Everything you need to grow...
Hot off the trowel
Gardens to Gander
Finally, the rain has arrived, and hopefully many of the gardens will be able to recover. We are sure that many of the gardens below are still worth visiting.
West Dean Gardens open Mon-Fri 09.30am - 5.00pm.
Sat-Sun 09.00am - 5.00pm
The National Garden Scheme (NGS)
Look on their website and find a garden near you to visit.
Woolbeding Gardens.
The gardens open again on Thursdays and Fridays only as from 24th April. Pre-booking is required for everyone.
Insector Clueso!
The Asian Hornet has arrived in the UK, and hundreds of nests have been destroyed. However, it looks as though they have been the tip of the iceberg. They are avaricious insects that target most of our pollinators.
Our honey bees are at serious risk of their hives being invaded and the colonies being wiped out. These predators are smaller than the European Hornet, which is not a threat. The Asian Hornet can be identified by its yellow leg ends and a wide orange band towards the rear of its abdomen.
If you see one, please report it using the iPhone and Android ‘Asian Hornet Watch’ app. Alternatively, email: alertnonnative@ceh.ac.uk
please include a photo if you can do so safely.
Weeders Digest
Wall & Water Gardens - Gertrude Jekyll
When a fellow garden club member recently acquired their new property — with a delightfully walled serene lily pond garden designed by Gertrude Jekyll — it seemed like the perfect time to return to Jekyll’s own wisdom on water in the garden.
Wall & Water Gardens is a timeless classic, written by one of the greatest garden designers of the English tradition. In its pages, Jekyll shares practical yet poetic guidance on designing dry-walled terraces, rock-gardens, stream gardens, ponds and marshy water features — and crucially, on selecting the right plants for water, marsh and alpine settings.
We recommend this book to anyone who loves the elegant marriage of stone, water and planting — If you’re curious about what kinds of aquatic or moisture-loving plants to try or how to balance structure and wildness around water, Jekyll’s book is still a deeply relevant, inspiring guide.
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Wall-Water-Gardens-Gertrude-Jekyll/dp/0881430021
Top gardening jobs for September
September can be a beautiful month when the garden’s hot-coloured plants are at their best, but this year summer has been brutally hot and dry in many areas, so our gardens could be a bit of a mixed bag. Hopefully the rains that have finally arrived will help to preserve some of our trees that have been sorely stressed.
Top gardening jobs this month
1. Divide herbaceous perennials.
2. Pick autumn raspberries
3. Collect and sow seeds from perennials and hardy annuals
4. Dig up remaining potatoes before slug damage
5. Net ponds before leaf fall gets underway
6. Keep up with watering new plants using recycled water if you can.
7. Start to reduce the frequency of houseplant watering
8. Clean out cold frames and greenhouses so they are ready for autumn growing.
9. Cover leafy vegetable crops with bird-proof netting
10. Start planting spring flowering bulbs.
Musings
‘September!
I never tire of turning it over and over in my mind.
It has warmth, depth and colour.
It glows like old amber.’
Patience Strong
‘Noons are sunny, warm and still;
A golden haze o’erhangs the hill;
Amber sunshine’s on the floor
Just within the open door;
In September.’
Elizabeth Cole
‘...some of the rarest days of the year come in September,
days when it is comfortably cool but pulsing with life’
Hal Borland
‘September is more than a month, really;
it is a season, an achievement in itself. It begins with
August’s leftovers and it ends with October’s preparations!’
Hal Borland
‘Is, then, September come so soon?
Full time doth summer ne’er abide?
While yet it seems but summer’s noon,
We’re floating down the autumn tide.'
Eunice E Comstock
‘It was a bright September afternoon,
The parched-up beech tree would be yellowing soon,
The yellow flowers grown deeper in the sun
Were letting fall their petals one by one.'
William Morris
‘All the months are crude experiments, out of which
the perfect September is made.’
Virginia Woolf
‘It was a lovely afternoon – such an afternoon as only
September can produce when summer has stolen back
for one more day a moment of dream and glamour.'
L M Montgomery
And finally remember...
'A fallen leaf is nothing more than a summer’s wave goodbye.'
