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Gardeners' World 1968 Season 59 Episode 16 engsubtitle fullmovie🎥 Burning Promise
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00:28The
00:35Hello, and welcome to Gardner's World.
00:39Yes, I am pulling bineweed off the fence and from beneath this hornbeam.
00:47So the roots are not competing.
00:50And as sad as it sounds, I really enjoy it.
00:55Especially if you've got pernicious weed, you know, just that you have to go out, litter
00:59until and often, I think, is the key.
01:04So, that's enough of that for the moment.
01:10If I'm honest with you, this is not going to be the most colourful gardener's world you
01:16have ever seen.
01:18The reason is, we moved in in October.
01:21First of all, it was understanding the space, then designing it, and then starting the building,
01:27the paths, the terraces.
01:29Then over the winter, very much the hedges and the trees.
01:34It's all about early days, getting the soil right and the structure of the garden.
01:40But I will promise you one thing.
01:42There is plenty for us to get on with.
01:44And on that note, we best crack on.
02:09And on that note, we best crack on.
02:14Just to sort of give you a bit of a recap.
02:17Now, ultimately, I've got four gardens.
02:18This first one being, let's call it the family garden.
02:21Some nice big lawn, deep borders, terrace area, pathway down one side, places to pause
02:27and sit.
02:29And you go down a level, but that'll be divided.
02:31There'll be a hedge across there, down a couple of steps, into what I'm going to call
02:35my sort of fruit and herb garden.
02:36And at the back, they'll sit this greenhouse, then another hedge, and then down another
02:41couple of steps.
02:42And then you'll go into a species rose, a few magnolias, and a lot of sort of perennial
02:49planting with a big circular pool in the middle, which will probably just be full of lilies.
02:55So that'll be a really romantic space.
02:58And then after that, another hedge across just to divide the space.
03:02And you'll go through to an area that's got my shepherd's hut, which I inherited, and
03:07an outside kitchen down there.
03:09Two sort of large sort of deck areas, somewhere to entertain, relax.
03:15It sounds good, doesn't it?
03:17The only thing is, I've now got to get on with it and make it happen.
03:24You might remember, back in spring, I was prepping this board, and I've since then kept
03:30it free of weeds, but also I'd put the canes in, where the shrubs were going to go.
03:35I'd normally wait until the autumn, but I'm itching to get some in the border.
03:40So I'm going to pop in just three today.
03:44I think the first thing to say is, when I'm buying these plants, I'm not necessarily thinking
03:50about them as plants.
03:52I know that might sound strange, but it's about shapes, forms, how they connect with
03:58what's around them.
03:59If you imagine this viburnum, it's going to grow probably to about three metres.
04:03I'm going to lift the canopy, so I'm going to prune all those lower stems.
04:07So you're going to see those, they'll be exposed.
04:09You've got a spring flower, and you've got a real leathery leaf.
04:12And then next to it, this is a good old dogwood, so Cornus siberica, quite relaxed in its growth.
04:21When I said spring flower, and think about it, fantastic winter stems, but also good autumn
04:28colour and a little flower.
04:30So you're starting then to join these sort of ornamental interests together.
04:34Then as we move down the border, you come to the Amelanchia, multi-stemmed, really doned.
04:41Flower, berry, autumn colour.
04:48Now we get to the Cotinus cogria, flamissio.
04:52The smoke bush are amazing plants, quite mounded in its habit.
04:58This beautiful sort of dark leaf with this smoky flower, it gives a pop of colour to the
05:04shrubs in the border.
05:06But again, you can just see the two leaves together, you know.
05:09So that will go in there.
05:11Now, last but not least, this is Ribae, so ornamental current.
05:18It's called Ribae's Oregon Snowflake.
05:21It gets up to about 1, 1.5 metres.
05:24But in my head, I'm going to sort of keep it slightly really in a dome.
05:29It will sit under the cornice mass, multi-stemmed, beautiful bark as it gets old, a winter flower,
05:35followed by a berry, even pretty good autumn colour.
05:39So you can see that all the time, all I'm doing is a little jigsaw and I'm putting it together.
05:45So, let's get it in.
05:46I'm not going to put any manure in the bottom because I've already prepped the soil earlier in the spring.
05:52The next thing I am going to do, though, is really soak this hole.
06:02Right, there we go.
06:03That's sitting in there nicely.
06:05And then as I take the shrub out, you just start to break that up.
06:09It's not bad at all.
06:10It's quite fine.
06:11There's lots of white root in there, which is ultimately what we want.
06:16And then, I'm gently teasing the roots apart to encourage them to grow into the soil.
06:22And now I'm just going to push that soil back around.
06:29What I've done by watering that hole before is create myself a bit of a sump.
06:36By creating that sump, our water's going to sit in there, you know, which will benefit that plant hugely.
06:42When it does come to watering this time of year, what I would say is rather than little and often,
06:49things like trees and shrubs, they're better off having a good soaking, you know, every two or three days.
06:58There we go.
06:59Slowly, slowly, it will come together.
07:03While I get the other two shrubs in the ground,
07:06Jamie went to Westingards in Chichester to enjoy some summer colour.
07:17In early summer, so many flowers are singing.
07:21The sweet peas climbing skywards, loving the mist.
07:26Salvias full of bees.
07:29There is a classic bloom for cottage gardens and borders alike that will add height, theatre and a variety of
07:39colour.
07:39They can be tricky to grow and they can be spectacular.
07:48Chantelle Spower is the deputy head gardener, who looks after one very special display.
07:59Oh, wow.
08:01Oh, wow.
08:02They're incredible.
08:04My goodness.
08:06It's not often I'm lost for words, but they're staggeringly beautiful.
08:12I have delphinium envy right now.
08:17This amazing array are delphinium allatum.
08:21There's 35 varieties here, given to the garden five years ago, with the aim of testing them out, learning about
08:28how they grow best and showcasing their blooms.
08:39Chantelle, why allatum, and why so many allatums?
08:44Well, other than the sheer beauty, they're more perennial than a lot of other delphiniums.
08:48And they're available in so many different colours.
08:51Well, you can see this sort of vast array of different shades.
08:55And their sheer size, you don't get any quite as high as allatums.
08:59They're the biggest delphiniums I think I've ever seen.
09:01Is that specific to the allatum group, that they're more branching and clint forming and almost multi-stem?
09:07Huge multi-stem plants, yeah.
09:12Allatum is a species that originates from the chilly alpine meadows of Europe and Asia,
09:17which is why they're more perennial here in our winters.
09:20They've been hybridised hugely over the last 400 years.
09:24But, like most delphiniums, they're still tricky, or fussy, or both.
09:34You've clearly got the magic touch when it comes to delphiniums.
09:37These are magnificent. What have you learnt in growing these?
09:41Well, the first and foremost, they really like their own space, make a real feature of them in a bed
09:45of their own.
09:46They don't want that root competition from other plants, which can also lead to great hiding spaces for slugs.
09:51I've always put them in amongst roses and daily, that sort of typical cottage, country garden sort of vibe.
09:57No, that's when they don't tend to thrive so well.
10:00So they want to be by themselves?
10:01They want to be by themselves.
10:03And what about the soil?
10:04They really need free draining.
10:05Right.
10:05They really don't like having their feet wet. That's their biggest killer.
10:08And then the third thing that always happens with mine, which I guess might be because they're in a mixed
10:13border with bad drainage, is mildew.
10:16Yeah, very common. You really want that good air circulation around the plant.
10:20Space is critical.
10:21Space, they really need a big bit of space.
10:31And then in terms of deadheading, do you cut these down at all?
10:35We deadhead them, and then when they finish flowering, we'll cut them right down to the ground.
10:40But they'll reshoot?
10:41They'll reshoot, they'll be reinvigorated, give them a bit of blood, fish and bone, and they'll re-emerge with another
10:46wonderful display, if not as tall.
10:48That's brilliant.
10:49It is wonderful.
10:50In the winter, do you lift and divide them? Do you propagate them?
10:53We're going to be lifting and dividing them this autumn, so extra plants, and that'll just increase their vigour again
10:58as well.
10:59Can I come back when you do that?
11:01Please do.
11:01Because then I can fill my garden up with all those spare dope in here.
11:05That's it, yeah.
11:07All right.
11:11Chantelle has also been taking basal cuttings, which involves removing a section of the stem and the woody crown.
11:19These were done in the spring and have developed into healthy new plants, and some are even flowering just three
11:27months later.
11:34The luxury of having so many different cultivars of delphiniums all growing side by side means I can work my
11:42way through and choose which one's my favourites, which is really difficult when they're all this magnificent.
11:49But this one has really caught my eye.
11:52This is called Rosemary Brock, and it's this lovely, dusky, soft, romantic pink.
11:59I'm a huge fan of this sort of colour.
12:02But also, as you've probably noticed, it rained a lot through the night, and so some of the delphiniums here
12:09have started flopping the rain, but this one has stayed fully upright.
12:14And these buds that haven't quite opened yet, they're like little pearls of joy that are waiting to unfurl.
12:21And the way these water droplets are just dangling off them are like little icicles.
12:25I think these are as beautiful, if not more so, than the flowers themselves.
12:30This is one that I'd definitely have in my own garden.
12:48This delphinium is striking, but in a very different way.
12:52It's regal, it's velvety, it's sort of rich and royal, and using deep, dark, bald colours like this in a
13:01flower border or in a container or even alongside other delphiniums like this adds real depth into a border.
13:07We had 33 millimetres of rain last night, and even so, they're still standing erect and tall and proud.
13:15Just go along and shake the droplets off them.
13:19Like you would do sort of picking apples off an apple tree, it takes the weight off the branches.
13:24It alleviates them of that weight pressure and makes sure they won't flop.
13:28Not that this one is.
13:41There are not many plants in the garden that are blue anyway, but this, this blue.
13:48These are electric blue, this is more of an azure, this is a sky blue, this one's called blue dawn.
13:53I think this one's one of my favourites.
13:55It would add a zing to any border.
13:59It's uplifting, it's joyful, it's smile inducing.
14:02And it's not just this brilliant, beautiful blue that's so special about this delphinium.
14:07It's the size of it.
14:08These delphiniums tower well above me.
14:12They're huge, they're vast.
14:14The other really clever thing about this plant in particular.
14:17Each stem, as it comes up, actually then also breaks again into all these separate side shoots of flowers.
14:25So as the main flower finishes and fades away, you've got all these other buds and flower stems waiting in
14:32the wings.
14:32This is going to give you weeks, if not months, of enjoyment.
14:46I challenge anybody to walk through this bed of delphiniums and not just feel inspired and happy and joyful.
14:54They're just fountains of happiness.
14:57And what Chantal's done here has not just infused and excited and sort of reignited my passion for delphiniums,
15:05but she's shown me how to grow them properly, which is something I've never been able to do.
15:10I'm on really heavy clay, and I now know I need to build a little raised bed to give them
15:16really good drainage,
15:17but more so put them centre of attention, make them the main feature in the garden,
15:22give them plenty of space, and then hopefully I'll also be rewarded with something this beautiful.
15:35MUSIC PLAYS
16:00One day, I might possibly be able to get delphiniums as big as I can.
16:06It's as beautiful as that. My offering at the moment are those which are literally two delphinium recuenei,
16:15which is a biannual that I grew in the other garden, have rocked up here in a plant that I
16:21bought with me.
16:22On the bright side, I can collect the seed, and maybe next year I'll be in a place where I
16:28can actually sow them.
16:30But, as we've already worked out, I've got an awful lot of building to do.
16:37So here, which is going to be a gravel path, bricks either side, is going to run down to some
16:43steps and then drop away into that lower garden.
16:46This is quite simple as far as the actual construction process.
16:52So, if I come down, imagine straight away I've got a path, it's sloping.
16:57So I've got a fixed point at the top there, a fixed point right down there where I meet the
17:02step.
17:03So, I've squared everything off the house, and then I've run a string line really tight from point A down
17:11ultimately to point B.
17:13So, when you're excavating, you're working out your levels, you've got to allow for that sub base, or let's call
17:20it hardcore.
17:21I've allowed about 100 mil there, then you've got your mortar bed that your brick's going to sit on.
17:26That I've allowed about 30, 40 mil, and then I sit my brick on top, which is about another 50
17:32mil.
17:32So, if you add all those together, you know, you're not very shy of about 200 mil.
17:39So, once you've dug it out, taken it away, then you start to fill back in.
17:44So, the hardcore goes in first, then you compact that, and then you're ready to start your building.
17:50When it comes to edging any path, you could do it in sort of timber, steel edgings, I've chosen a
17:57brick.
17:57You know, there's lots of different options.
17:59Although this is a clay brick, it is a paving brick.
18:04So, a lot of the bricks that we build our houses with, they can't use them on the ground in
18:10the gardens.
18:11Because what will happen is they suck up too much moisture, and then in the winter, if the frost comes,
18:17they'll blow the surface of them.
18:18With these, these have actually been what we call fired to a temperature that will deal with the cold conditions.
18:25And if we sort of talk about the mortar mix, this is one part cement, and then six parts sharp
18:34sand.
18:34All I'm doing now, really, is laying myself the mortar underneath, working that down with my trowel.
18:43And then I'm just going to offer my bricks in, and I'm working to my line.
18:49So nice, simple, and level.
18:52And then what we do, is as we're working down, we're sort of haunching as we go.
19:00That's going to hold the brick to stop it moving.
19:02So it really is that simple.
19:15So I will top this up, probably with a bit more sand, and leave about 30, 40 mil for my
19:22gravel finish.
19:23But I will not do that to really...
19:26The last sort of knock-ins, when the garden's getting to the point where, you know,
19:31I'm not bringing in dirty wheelbarrows and lots of mud on my feet, you know,
19:37because I don't want my gravel being ruined.
19:39So the next thing, really, finish the pathway, sand through, and then I can prep the beds, finish off.
19:54Now, we're off to Norfolk to meet Rajal Shah, who has put a modern twist on a cottage garden.
20:09I describe my garden as light and airy, filled with plants that dance.
20:21Delicate, wafty grasses, succulents.
20:25Tumbled together, they make for quite a charming cottagey look.
20:31Putting a plant in the ground and watching it thrive and flower is just so special.
20:38It's been like medicine for me.
20:44My name's Rajal, and this is my contemporary cottage garden in Norwich.
20:53A lot of the plants that I think of as traditional cottage garden plants won't necessarily thrive here.
21:00We have very sandy soil and it gets very dry very quickly.
21:05I've never, ever had a squidgy lawn or puddles, doesn't matter how heavy it rains.
21:11So I've had to choose plants that cope with that.
21:19See, this is the big south-facing border, the hottest, driest, toughest part of the garden here.
21:27I wanted a great depth of border to really have an impact and so I can have plants coming into
21:34their own through the year.
21:36The ones that will thrive here are drought tolerant.
21:39They can cope with this very dry sandy soil.
21:42So there's verbena bonariensis, there's gauras, agapanthus.
21:50And back here is a really special plant called Althea cannabina, which is in the mallow family.
21:56If you like hollyhocks but can't grow them, it's the same flower shape but much more delicate and pretty.
22:02So I'm picturing a sea of pink airy flowers all around me.
22:08Lots of cottage gardens can start to feel quite tired and faded at this time of year.
22:13So I think foliage is really important, particularly when flowers are a little scarce.
22:19So lovely shiny foliage from something like this pitosporum tenufolium golf ball.
22:25The coloured foliage from the beautiful Sambucas.
22:36I moved here back in 2012 with my husband.
22:41Both the children were under three.
22:44And it was pretty hard.
22:50Gradually I just got more and more stressed and tired and my self-esteem went down, down, down, down, down.
22:59I felt I wasn't good at being a mum.
23:03And in the end I did leave my job and was finally diagnosed with postnatal depression.
23:15When I was at my lowest I couldn't face going out.
23:19But the garden was safe.
23:21I could still be outside.
23:26As I started to feel a bit more functional, the garden became a refuge.
23:33And I just started picking away at it, planting things.
23:40I think the physical element of gardening was a big factor in my recovery.
23:50Seeing things grow and getting those wonderful rewards for your efforts was something I could do and feel safe doing.
24:00You just get immersed in this world of sounds and smells and sights and textures.
24:06Your mind is just focused on that.
24:11In a way it was like I was prescribing myself gardening.
24:20I'm always looking for spaces where I can squeeze more in.
24:25Hence it being quite cottagey.
24:27I want it full of life.
24:29It thrills me when there are butterflies and bees and dragonflies and other weird and wonderful creatures around.
24:51So the way I made the garden more contemporary is by having these linking elements.
24:59I've used repeating materials or structures to connect the garden.
25:07Behind me is this ROM steel reinforcement which is used to reinforce concrete.
25:13And it goes naturally rusty so you get this beautiful colour and texture behind the plants.
25:19The shape is ideal for screens and climbers.
25:22This is Dracula Sperma.
25:24It's an evergreen climber that twines the most wonderful fragrance when it's in full flower and will eventually screen the
25:31greenhouse beautifully.
25:34I couldn't be more grateful to have found gardening in my life.
25:38The garden gave me a chance to experience success and things going right when everything else in my life was
25:47going wrong.
25:49And it continues to heal me whenever I need it.
25:52It continues to heal me whenever I am.
25:52It continues to heal me when the mud stays.
26:20It is stone timberืts.
26:22you know a garden being a safe place i think so many people are going to resonate with your story
26:32look just saw creating a little courtyard for the time being with a lot of the containers that i
26:38bought from the other house so yes we have some color absolutely stunning but i want to arrange
26:45the pots but make the most of the walls which are south facing what i want to grow here
26:52is a fig but figs it's not just about digging a hole and popping it in what you want to
26:59do is actually
27:00contain the roots so by doing that you've got to just stress the plant slightly and then hopefully
27:07that kicks it into delivering more fruit so i've dug a hole probably about 50 to 60 centimeters
27:15and about the same wide and these these were slabs that were already here to be fair when we
27:21when we moved in i'm just going to bring these in so in a way i'm i'm making a planting
27:28box so height
27:30wise i just want to be just above soil level so you don't want the sort of any chance of
27:36the roots
27:36coming out and over so now i've got a wonderful little sort of planting container i'm just going
27:42to put a little bit of this rubble that i've dug out back around just to hold the paving slabs
28:05right i've backfilled the hole i'll be honest with you this is hot if the figs don't ripen here
28:15they've got no chance now what i want to do is i'm going to wire the wall so i'm going
28:20to grow it
28:21up against the wall i'm going to fan it out and then tie it in as we go
28:30what i'm going to create is is some horizontal wires first one's about 50 centimeters off the
28:36ground and then i'll repeat that working up the wall
28:44and i've allowed about 70 centimeters between each eye but that'll vary depending on what you're
28:52trying to support
28:56so when it comes to the wire this is about two two and a half mil galvanized wire so what
29:02we're
29:02going to do now really is start to work this through the holes this is the fun bit
29:14pulling that along
29:23so we just pull that through that last hole and i've got about 10 centimeters to play with
29:31and all i'm going to do then is start to wind it back around the wire you might find it
29:39easier
29:41with a pair of pliers so once that's pulled back round then what you want to do is then go
29:47back to
29:48the other end now what i'm doing is tensing that wire i'm not that worried about it being really really
29:59tight i mean it is but you know i could possibly pull on it and pull on it because what
30:05you'll find
30:06is that wire is already warm so what will happen as weather changes the wire would actually tighten
30:24itself
30:25like the shrubs earlier on i'm going to water this whole well before we drop the fig in the fig
30:34that
30:34actually is highly recommended for outdoors you will see mentioned a lot is brown turkey but this
30:42osborne's prolific i'm hoping the second part of that is right it's been recommended to me
30:50good cropper and a friend has said to me they taste really good frosty so i'm hoping that they do
30:59um when it comes to planting against a wall really anytime don't put anything too close whether it's a
31:08climber a wall shrub you're always better off bringing it you know a foot away and what we're
31:16going to do is we're just going to tilt this back in right let's get this soil in i've literally
31:23just
31:24dug it out the back garden so i'm not putting in a lot of compost take the cane out
31:31if i just tease these apart carefully you can see as i tie them in to the wires above
31:39i can create a beautiful fan so hopefully in time not only will i have beautiful feeks
31:48but as that covers that wall those fantastic architectural leaves against that backdrop i think
31:58will look absolutely stunning talking about stunning we are now off to cow's garden in devon
32:24about eight weeks or so ago i started this little plot and it is little it's about eight feet by
32:31five
32:32feet about one and a half by two meters i just wanted to show that not only can you grow
32:38beautiful
32:39flowers but alongside them you can grow all sorts of wonderful produce even in a really small space
32:47like this everything in here has been grown from seed and already i'm beginning to harvest stuff
32:58look at that
33:02this is a beetroot called boltardi boltardi just means it doesn't run to seed it doesn't bolt
33:08and it's my favorite beetroot it tastes really good and quite frankly when you're growing vegetables
33:15the only thing that really matters is the taste that's what you grow them for to eat
33:21one of the first flowers i planted was cosmos easy to raise from seed it's a half-hardy annual
33:29it's been flowering its socks off for weeks all flowers try to set seed but if you want to keep
33:37them flowering it's vital to cut off their dead heads as soon as the petals fall i trace the stem
33:44back to the next bud and snip off just above it if you carry on doing this regularly and keep
33:52them
33:52well fed and watered you'll be rewarded with a glorious show of blooms right through to the first frosts
34:01so that's it with the cosmos for now but i shall keep on deadheading because i want them to flower
34:07i
34:07don't want them to go to seed but i do want this lettuce to go to seed unusually i want
34:14it to flower
34:15set seed and i'm going to save the seed for next year now this is a little gem and i
34:21had a whole row of
34:22them through here and we've eaten most of them you can eat it either as a salad vegetable or you
34:27can
34:27even cook it but only when it's young by the time it's done this these leaves are very very bitter
34:39right that's the last of my lettuce out apart from the one that's going to go to seed and what
34:43i'm
34:44going to replace it with is some rainbow chard now this is a mixture that's called bright lights for
34:53obvious reasons the stems are lots of different colors yellow red some of them are white and the
34:59reason i want this in here is even when everything else has been taken out it'll carry on through the
35:05winter and it's delicious one quirky feature of rainbow chard is that the color of the roots
35:15corresponds with the color of the stems i'm alternating the chard with brompton stocks
35:24so i'll have handsome foliage and glorious scented flowers
35:31several weeks ago i sowed some basil seed directly into the ground in a big circle
35:37and the whole idea was that eventually i was going to put a tomato in the middle of that
35:42and there's this old saying what goes together grows together or the other way around and it's
35:48great to grow basil with tomatoes sadly although the seed germinated the slugs got every single one
35:57now i've sown some more basil seed but i'm afraid they're really tiny plants so i'm going to cheat
36:02i've been to the supermarket and got a pot full of basil but what they do when they sow this
36:09basil seed
36:10is put loads and loads of seed on the top which means i've got a whole multitude of little separate
36:17basil plants well they will be separate when i finish with them
36:21so thumbs in and you've got to go for it you've got to be brave
36:33now i could separate that even more but i'm not going to and i'm just going to plunge this whole
36:40thing
36:40into here of course especially on a hot day like this it'll need a really really good watering and
36:50i'm going to finish it off with a bit of grit this will keep out any weeds it'll retain the
36:57moisture
36:58once i've watered it and with a bit of luck we'll have several really established plants
37:14well this little plot is abuzz with all sorts of insect action there are bees and hoverflies
37:20butterflies all sorts they particularly love the cosmos and the rubeckia these big open flowers
37:28i'm sure you know that i garden organically i wouldn't dream of using any kind of pesticides
37:33and insecticides and so far this plot is just about pest free but it's just the time of year
37:41when aphys start to move in and start gobbling up your crops and i want to do a bit of
37:46companion
37:47planting and the plant i'm using is tagetes it's sometimes called french marigolds sometimes african
37:55marigolds it's got sort of very pungent kind of foliage so that itself will deter some things on one
38:03of the insects that's going to come into here and be attracted by this is the hoverfly hoverflies lay
38:09their eggs on the stems of different plants now when those eggs hatch into larvae they don't eat the
38:16plants because they carnivorous so what they're going for is aphys and they'll gobble them up and
38:23keep your plants really clean and this one's called harlequin you can see why because it's got these
38:29alternate mahogany and bright golden yellow petals
38:38i've also planted up a container with ornamentals and edibles there's cosmos purity amaranth and aurac
38:48so far everything's heading for the sky it needs something shorter to grow over the edge so i'm
38:55squeezing in some nasturtiums they satisfy both criteria not only do they have showy flowers but
39:03you can eat them too just look at that never mind look at them smell them oh that fragrance is
39:19it's just summer personified the sweet peas of course and they're one of the first things that
39:25i planted in here i planted them up this wonderful structure and alternated them
39:31with three different kinds of climbing beans of course the more you cut them the more sweet peas you
39:39get and who wouldn't want a bunch of those on the table they're just lovely and they're going to
39:44carry on producing those flowers all summer long
39:51we're halfway through the season already and yet we've got masses and masses of beautiful flowers
39:58and gorgeous produce and there's so much more to come
40:20i do love that interplanting of veg and flower but that for me is a little bit further down the
40:29road
40:30you might see look i've had a bit of a rethink the fix it's there at the back
40:36do you know the one plan i cannot do without his herbs you know i love my cooking so i've
40:45got loads
40:46of them in containers and i'm growing them on and ultimately they will make it into the garden
40:52long term but i'm just sort of playing about i've sort of got this really sunny side things like the
40:57times
41:00and the sages and my sort of mints and things like that sit back in this space there you go
41:07i can mess
41:08about with that when i come out with a cup of tea but i've got a couple more a few
41:14little times that i
41:15bought i just want to pop those on and i have a mint that needs a little attention
41:23first this is a lovely little lemon thyme which is incredible beautiful flower
41:32but straight away
41:35two herbs completely different conditions you know my mint will love damp even take a bit of
41:42sort of semi-shade whereas the time you're all happy basking out in the sunshine
41:48yeah so what i'm going to do is put three in this little pot you know i want this to
41:55be free draining
41:56so my mix really is peat free compost i've got a little bit of topsoil in there some horticultural
42:04sand and then grit so if i actually hold that together falls apart straight away so you know that
42:12is going to be free draining put some of that in the bottom there and then let's tease these
42:18out of here what you'll find with times as well when you buy them especially this time of year
42:25they're normally well and truly rooted through so i'm going to be quite brutal i'm literally just going
42:32to use the back of my secateurs and just knock that down that will really encourage that plant
42:43another one in now right so there you go that's the second one so really the key to this
42:55you know growing well is me putting in a nice sunny little spot yeah keep an eye on the watering
43:02over the rest of the summer but that drainage is key so really good free draining mix
43:15and keep the plants apart
43:19good air circulation
43:24and there's one little bit i'm going to do i know hold your breath take that off
43:36that's
43:39that'll be used in tonight's tea
43:42cutting those flowers off and now the way those plants are water that in
43:48that'll do it a world of good because it will concentrate on putting that root growth in
43:52and then actually it will start to sort of restock itself from the bottom so there we go
43:59now for something completely different a lot of you grow your mince in pots what happens is eventually
44:06your center starts to die out it shoots and runs it shoots and runs that's ultimately what it does
44:12so what we're going to do is i'm going to cut straight down through the middle of this
44:21and then just where i can't get through there i'm just going to take the secateurs
44:26and just cut through those
44:28then if we bring our pot back up
44:32what i want now as you think about it i want to hold that moisture in to what i'm going
44:36to do here
44:37so the mix i've got here has got peat-free compost but some topsoil so what i'm trying to do
44:44in my
44:44head is is get to as close as possible to where this would be happy you know growing in a
44:51in a garden
44:52environment so it now sits back to back in the middle and then we're going to work in
45:01that compost in around you think about the compost i picked up with the time now if i pick this
45:09up
45:10give it the same squeeze stays together so you instantly know that is going to hold more moisture
45:18so all i'll do with that is give it a really good soaking just keep it slightly sort of in
45:24the
45:24semi-shade keep an eye on that watering that will soon root away
45:32so i said i couldn't live without herbs well we're now off to the west midlands to meet tracy west
45:41and i'm not sure she could do without her roses
45:50of course i love roses can you see them all around you you call it a bit of an obsession
45:56i would
45:56think some people when they look in the garden see how many there are you wouldn't have this many if
46:01you didn't love them i'm tracy and this is my rose garden in birmingham we moved into this house 26
46:10years
46:10ago the garden was a very mature garden there wasn't much color it was quite overgrown it was unkempt
46:17really now obviously the garden is very very different it's packed to the rafters with color
46:23roses everywhere all different colors different types different breeders
46:32i've always liked gardening but probably around 2018 i started to join a few social sites and then
46:42there was actually one person that invited me to join a site that was just for roses i started
46:49getting more and more drawn into it i could feel myself thinking i think i want to go more down
46:54that
46:57root one of the things that i love is the names of the roses and the history behind them it
47:03always
47:04gives them a bit of interest this rose is named gertrude jekyll and she's named after a famous garden
47:09designer born in victorian times it's a beautiful electric pink and it's got a lovely scent quite thorny
47:17very known for her thorns and the flowers are a lovely rosette shape
47:26so the name of this rose is desdemona she's one of my favorites she has beautiful pink buds
47:33that open up into these lovely white cup-shaped blooms you don't have to do too much to keep a
47:38rose looking this good the main things are really to prune in january and make sure you feed twice a
47:45year
47:45before the first and the second flush and mulch to suppress weeds and protect the base of the plant
47:52if you do those things that they're not that difficult you will be rewarded in full with
47:58these beautiful blooms and this lovely glossy green foliage
48:08so this is floribunda rose the name is absolutely fabulous very pretty rose it's a standard um which
48:16means that it's been grafted the the trunk and the roots come from the host rose which they call the
48:23root
48:23stock and then they will graft three shrub roses onto this stem you can see one there another one here
48:32and another one there having three shrub roses grafted onto one stem does make them quite top heavy
48:38so it's very important to make sure that you use a a good stake and a good strap to keep
48:44the head
48:45supported the other thing is because they have a lot of height it means there's a lot of space
48:50underneath them so you can under plant with companions here we've got oxide daisies geraniums
48:57foxgloves the lovely thing about most of these they self-seed i don't even have to collect the
49:02seeds on them they just sprinkle themselves over the garden then pop up again the next year
49:11so this rose here is called roldal it produces an abundance of blooms and for those people that
49:19aren't very happy working with thorns it is virtually thornless you can really handle it without getting
49:25snagged or anything like that so we decided to put potted roses in here yeah so these these have
49:36probably been here now about five or six years did our homework and looked at the size of the pots
49:43that
49:43you would need to grow roses in and it was around 50 centimeters wide 50 deep for a shrub rose
49:49to survive
49:50in a pot if the roots become congested in a small pot very quickly the rose will tell you that
49:56it's
49:56not very happy you'll look at it and it'll look sad and it'll start wilting and so if you can
50:02look
50:02at them and they're saying to you i'm happy then you know you're doing something right if you don't
50:07get any rainfall in summer you probably need some water pots every other day so that you can literally
50:12almost see it coming out the bottom of the pot and you know then it's gone all the way down
50:16to the roots
50:21so as you're watering try and make sure that you only water the base of the plant because
50:28fungus can reside in the soil and if you if you splash the leaves and the soil splashes back up
50:36onto
50:36leaves you can end up with black spots or other things that might be harboring in the soil at the
50:44time this is black spots on this rose roses are susceptible to several diseases the most common
50:51ones are black spot mildew and rust yeah so what i tend to do is just pick the leaves off
50:58and you find
50:59they do come off quite easily because they're already starting to die it's a fungal disease so you don't
51:03want to put that into your compost and you want to bin it and get rid because if you put
51:08it into your
51:09compost you're putting it straight back into the ground again and that you know defeats the object
51:14doesn't it really when we moved in here the top part of the garden was basically a dumping ground
51:23there was just a load of rubbish and rubble up there so we decided to start tidying that up and
51:28put in some borders and some plants various plants and roses and some ramblers
51:35we had these ladders lying up here rather than throw them away we could use them as climbing supports
51:41for the roses this one is a rambler called paul transon this rose is morven hills and this rose here
51:52is gardenia they're ramblers they've been here about three three and a half years now and they've just
52:00started to get to the top of the hoops and put on quite a nice display the hope is that
52:05these two
52:05then will mingle so you'll get the pink and the yellow all mingling together giving lots of color
52:12because that's how i like it really i'm a bit random with my colors i like different pops of color
52:16all over
52:17the place it is hard work looking after this many roses but when they start blooming and that's payback
52:26time and that's that's what you work for i think that rosie's chose me somehow they crept into my life
52:37and i'm glad they did
52:53tracy beautiful who doesn't love a rose
53:18i'll be honest with you i've been looking forward to doing this job all day long
53:26all facing wall so this stays lovely and cool so what i want to do here really is start to
53:33cover
53:34some of the wall and an ideal plant that i can let go up the wall is this hydrangea ptolaris
53:41so what i've done here is i've put in top soil with a lot of sort of well rotted manure
53:48and what's lovely about the hydrangea is i don't have to put wires on the wall because it will just
53:55click
53:55and it's not evergreen but i really do love i love the structure that it creates you look in there
54:06closely what i love is as it clings and then it loses its leaves in the winter it sort of
54:13reveals this
54:14sort of skeleton which i think looks absolutely incredible and then you've got as with so many
54:22other hydrangeas beautiful flower sort of late spring really early summer probably
54:2915 20 foot up there but at the same time it could be clipped and controlled so root system lots
54:35of
54:35wonderful white fibrous root let's just loosen that all up a bit i think if you are planting anything back
54:45against the house i've come about a foot so about 300 mil away
54:53let's just throw that in around there really is a lovely plant for a north facing wall
55:00i'll still keep an eye on it you know especially over the first 12 18 months but i'm sure that
55:08will soon
55:09get away so i'll give this beautiful hindranger a drink and maybe treat myself to one here's a few
55:19things you could be doing at the weekend
55:31birds hedgehogs and even insects need a regular supply of water and in hot weather this is even
55:39more important to give them a helping hand i like to fill a shallow tray with a few rocks and
55:45stones from
55:46the garden place somewhere cool out of the way and keep topped up with water if the weather stays dry
55:59there's still time to sow lettuce
56:03i'm using an old metal container but you could use anything provided it's got a few holes in the bottom
56:12fill with multi-purpose peat-free compost level off and water sprinkle the seeds over the surface i've
56:24chosen a mix of salad leaves which are dead easy to grow cover with a fine layer of compost and
56:31within
56:32a few weeks you'll be picking your own salad fresh from the garden
56:41plants in containers will be romping away now and over the next few weeks we'll use up a lot of
56:48nutrients
56:49to help keep them ticking over it's worth giving them a weekly feed i like to use organic seaweed feed
56:56which will give them everything they need for the best results apply last thing at night or
57:02first thing in the morning wetting the roots rather than the leaves
57:25i think this garden i know it's early days and at the moment i feel like i'm ultimately doing a
57:33lot
57:33building that early planting but there's an incredible atmosphere in the space that even from the first
57:41time you know when i arrived it was just grass but it felt something and i think that is so
57:49important
57:50and now the levels are cut the trees are in i'm starting to sort of add the places to be
57:58an eek more out of the atmosphere it's i know it's going to be a special place and after a
58:09good day in the garden
58:09myself and her ladyship here we come down here sit on this little bucket and just have a moment
58:18and i'm not sure life gets any better so i'm afraid that is it from us this week next week
58:29will be a
58:30rhs badminton flower show myself rachel and ashley will be having another round in the meantime look
58:38after yourselves bye-bye you can say bye-bye look at you
58:43bye
58:52bye
58:54bye
58:56bye
58:57bye
58:59bye
59:00bye
59:01bye
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