Gardeners World episode 41 2021

hello welcome to gardner's world now at this time of year even though it's been a long time coming that combination of heat and flowers in their prime is perfect to create lovely scent and tonight's program is just filled with fragrance i'll be making an area in the wall garden to maximize the possibilities of scent carol goes in search of the scent of roses both in the wild and in the collection at dutton hall in lancashire isn't this just magnificent and the scent is light and apple-like delicious rachel is visiting the rhs garden at harlow carr to see their fabulous display of aromatic plants and the incredible collection of sweet peas and i'll be propagating herbs in the herb garden here at [Music] longmeadow this is our herb garden which we've used for years in a very basic way just growing enough hurts the kitchen but revamped it last year and to be honest of all the garden this has probably suffered most for the rain that we had because mediterranean herbs in particular really don't like cold wet weather they're just not designed to cope for it what they like is baking sun and really good drainage and quite poor soil and one of the problems of two lush conditions is that they get incredibly lanky and you can see how in here and this is a disgrace i do admit it as a herb garden this has not worked out now you can see how this marjoram a margarine oregano same plant has grown incredibly lanky and shaded out the time which has died back a little bit of growth on that but time hates shade of any kind another one lost here disastrous really even this rosemary has got this classic dieback rosemary hates having wet roots now i'm going to cut back in here and i'm going to take some cuttings to give me fresh stock which i'm then going to plant elsewhere in the garden where it has a better chance marjoram will regrow perfectly well i love marjoram it's great chopped up in a tomato sauce you can add it really to flavor anything it's got that particular hot oiliness to them and it's that oil that we love so you need sun to bring the oils out i like to leave the fennel because the seeds are really the bit that i like to harvest most fennel seeds either on their own nice aniseedy tastes that you can just munch or else with pork of any kind are absolutely fantastic and of course you can add the foliage to fish it's got that particular aniseedy taste and fragrance they're magnificent plants too absolutely lovely now there are a number of ways of growing many of these herbs and now is the perfect time to take cuttings first of all you need to find a healthy plant in fact i put some in a planter here and deliberately mainly filled it with grit and they're fine growing perfectly happily in the right conditions looking good so that's a good starting point the second thing to look for is a nice upright stem that is not flowering what we need to do is hunt in there you see there we are that's a non-flowering stem so i'll take that always put cuttings straight into a bag and the chances of them taking our increase hugely now that's all really good cuttings material so go down the bottom cut that off and it looks fairly flimsy but that's all right that will root perfectly well and herbs at this time of year have got fresh new growth that's slightly hardened off so they're semi-ripe cuttings and this is the perfect time to propagate from thyme rosemary sage any of these mediterranean slightly woody herbs do it now and you'll have a good set of plants next year now on a day like today where it's warm speed is of the essence hence the importance of the bag to stop evaporation essentially all cuttings need the growing tip some leaves and some stem and that's it so the first thing to do is to cut it down to size a little bit you do need a sharp knife a nice flat surface and make your cut just below a leaf node so in this case we can go there and just cut and then carefully strip off some leaves not too violently because that will tear it and then you get wounds so that's fine there we need to put that into a potting mix that is really well drained i've added lots of perlite grit would do just as well i just happen to have some perlite spare and then put it in at the edge of the pot that's not critical but it does seem to help i think it's to do with drying out the plastic pot stops it drying out so much you can go right round the edge and burying it about three quarters way down the length of the stem right i want to get these under cover a quick label water them lightly and then i'm going to put them under my mist propagator but you do need to spray them and if you don't have a mispropagator or even a mini propagator put them in a polythene bag and if you put the polythene bag over the top do remember if you put it over like like this if i can find the hole you put the polythene bag over the top and support it so it's not collapsing on it and then every day turn it round so you don't get a buildup of condensation which will rot the plants but if nothing else just keep spraying it with a mist sprayer of water two or three times a day and that will go a long way to stop it dying off right let's get it in there well mediterranean plants have had a tough year of it so far and anyway making more should set me up to do better next year but some herbs have had a really good time and none have done better than mint we've got various mints around the garden but you can see that this moroccan mint is loving it and this of course is the mint that they make that delicious tea out of in north africa we've got eau de cologne mint there and various other places we've got apple mint spearmint and peppermint all of them really happy in this wet lush weather that we've been having now these are actually planted in pots and that just sunk in the ground because if mint takes root it can take over and it's really difficult to get rid of however for all its robustness there is a potential problem for garden mint and we went along to rhs wisley to find out more about it [Music] the vehicle is seven millimeters in length it's a shiny dark blue color and you're likely to find it on mint plants either possibly on the upper surface of the leaf perhaps more likely feeding or hiding underneath the leaf in the worst case scenario it is a pest which will cause noticeable damage to the extent that people may have to take control measures against it what you're looking for is holes in the leaves it was recorded for the first time as a breeding beetle in britain from a garden in new england in kent and that was lot in july of last year [Music] as far as we know this is a specific pest of mint plants i.e menthe species both wild and cultivated ones we don't think it will feed on anything else in gardens the blue mint beetle has a typical sort of life cycle for beetles the females will lay eggs those eggs hatch out into soft-bodied lava a rather globular appearance with a black head and a blackish grey body and the larvae like the adult beetles will feed on the foliage of mint plants in britain we now have two species of mint beetle there's the green mint beetle which is native to britain it's not a major pest of minting gardens it's perhaps more common on wild mints growing alongsides of rivers lakes and so on whether or not the blue mint beetle is going to be worse we don't know yet it's still early days we're still waiting to see whether or not it will spread and if it does spread how abundant it becomes on garden mint plants how you tackle this pest depends partly on how big a clump of mint you've got if there's a small clump it's feasible just to search the plant pick off the adults and larvae as you find them and that will keep the damage down to a low level if you need to use a pesticide there is an organic chemical called pyrethrum which you can use that should be reasonably effective against the larvae but maybe less so against the adult beetles there are also synthetic pesticides which are approved for use on mint and these include chemicals like lambda cyhalothrin and delta methylene at the moment we still don't know how big a problem blue mint beetle is going to be so this is where the public can help us they can send us records and this will give us a better impression of what is happening with this insect [Music] if you think you've got bloom in beetle you can contact the rhs via our website now there's plenty to do in the garden without worrying about pests and diseases and here are some jobs to get on with this weekend my lavender has had a miserable time of it so far this wet summer however by cutting lavender back now you rejuvenate it and give it a chance to perform again before summer is out be careful not to cut back into last season's wood because there's a risk of die back but just leave a little bit of this year's growth [Music] i suspect like me that you got out of the habit of watering but don't overlook regular watering of containers the plants are full grown they're doing a lot of work and making huge demands on their roots to make sure they have a good water at least once a week even if the weather is wet [Music] parsley is an invaluable herb that you can grow and eat all year round and if you sow some seeds now you'll provide yourself plants to take you right through winter you can sew them direct outside but i prefer to sow them in a seed tray or plugs raise individual seedlings so they're strong and healthy and then plant them out in about six weeks time a job that i tackle at this time of year every year is pruning back these espalier pairs now the point is that all restricted forms of apples and pears whether they're espaliers cordons fans or just just bush or dwarf trees need summer pruning and this is to hold their form if you prune in summer it restricts growth pruning winter and it encourages growth and so if you want asparagus then it's something you have to do regularly now this time of year it's not all about being busy in the garden i think it's time to have some fun too and visiting other gardens is both really enjoyable and also very informative and rachel's gone up to rhs hollow car where they have a fabulous collection of aromatic plants and really good sweet peas [Music] [Applause] when i arrived early this morning these philadelphus or mock orange were already pumping out the perfume you knew that it was there before you reached it as you see this is a very large double flower variety and i think this is the best place for it somewhere towards the back of the border because you don't need to be up close in order to get that fragrance when it finishes flowering well those stems can be a little bit ungainly the leaf isn't terribly interesting so you could grow something like a clematis viticella through it to give you a second season of interest i grow this rose in my own garden where it gets much taller but depending on how you prune and how open the situation is you can keep it low and then it's a perfect partner for lavender also an essential for summer fragrance and this one is called peter pan it's nice and low growing which makes it a perfect edging for the front of a border [Music] here at rhs garden hollow car sweet peas are integral to the summer display and i met up with curator elizabeth barnforth to get some real tips from the top [Music] even in a bad year this hasn't been a great year for sweet peas and look at them beautiful yeah we have had a particularly good year where i think others have struggled [Music] just in terms of the cultivation of sweet peas the soil is probably the most important aspect because you imagine all of that top growth they're pushing on during the season and the amount of flour that they're going to produce they really need to get their roots down so an open kind of structure is what they desire most um as long as it you know you can keep it moist through the season it's really important i love all of these very soft lovely pastel colors but this one right at the end it's sort of it's drawing me to it it's the color of almost an old lady's lipstick you know what i mean is it i don't mean that in a bad way but it is it's got that kind of quite punchy corally red so you're telling me that's not in your makeup bag no it's not in my makeup bag but no i love it it's great yeah yeah it's beautiful and um that's one called restimel and actually the scent is is pretty good on that [Music] of course one of the best things with sweet peas is that you should pick them often so that you get more of them yes exactly and i think always evakes memories of childhood because i used to go out and pick um with my mum and i'd bring them in and the whole the pine kitchen table which used to be all scrubbed clean was just full of pollen beetles um but the real the real trick there is to just put them in a shed before you bring them in they'll migrate towards the lights and then you will be clear of pollen beetle and they'll be you can sit on your yes your table and just the scent will be wafted around the room so you get all the fragrance and not the beetles inside this is a lovely variety and again another small flower and and not very frilly in fact not thrilled at all no i think you you're actually a lover of the ground the floor as well i think i might be this is the way i'm leaning definitely in a container like this one this is the cupid series makes that lovely blend of purples and pinks which means you can enjoy that wonderful fragrance so quintessentially part of a summer garden not only in a place the size of harlow car but in the smallest plot i do like my sweet peas to be as tall as possible actually something about the height they have but the crucial thing is that they're fragrant just that perfect scent is an integral part of the whole flower and scent is what i want to get into this area this is where we sit and the sun quite neatly divides into morning sun here so it's great for an early morning cup of tea in the sunshine and then from lunchtime onwards it's in shade and over on this side you get the afternoon and evening sun and you can sit and lap it up and wherever you have stone you're always going to have the potential for more heat and more fragrance because the heat bounces off the stone heats up the oils and the plants and somehow the scent gets caught so you want to create the most fragrant parts of the garden where you sit and that could be of course more than one place but you want to really pack the scent around seats and far better to have one area that is really rich with fragrance than just dots all over the garden so that's what i'm trying to do here now we've had lilies and we've got scented leaf geraniums and these are all fantastic but i just want a little bit more particularly to go on into autumn so i've got some climbers here this is tracy sperman jasminoides now i have never grown this before i've often admired it in other people's gardens and love the fragrance and when it's in full glory it can cover a wall and just this mass of flour that repeats but it's a little tender but if i put it here where the figs were it's going to get full sun perfect south-facing sunny walls and i've got a slightly harder yep jasmine for some reason i've not grown a jasmine in this garden i've had it in previous gardens and we all love jasmine and it's quite familiar because it's used in various things but it's just on the edge of being cloying but the right side rich and strong and seductive right before i plant i'm going to add some grit as a rule of thumb you'll never go wrong improving the drainage for any plant that loves being baked in sunshine and as an example we've got some marjoram growing out of the wall now you think of the mudrum in the herb garden we saw that was growing very lank and falling all over the place this has got pure line there's no soil of any sort in there at all and it's completely upright and happy and that's a pretty good clue for what it likes right when i plant a border i'm thinking about all the colors i'm thinking about the relationship between colors the effect of colors and i guess we should do that with scents as well what will sense work like with each other what effect do they have on us we're wondering if perhaps we ought to be working the mix of sense with the same skill and subtlety that we work our colors rather than just bunging them in what i'm constructing here is a highly artificial exercise in scent now there's nothing wrong with that that's what we do in our gardens we create an environment fine-tuning it tweaking it to make it exactly as we want for us but carol has been in search of scent that couldn't be more natural in the british isles but the most widespread and therefore the most familiar is our dog rose rosa cannina it spreads itself along hedges scrambling all over the place and if it meets a tree off it goes to sandy into its branches and it's these simple single flowers which is so emblematic it is the national flower of england this is the red rose county of lancashire standing at the top of the picturesque rebel valley is dutton hall a 17th century manor whose garden is filled with over 200 different species of roses rich in colour and heady with scent and this is the red rose of lancaster otherwise known as the apothecaries rose because it was used hugely medicinally and herbally probably in many cases just to disguise some of the bad smells that were around at that time it has the most beautiful perfume it's robust strong has a lovely clean foliage i mean if you're into white roses then i suppose you could go for the white rose of york but it's tall gangly in comparison just doesn't have that scent i know which one i choose roses come in all shapes sizes and scents and away from the geometric formality of the front terrace of dutton hall the roses have been left to relax into their surroundings isn't this just magnificent this is rosa betty sherry it's got these big open loose sort of clusters of single flowers it's the same simple flower formation as our dog rose and the roses themselves opening from little deep pink buds pink up first and then fading to white so you just get this gloriousness this great cascade of bloom and the scent is light and apple-like delicious both that and the fact that these flowers are so open they're drawing in the inserts from all around [Music] the garden has been created by catherine perry the ramblers they're really brilliant at just scrambling where they want to and judging by the roses here she has a fondness for the older and more aromatic varieties i used to grow roses commercially yeah and just some of these were actually buddied in the ground as and never lifted and so you've left and i've left them yeah and um then made a garden around them and what in particular is it that attracted you to to roses so much well as a child i we had ordinary more modern roses in the garden and i didn't hadn't really come across the old-fashioned ones but then when i did looking at other people's gardens i realized that there were all these roses that were far from stiff and rigid and pointed buds there were these big flat flowers that were single there were giant single ones so varied all roses are so much more refined and and subtle [Music] when i first moved to gleep cottage one of my burning ambitions was to grow old roses and in particular this one this is rosa alba celeste i'd read all about it the beauty of its flowers and the perfection of its buds the sort of shape that you feel the people who've bred hybrid teas have been trying to attain all alberosis have really tough almost glaucus foliage and they're really disease resistant as for the scent it's beyond words just a few weeks ago i harvested my first new potatoes from here everything looked great now look at it it's been afflicted by blight and you can see typically these chocolate spots appear on the leaves and then in a matter of days the whole thing is withered and killed back now blight is a fungal infection and you need high humidity and heat and we've had just that so it's very common right across the country i'm getting stories of people getting it the thing to do is to remove all the foliage and dig up the potatoes dry them out and then eat them they'll be completely good to eat but they may not store very well once you've removed the foliage it is best to burn it if you can otherwise take it to your local green waste collection for them to dispose of and don't grow potatoes in here next year but you wouldn't want to anyway because of the natural rotation if the weather's dry you can leave the potatoes in the ground for up to a week but it's probably a good idea to get them out as quickly as possible before i do that though i want to show you another kind of blight that's a bit more serious now look at this here we have one two three four patches of box plight but in fact two types of bot sprite the cylindricadium boxy cola and volutella boxyi but the net effect is the same the plant just collapses in on itself and dies back once it's here it's unlikely to disappear very quickly you can't spray specifically for it even if you want to your best bet currently is just to clean it all out and leave it don't feed it because all you're doing is getting soft growth that is more prone by the way if you've had blight really be interested to hear from you because box blight is one of those things we are all learning about all the time however first job i'm going to do is cut out all the material pick up every scrap of stuff and then really importantly disinfect my secateurs and hopefully it doesn't spread but it's not all doom and gloom there's lots of lovely things in the garden so enjoy yourself and i'll see you back here next friday [Music] you can read more about life at longmeadow in this bbc gardeners world book history in the making next here on bbc2 michael wood explores the industrial revolution in the great british story [Music] [Music] [Music] so [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] do [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] you

Channel: Gardeners World

Views: 14,928

Rating: 5 out of 5

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Id: NvAriF8EHJw

Length: 31min 50sec (1910 seconds)

Published: Mon May 24 2021