News - Page 126
You can find the latest news from Birchen Grove garden centre here!
Any questions or do you want to know more? Just fill out our contact form or call 0208 905 91 89. Want to get social? Use #loveBirchenGrove.
See you soon at Birchen Grove garden centre.
Look out for lily beetles as they can be a real menace at this time of year. They attack not only oriental and asiatic lilies, but also members of the same family including fritillaries and the spectacular Cardiocrinum, which grows to a massive 2m in height and is a real head-turner in the late summer garden.
The adult beetles are very pretty, in brilliant scarlet with a jet-black head and legs. But their grubs are among the ugliest in the garden: found in th...
Read more...
'Osteos' are such good value for money. They are perennials, meaning they go from one year to next (in normal circumstances), and get bigger each time!
The flowers open and close with the sun, creating a stunning display - and the plants come in several different colours, with white, oranges, yellows and purples being among the most popular. Come and have a look at our beautiful selection!
Lift and divide daffodil clumps just after they've finished flowering, to prevent them getting too overcrowded. Left to themselves, bulbs multiply to the point where they've no longer got the room or resources to flower, resulting in 'blind' clumps which fail to flower, so keep an eye on your daffs and if any are showing signs of feeble or non-existent flowering it's time to sort them out.
Using a garden fork to avoid damaging the bulbs, lift the whole clump...
Read more...
A container vegetable garden
You may be short of outdoor space, but that doesn't mean you have to do without home-grown vegetables. There are lots of veg which do brilliantly in containers, whether windowboxes, grow bags, pretty terracotta pots or just tin cans nailed to a fence.
Growing in containers has many advantages: perfect soil, easy planting and your crops are kept well out of reach of slugs. These days, there are lots of innovative new ideas a...
Read more...
May's plant of the month is the petunia, a much-loved regular in bedding displays, containers and hanging baskets across the country.
There can be few flowers with such a dazzling range of colours to choose from: everything from deepest purple to brilliant yellow, white, pink, striped and bicoloured. As well as single petunias you can find blowsy double-flowered types, and varieties with prettily ruffled petals.
Large-flowered grandiflora types and the...
Read more...
The Petunia is one of the most beautiful - and most versatile - of all the summer bedding plants.
They come in many different colours, and can be used just about anywhere in the garden. For a flowery border, to on the patio in pots and containers, or perhaps a lovely welcoming display at the front door, and as there are also trailing varieties they are outstanding in hanging baskets!
If you pick off the flowers as they finish, this will encourage more...
Read more...
What to do in the garden in May:
This is such a wonderful time of year, when there's warmth in the air and in the soil and the garden is just hinting at summer finery. Keep it looking its best with these jobs to be getting on with this month:
General tasks:
- Start mowing the lawn setting your blade to a higher setting to begin with, then lowering it as the season goes on.
- Stay alert for pests, especially aphids and lily beetles whi...
Growing your own food is one of life's great pleasures, and like most good things, it's worth doing well. A great way of measuring your progress is to pit yourself against the old-timers - producers of football-sized onions and metre-long carrots.
It takes courage to exhibit your produce, but it's a lot of fun. Once you take the plunge and enter your first show, you'll be warmly welcomed in, with lots of advice and if you're lucky, hints on how to grow bigger...
Read more...
Sow hardy annual flowers in generous drifts straight onto the ground this month, as the soil is now nicely warmed up and they'll germinate and get growing in no time.
Annuals include some of the loveliest of all garden flowers, often self-seeding at the end of the year so you'll have new plants popping up next season too. You'll find lots of seed to choose from in your favourite garden centre: try feathery-petalled love-in-a-mist (Nigella damascena), sky-blue...
Read more...
One of the real skills of good vegetable growing is the ability to time the cycle of sowing, growing and harvesting so you always have a steady stream of goodies to pick fresh from your garden.
It takes good planning and a few canny tricks to make sure you always have just the right amount to pick, ready when you want it, every month of the year. Here are our top tips to help you keep the crops coming.
- Sow often: sow everything at once and you'll...
Plant up edible hanging baskets for decorations that are as productive as they are pretty. Alongside the usual begonias and busy lizzies, make space for baskets crammed with tumbling tomatoes and herbs, alpine strawberries or even brilliantly-coloured chillies, for a delicious harvest just outside your door.
You'll find dozens of ready-grown plug plants in your favourite garden centre to start you off, as well as hanging baskets, felted liners and compost. Th...
Read more...
When you're just starting out, full of enthusiasm and keen to get going, it can seem an age to wait before you pick the first fruits of all your hard work. And it's true that some crops, like purple-sprouting broccoli or parsnips, can take all year to mature to harvesting stage – mind you, it's well worth the wait.
Luckily there are loads of fantastic quick-crop vegetables to grow and eat while the slowcoaches are getting going, so sow these and you'll have p...
Read more...