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Gardening article For week Ending January 9th 2010 Around about now you may well be
thinking of how to dispose of your Christmas tree. There are a lot of
places that will take real, cut, Christmas trees, for re-cycling.
Collection points can be found at many places that sold them before
Christmas including most Garden Centres and Cannock Chase Sales Centre.
On the Chase they will be “Chipped” and spread amongst other growing
conifers as a There are many other green re-cycling schemes that are more adventurous including one seaside council who are experimenting with using the dead trees to hold back and even reclaim sand dunes by partially burying them in the sand so that the branches trap the blowing sand. One nature reserve stacks dead Christmas trees lengthways along boundary areas to make a rough barrier that climbing plants can naturally colonise and green up to make a growing hedge. It is not easy to keep live Christmas trees in pots from one year to the next, so if you don’t want to plant yours in the garden, there are some sites that will take unwanted live trees in some areas for replanting in the wild. Some re-planted trees don’t survive, but many do and grow on to develop into full-grown fir trees and make new woodland.
When Poinsettias have finished cut them down and grow them on as any other house plant until about September before restricting their light by putting them in the dark for a few weeks. When you bring them out they should colour up again with luck. During a warmer spell, when the soil is workable, it is a good idea to start and prepare for the Runner Beans by sorting canes and digging a trench where they are to be planted out in the Spring. Line the bottom with a layer of newspaper, then any rough compost or vacuum cleaner fluff, fill it in and leave to settle until the spring. There is not much else to do now except sort and clean seed trays and pots. If you have any plastic labels with writing on, you can clean it off with wire wool, or an old Brillo pad and a bit of elbow grease. There is no need to keep throwing them away. Well that’s all for now. Hi
folks, a happy new Year to all.
Now
a change of topic, if like me, you grow sweet peas and don’t start
them off in the late Autumn, now is the time to sow them. Gardening
books say chip the seed first, but it is not a good idea to try it if
you have poor eyesight. I find if you soak the seed in hot water for a
few hours it works just as well. If you can’t, or don’t wish, to get
the deep sweet pea pots, save your toilet roll inners and plant in
these. You can stand them in a plastic container that has had fruit or
tomato’s in it with about 1 inch of compost in the bottom. The roots
will grow into it and then plants can be lifted out easily. When planted
out the pots, or toilet roll inners, will rot down in the soil. If
you want Snowdrops in the garden, it is best to buy them in pots already
growing, in “The Green” as it is called, because they are rather
temperamental from bulbs, specially if the bulbs have become a little
dry. I think we should be seeing them for sale like this soon. Keep
Christmas cacti slightly damp but don’t over water. When the summer
comes and all danger of frost is over they can be stood outside and
watering should be virtually stopped then. Alternatively they can be
stood in a greenhouse and allowed to bake in the sun. This apparent
neglect should be continued all Summer and they will reward you with a
burst of flowers next Christmas when you can start watering them
regularly again.
Gardening Tips week Ending 13/1/07 Hi
Fellow Listeners
I hope you had
a good Christmas and I would like to wish you all a Happy New Year.
Whilst
on the subject of foliage plants, there are quite a variety of Euonymous
plants available, some gold and some silver edged. They will usually go
greener in the spring and then back to colour later on. There are also
various coloured Sages, some of which will stay small and some that will
spread. I have a Golden Sage about 18 inches to 2 foot across and 1 foot
high. It is in a North facing bed among shrubs and gives a lovely light
patch. More grey leaved shrubs include Senecio Greyii, Helichrysum and
Phlomis. Other plants of interest in the Winter are Cornus that are
grown for their coloured stems. There are green, yellow and red stemmed
varieties, but be warned they can grow very large. It is the new stems
that show the best colour so they should be cut down hard each year to
encourage new growth. Another
cheap and cheerful vigorous plant is the garden Euphorbia. The foliage
is nothing very special but it does have bright yellow flowers early on
in the year. The sap is mildly poisonous and is supposed to deter moles
from your garden. My
vegetable patch is rather small but at the back of it I grow a few fruit
bushes, Raspberry, Gooseberry, Red Current, etc, which come in very
handy for a fresh fruit salad throughout the Summer. Some of the Garden
Centres have quite a good selection now and if they are root wrapped, as
some are, they will come cheaper than potted ones. If the ground is not
too soggy it is the ideal time for planting any type of shrub or tree in
the garden.
Well all for now
Frances Hartley.
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mulch,
but most re-cycling depots will chip them and then blend the chippings
with other green waste to produce a compost. If you try and do this at
home the resulting compost will be highly poisonous to other plants as
it will be very acidic. Don’t even put the fallen needles onto your
compost heap. If you want to re-cycle your Christmas tree at home you
can make use of it in other ways. Carefully cut off all the side shoots,
(stripped of their needles) and then use them to support young climbing
plants such as Sweet peas and beans, or herbaceous flowers in your
borders, next year. If stout enough, the remaining trunk of the tree
might be used as a tree stake or post.
I
think most leaves will be long gone from the trees by now, but some
trees and bushes such as Jasmines and Passion Flowers have been holding
on to them. If you have still got leaves on the garden, or even on the
lawn if you haven’t cut it, either the worms will drag them into the
ground if they are not in thick layers, or when the lawn mower comes out
again, it will chop them up to make good compost if mixed in with the
grass cuttings. Compost can include shredded paper and as the banks are
always advising people to shred statements for security, my son and I
bought a small paper shredder to shred all our bank statements and
letters with our name and address on. The paper then goes on the compost
heap and mixes in with all the vegetable and fruit peelings, including
banana skins and egg-shells that should be roughly broken up. In about 6
months you will have some lovely compost ready.
If
you had planted bowls for Christmas they probably contained Cyclamen. It
is best to take the Cyclamen out and pot them up separately, in fact it
is always better to pot all plants in a bowl separately. The pots can be
hidden and stood in a larger container all together so they can be taken
out for different watering needs.
It
is time to think about Spring in spite of the dull wet and windy
weather. Now is a good time to make a note of dull patches in the garden
and if you can’t see much, get a friend or relation to help point them
out. There are a lot of variegated foliage plants about in Garden
Centres and also shrubs with berries on that will give some Winter
colour. I know the birds will go for the berries, but they are not keen
on all of them. They will leave some of the Cotoneasters and hips on the
roses 'till they are desperate for food. If you have a large space, a
variegated Holly looks nice. There are some about with very few, if any
prickles as well as Gold and Silver variegated varieties and of course
on female bushes you will get the berries.