the eyes of the
50:16beholder that to me is beautiful at the other extreme are things like this this is camellia
50:23luchuensis which is a species such as you'd find growing in the world so the flowers are tiny they're
50:29single flowers they're quite sweetly perfumed which the vast majority of camellias are not and
50:35then the third one that I've got here is a variety called koto no kaori which is a hybrid between
50:41luchuensis
50:42and a japonica variety and this to my mind combines the best of both worlds got the color you've got
50:49the floriferousness of it plus you've got the perfume this is me propagator and I took this batch
51:00of cuttings very late July early August last year they've been pretty much undisturbed since then just
51:06water them occasionally and it'll be interesting to see whether they've got any roots on them
51:12ah look at that a little root system oh you're looking at a happy man here terrific when I take
51:21them in the cuttings that I took I cut that off right at the base wounded it slightly with a
51:28very
51:28sharp knife I just pair the bark off just down one side which is just enough wounding to to stimulate
51:34rooting a bit and stuck it in the propagator so that needs to be potted up now into a little
51:41individual
51:41pot and lots and lots of new plants here we've got another species camellia this one's one called
51:57transnocoensis with tiny little white flowers very very strong contrast with this and the debbie behind
52:04it the typical what people would think of as camellias perhaps wouldn't even recognize this
52:09as a camellia at all but it has a much more natural relaxed habit of growth so very thin twiggy
52:16upright
52:16habit of growth that might be much more appropriate to a lot of people's more natural type gardeners than
52:22the traditional camellia people who don't like camellias are not amenable to reason are they for
52:33heaven's sake how could you not like camellias make any sense
52:55well it's hard to say this Jim but you may notice I don't have a single camellia in this garden
53:01because I'm one of those terrible people that has not yet learned to love them maybe it will come to
53:07me but I do love hydrangeas and I've got some here in the writing garden you may notice that we've
53:14made
53:14some changes over winter because when we put the doghouse up last summer we put a path in front of
53:20it and it was a bit narrow so we widened the path to make a terraced area now there is
53:26space to put
53:27big pots I've got two and I'm putting in hydrangea paniculata hydrangeas cope well in light shade and
53:36they need relatively good drainage and the great thing about paniculata they can be pruned hard every
53:44year so therefore you can grow them in a pot without them getting too big first things first it needs
53:50a
53:50crock in the bottom it's not so much to improve the drainage but it's to stop the compost falling
53:56out the bottom of the pot I have already mixed up a mixture of grit plenty of our homemade leaf
54:05mold
54:18right now that obviously gives lots of room for growth and because this is a great big pot I do
54:25want
54:25it to be dramatic this is a hydrangea paniculata kayushu and it carries conical white flowers June July
54:35August a lot of hydrangeas you think of as being September coming into their best later in summer
54:41and into autumn also the critical thing about them is they flower on new wood right let's take it out
54:49the
54:49pot as a rule of thumb when you're planting anything in a pot leave at least an inch for watering
54:59perfect
55:11now as always particularly this time of year when you plant anything water it in
55:19give it a good soak as well as watering it and giving it moisture it's moving the soil around the
55:27roots and I will water this weekly now what you see will carry no flowers at all so these stems
55:35will
55:36be bare the new growth will carry the flowers eventually what I want is a plant that is about
55:42seven foot tall festooned with white conical flowers now I've got some jobs and you could do this weekend
56:04buddlia can be pruned now it flowers on new growth so everything that is on the plant
56:12now will produce no flowers so you need to cut hard if you go down to two buds from the
56:20base of the
56:20plant that's about as low as you need go or maybe about two or three foot but be brave and
56:29cut hard
56:37now is a great time to soak cosmos for a really good late summer display fill a seed tray with
56:45peat-free
56:45compost and carefully sprinkle the seeds so they're evenly placed across it cover them over water them and
56:53the best way to do this is to dip it in a tray of water for about 10 minutes and
56:57then put them
56:58somewhere warm to germinate and they should be ready to prick out in a few weeks time
57:08if you've got hyacinths that you've grown for an indoor display over winter or any other bulbs that you've grown
57:15in containers you can plant them out into the garden when they've finished flowering put the whole thing
57:24untidied up leaves stems and all into the soil bury them and let them die back naturally and they will
57:32flower next year
57:38so
58:03I will take these buddlier cuttings and put them through a shredder.
58:08And then that will go onto paths, and that way everything gets recycled.
58:14Well, that's it for today.
58:16It's been a beautiful spring day here at Longmeadow.
58:20And I do hope that you can get out into your garden and enjoy some spring sunshine
58:27and just this sense of the world breaking free from winter and coming alive again.
58:32I'll see you back here at Longmeadow next time.
58:35So until then, bye-bye.
59:02Longmeadow next time.
59:04Longmeadow next time.
59:05Longmeadow next time.
59:06Longmeadow next time.
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