Hellebores - tips for growing and cutting

Now is the time to plant Hellebores, to give early spring colour in the garden.  These plants love light shade, typically growing at the edge of deciduous woodland.  They also like well drained but moisture retentive soil.  If you do plant Hellebores now, they should be watered throughout the summer for the first year until well established.

After Care

There are a number of species available, such as niger, odorus, and purpuracens, although many will be hybrids, often of the Oriental variety. For aftercare purposes, they may generally be divided into three types, all of which need slightly different treatment.  Hellebore leaves tend to get rather large and tatty, and also show disease such as black spot as they become older.  A good aftercare regime involves removing the old leaves, which in many cases has the added advantage of displaying the flowers to better effect, while getting rid of the pests and disease that they harbour.  The picture on the right is of my own hellebores, from which I removed the leaves about four weeks ago (admittedly leaving it a bit late, because of all the rain).

• The first type of Hellebore is the one which carries its leaves on separate stalks to the flowers.  These are easy - in autumn or late winter, as the flowers are starting to show, simply remove all the leaves (and here's a handy hint - do it carefully as it is easy to remove developing flower stalks at the same time.  I tell you this from my own sad, sad experience).  It is a good idea not to compost the leaves as they will harbour leaf spot, pests and other diseases.
• The second type is the one which carries flowers and leaves on the same stalk.  The leaves need to be left until flowering has finished, when the stems can be cut down.  If a plant is badly infected with leaf spot, all the infected stems can be removed in the autumn, but this will lose the flowers for the coming spring.
• The final type includes species such as atrorubens, torquatus and some forms of multifidus, odorus and purpurescens.  These naturally die back to the base at various times of the year, so the dead leaves and debris may simply be cleared away.

All that is then left is to give them a light dressing of a general fertiliser such as blood, fish and bone (but not if you have foxes - use an artificial fertiliser instead).  They can also be mulched after pruning with leaf mould or spent mushroom compost.  Do not use well-rotted manure as it tends to promote leaf growth at the expense of flowers.

If you do have leaf / black spot, spraying with two systemic fungicides alternately is a good idea.  Spray twice in autumn and then twice again in early spring when the new shoots are emerging.

Hellebores as cut flowers

In this week's Saturday Telegraph, the sainted goddess Helen Yemm (in her Thorny Problems column) was asked how to transfer cut Hellebore flowers from the garden without them instantly wilting.  This appears to be a problem for most Hellebores, and especially the Oriental hybrids commonly found for sale.  Helen offered three solutions:

• Simply pick only the flower heads, and float them in a wide, shallow bowl of water.
• Heat treat the stems.  This is a technique used by flower arrangers for these and other tricky wilting plants such as euphorbias.  Dip the bottom inch (2.5 cm for our younger readers), of each newly cut stem into hot but not quite boiling water, for about 30 seconds. 
• The third tip came from one of her readers many years ago.  Fill a washing bowl with water, place the cut stem in the water held in your non-dominant hand (ie the left if you are right handed), then crush the stem firmly between the thumb and forefinger about one and a half inches above the cut (again, for our younger readers, 3.5 to 4 cm).  Then cut the stem through the crushed area, while still underwater (that is why you need to crush with your non-dominant hand, so you can wield the scissors with the correct hand and not take off your fingers in the process!).  This apparently removes the airlock which can form and the stems should quickly stiffen.  It can them be transferred to a vase.  Note that it is a good idea to do this as soon as possible after cutting the flowers. 

Broadview Gardens, Hadlow - Open for the NGS and throughout the year

Hellebores and snowdrop combination at
Broadview Gardens

Broadview Gardens in Hadlow, Kent, is one of the events listed in our latest event flyer (which can be viewed from the link on the right until the next meeting in March 2014).  The gardens are part of Hadlow College, which is a horticultural college, and the gardens are used as a means of teaching for the students as well as providing a destination for interested gardeners to visit. The College is also an RHS accredited centre, offering a range of full and part time qualifications in horticulture, garden management and design.  Although they are open during the year, they are also open for the NGS with guided tours as part of a Hellebore weekend, as the gardens hold the National Collection of Hellebores and Japanese Anemones. There are also a variety of spectacular bulbs such as snowdrops and irises, which are currently in bloom.

Snowdrops en masse at Broadview Gardens

However, Hellebores and Snowdrops are not the only attraction for these gardens, as the teaching element (including the teaching of garden design mentioned above) has led to the creation and maintenance of a number of show gardens.  Students normally build a new garden or regenerate an existing one each year.  There are in fact 10 acres of garden to explore.  We visited this garden at the beginning of this week, and thought that members might like to see some photographs of them, in order to illustrate the variety that is on display.  We would definitely recommend a visit.

And, I might add, there is a very good coffee shop serving breakfasts, light lunches and cakes!

The full address of the gardens is Broadview Gardens, Hadlow College, Tonbridge Road, Hadlow, Kent TH11 0AL.

Italian style garden at Broadview Gardens

Fountain garden at Broadview Gardens

Oriental Style garden at Broadview Gardens

Stone and Water garden, designed to be easy to maintain with year-round enjoyment

Local-ish events February-March 2014

The eagle-eyed among you may have spotted a new leaflet floating around the meetings this year, entitled "A Selection of Local-ish Events".  We are trying to update this each month, with some local events run by the NT, RHS, NGS, and other interesting locations in the area.   Our rough and ready rule-of-thumb is to regard about 25 miles as local!

We have made a permanent link to the latest brochure in our permanent pages section, on the right of the blog. Please click on it to see what is happening around us.

Please let us know what you think, and what sort of events you would like to see!

February meeting 2014 - The History of the NGS

Many thanks go to Mrs Margaret Arnott, who gave us a talk on the History of the National Garden Scheme at our February meeting.  During the talk, we discovered the origins of the term "District Nurse", arising from the founder of the NGS who started a charity in Liverpool following the death of his wife to raise money for home nurses.  He divided the area into "districts", and the term was born.  Mrs Arnott also gave outlines of a number of Surrey gardens open for the "Yellow Book", including her own garden at Heathside, Cobham - which also happens to grace the cover of the Surrey gardens NGS booklet.

Although, as this article goes to press, the full NGS Yellow Book is not yet available, members are recommended to use the NGS website, www.ngs.org.uk, which allows you to search for gardens open at specific times, and/or within a specified radius of home.  The website also carries up-to-date information on garden openings, and is worth checking for changes to advertised times before departure - some gardens have had to close at short notice recently on account of the rain and flooding.  The website also appears in our "Useful Links" section, on the right of the articles.

Questions, questions, everywhere ... but not so many answers!

At last night's meeting, two questions were posed to me regarding items that have recently been blogged.  Embarrassingly, given my air of quiet knowledgeability and boundless intellect, I was unable to answer either.  However, in the spirit of information sharing, and my own giving nature, I felt that they should be presented to the public, partly in the hope that the membership may be able to help. I have also added a question of my own, that comes out of the research needed for the others.

Galanthus Nerissa - the true colour.  Not pink at all!
Photo courtesy of Dryad Nurseries, www.dryad-home.co.uk

Question One - from Brian.  In our article on alternative Valentine's Day presents, "A Gardener's Valentine's Day" the picture of Galanthus Nerissa is distinctly pink toned (and looked very pink indeed on the printed page which was available for reading at the meeting).  Is this a genuinely pink toned variety? 

Answer One:  No.  The photo used is a beautifully lit arty portrait; the purplish colour on the double corona is also not present and is in fact green.  A less arty piccy is on the right, to give a true representation of the snowdrop.

Question Two - from Margaret.   In your article, "How much more local do you want?" you talk about Daphne Bholua Limpsfield. How did this variety get its name?

Answer Two:  Dunno. I have been able to discover that this variety was introduced in 2000, as a seedling derived from Daphne Bholua Peter Smithers.  It is one of the "most honestly evergreen" Daphnes, as described in a small article in Comment in The Garden in January 2014.  It is not a common variety but is listed in the RHS Plant Finder as being available at Coolings in Knockholt, or at the RHS Wisley garden centre.  It is also planted at Wisley.  However, the derivation of the name is not easily discoverable, and I am still trying.  Would any members who have any ideas or knowledge please leave a comment on this article to help us out?

Question Three - from me: It appears that there was once another Limpsfield variety, the Dianthus Limpsfield White.  Does anyone know if this is still a current variety, where it may be purchased, what history it has, or if anyone has a clump that we can persuade them to take some cuttings from?  The plant is not listed as available in the RHS Plant Finder, but there is occasional reference to it on the web.

Answer Three:  Over to you, members!

Crime spree three - now it's snowdrops.

Galanthus Woronowii Elizabeth Harrison

The saga of garden crime horror stories continues.  News is starting to come in regarding a new spate of thefts from both public and private gardens. This time, it is the snowdrop that is the center of attention, as growers and enthusiasts wake up to find their treasured clumps have been stolen overnight.

At this time of year, snowdrops herald the first signs of spring, and have a peculiar place in our national nostalgia.  Snowdrop collecting has been booming over the last few years, and with that boom comes an increase in the price of the rarest specimens.  The most expensive snowdrop is apparently Galanthus Elizabeth Harrison, a single bulb of which sold in February last year at £725.  Yes, that's right, seven-hundred-and-twenty-five pounds; I have not slipped a decimal point.  It was purchased by Thompson and Morgan in Ipswich, for breeding purposes, and is rather special owing to the distinctive yellow ovary and petal markings - but at £725, it would have to be unusual to say the least!  At last year's Spring flower fair at the RHS Horticultural Halls in London, Jilly and I balked at paying £8 for a single bulb of one particular variety.  The idea of paying nearly one hundred times that makes me feel faint, and I'm going to have to go away for a lie down...

... and now I'm back, but still feeling amazed and frankly rather hard done by.  I never knew there was so much money to be made in gardening.  Back to the topic, however, and it seems that the thefts are becoming serious enough that gardens such as the Sir Harold Hillier Gardens near Romsey in Hampshire no longer label their varieties as this encourages night-time raids on the clumps.  In their Winter Garden, a beautiful carpet of snowdrops at this time of year, only two of the many varieties have a label attached, as a matter of policy.  The head gardener, Fran Clifton, tells the story of how she planted out two pots of Galanthus Blewberry Tart (a rare variety costing £25 per bulb) back in 2008, and both clumps promptly went missing.  She says that the problem has become noticeably worse in 2011 and 2012, with the garden now planting snowdrops in subterranean cages so that you cannot just dig them up.  Very rare varieties have been dug up, planted in pots, and are now housed in locked greenhouses - they can be seen only in a two week special exhibition, after which they are returned to the safety of a lock and key.

Galanthus Nivalis at Coton Manor

The problem doesn't just affect the large public gardens.  Steve Owen maintains the National Collection of snowdrops in his back garden in Bedfordshire, amassing more than 900 varieties.  This year, only his family and friends will see the display as he has found that thefts increased dramatically when he opened his gardens to public viewing for the first time in 2012.  He has noticed that visitors bring cameras, and that some then marked the positions of desirable clumps so that they could later be stolen during the night.  He lost a variety named Galanthus E. A. Bowles, only discovered in 2004, a theft that he says cost about £900, and has now started to fit CCTV and anti-theft lights.  It is clear, he says, that plants are being stolen by highly knowledgeable thieves, who are targeting varieties not normally available for sale.

Apparently, gardening forums on the internet are now beginning to show an increase in the number of ordinary householders who are waking up to find clumps of snowdrops missing, as the mania for snowdrops has increased over the last few years and some people are not prepared to wait for their own plantings to fill out.  Bulbs are also disappearing from parks and roadside verges.

Which all makes me rather relieved that the snowdrops that I have just purchased for my own garden cost no more than £2.95 for a small clump in a pot, from Knights, and that was before the three-for-two discount.

A day for love - unless you're a slug.

As the days grow longer - at last - and spring edges ever closer, our thoughts are supposed to turn to love and romance.  February 14th may be Valentine's Day, the day for love and all that, but for the dedicated gardener it marks another important event - the day that, traditionally, first steps are taken to ward off the dreaded slug.

I'm not sure if it is the Hurst Green clay and all the dampness it creates that encourages vast numbers of slugs in my own garden, but we seem to be some form of Slug Central for the little gastropods, where they seem to be having a riotous party with their close friends, the snails, with my prized plants as their canapes.  I must admit also that despite all good intentions for a wildlife friendly garden, I still cannot stop myself using slug pellets. I can hear the sharp intakes of breath from here as you read this, but we have such an issue with these slimy things that it boils down to a stark choice; the slugs, or the delphiniums.  And I, appalled reader, choose my delphies (and my hostas) every time.  You can of course try the eco-friendly alternatives such as copper tape on pots, copper rings around plants, new pellets made out of a woolly material, or sharp grit around the plants, but I must personally admit that the old fashioned slug pellets and the liquid Slugit have always worked the best for me - and besides, I do try to make up for using them in other ways.  We all have exceptions that break the rule, and I will not apologise for this one.

There is of course no special or magical reason why slug pellets - or their more friendly alternatives - should be applied specifically on Valentine's Day, but slugs and snails are generally just becoming active at this particular time of year (although they may be several weeks in advance this year owing to the warm and damp winter, assuming they haven't actually drowned in the meantime).   We need to remember to protect young delphinium and hosta shoots in good time before the slugs go to town on them, and so Valentine's Day makes a very memorable time-marker to jog your memory and put in slug protection before the little blighters appear and do the damage.

Besides, as I tell my wife, I can't be blamed if the importance of putting out the protection on Valentine's Day itself means that we can't go out and book a table at a restaurant. You can buy a lot of slug pellets for the price of a meal at Le Manoir...

High-drangeas!

In a strange coincidence following our recent post on garden crime, the newspapers are today reporting another issue regarding thefts from gardens, albeit a rather strange one.  It appears that residents of Hucqueliers, a village in northern France, have seen their hydrangeas stripped of their flowers - and the thefts have now spread across the area.  Apparently the practice was first seen in Germany - and the reason is quite peculiar.  Police have warned that the gang (or gangs) involved have been stealing the flower heads in order to smoke the petals, as they give a hallucinogenic and euphoric effect.  These hydrangeas - and reports do not say whether it is all plants in the genus or only a specific variety - contain a chemical similar to that found in cannabis.  Experts have now emerged, somewhat predictably, to announce that smoking the petals could lead to serious health problems.

This rather begs the question "how on earth did anyone find out?". Someone had to be the first to try, and to make the discovery, but how do you get the idea in the first place?  Although I like to think of myself as a gardener open to new concepts and experimentation, I cannot say that I have ever had the urge to smoke, ingest or otherwise make use of any random petals or plants in the garden (other than veg, I suppose) on the off chance that they just might give a pleasant buzz.  Can't we stick to just enjoying the scent, and leaving the blossom on the plant for others (and the wildlife) to enjoy?

So now, when you look out at your neighbour's hydrangea display, you have to ask yourself whether they are growing them for show - or for another reason entirely!

Great Dixter plant catalogue and lecture programme

Members may be interested in the 2014 Nursery Catalogue from Great Dixter, one of the great British gardens, which is now available and can be downloaded here.  The catalogue also contains information on the lectures that are run at Great Dixter, together with contact and booking details.

More information on Great Dixter Charitable Trust may be found as follows:

www.greatdixter.co.uk and www.greatdixtershop.co.uk

February Meeting 2014

Our next meeting is on February 12th 2014, at St Agatha's Hall as usual, with a start time of 8.00 p.m.  Please aim to arrive a little early if you need to renew or take out your membership as this may take a little time if there are a number of members trying to do the same!

We will be welcoming Mrs Margaret Arnott, speaking on the history of the National Garden Scheme.

As we are always looking for new members, please do bring along a friend - their first meeting is free.

How much more local do you want?

Daphne bholua Limpsfield in Hurst Green

At this time of year, the garden can look a little like a wasteland, with little to tempt anyone but the most obsessive gardener outside. I know that we should be out preparing for Spring, pruning away and clearing up the borders, but the wet weather that we have been suffering from does not make this overly attractive. We all need reasons to go out, and one of the best at the moment is the smell of the Daphne that is outside my back door. The scent of many winter flowering plants is the drive that can make us go outside at this time of year, and few perform better than Daphne Bholua. The small clusters of pinkish purple flowers open up in late January to early February, and will scent a very wide area. We came across this plant some years ago at Wakehurst, where there is a stand of a number of plants just as you enter the path that leads to the bird area (if you have been, you will know where I mean). We smelt the Daphnes a long time before we saw them, and decided that we had to have one in our garden.  The one shown in this post has been in our garden for about three or four years.

The highly scented flowers of
Daphne Bholua Limpsfield

One of the most popular scented varieties is Daphne Bholua Jacqueline Postill. It is found as a recommendation in many of the gardening tomes - but there is a recent problem with this variety. You may know that, in order to maintain a specific cultivar, it has to be propagated vegetatively, that is by cloning through cuttings, layering etc, and not through seed as the variety cannot then be guaranteed. There is apparently only one plant breeder in the UK propagating Jacqueline Postill - and he has just retired. It is therefore difficult to find in most nurseries at the moment. Instead, why not try another variety that seems to be just as good - the wonderful locally named Daphne Bholua Limpsfield? This is the plant that is in our own garden, and it seems well adapted to the Hurst Green clay soil. It needs a sheltered position, with some sun, but ideally not south facing; it is hardy but can do with some protection from hard frost as this can kill off the blooms before they open.  Putting it in a position that does not get too windy is also ideal as it will allow the scent to collect without being blown away - ideally close to the back door with protection and shelter from the house. It needs little maintenance and will eventually grow to a maximum of 4 meters. although it stays reasonably compact for many years. The only other consideration is that, although generally evergreen in Hurst Green, the plant can be a little straggly and dull in the summer, a little like camellias or rhododendrons - plant it as a shrub for winter interest, with companion planting to divert the eye for the remainder of the year. The scent is well worth the effort.

And, of course, you cannot get more local than a plant named Limpsfield!

A Gardener's Valentine's Day



Galanthus Nivalis - A heart-shaped mark
Photo courtesy of greenforks.com

Valentine’s Day is fast approaching! Are you tired of giving flowers and chocolates? Struggling to find an original gift? Here are a couple of plant ideas that I can guarantee are less fattening than chocolate.How about purchasing your loved one a selection of snowdrop cultivars? The green marks on the inside petals are heartshaped and as they bloom during February your thoughtful gift will be admired on Valentine’s Day year after year. Please note that this does not excuse you from never buying a Valentine’s gift again! Garden centres usually have a small selection of cultivars, although they will by now be selling out fast; for a larger selection you will need to use a snowdrop specialist. When we visited the RHS London Plant and Design Show last year at the Horticultural Halls we were stunned at the number of different snowdrop cultivars. Unfortunately, we were also stunned at the prices some of them commanded. I really wanted a Galanthus Nerissa, a very pretty double-flowered snowdrop, but I baulked at paying nearly £25 for one. Never mind, at least it gave me a better idea of the Dutch tulip bulb fever!



Galanthus Nerissa
Photo courtesy of macplants.co.uk

If your pockets are deep and really I mean potentially very, very deep, you can bid on ebay for the opportunity to name a new snowdrop cultivar. Bidding ends on February 13^th at 8pm and if you ‘win’ you will receive a snowdrop cultivar with whatever name you have chosen. (Please remember that Jilly begins with a ‘J’ not a ‘G’!) The cultivar will then be available for sale so that you can annoy all your friends by insisting that they buy them. For further details, please see the website www.evolution-plants.com.

Finally, the Millenium Seed Bank at Wakehurst Place has a selection of seeds waiting to be adopted. For £25 you can adopt a seed, receiving a nice certificate as well as newsletters during the year. Popular choices for Valentine’s Day include the slender stalked rose, Rosa Graciflora; love-in-a-mist Nigella Damascena or, my favourite love-in-a-puff, Cardiospermum halicacabum, with its extraordinary seeds with heart-shaped marks. For further details, please contact Jill Taylor at Kew Gardens on 0208 332 3248.

Alternatively, be dull and buy chocolates.



Cardiospermum Halicacabum seeds
Photo courtesy of flickrhivemind.net