[Help] Gardeners Question Time.

[Kalimantan Gull]

Hello gardener peeps. Is it too late in the year to pollard an Ash (been pollarded several times before) and how drastic can I do it - can I chop everything?

Ta ta thanks

 

[Cowfold Seagull]

View attachment 134999

A few of these adorned with the odd garden tub would look very nice, and hopefully deter said dog.

 

[Coldeanseagull]

Hello gardener peeps. Is it too late in the year to pollard an Ash (been pollarded several times before) and how drastic can I do it - can I chop everything?

Ta ta thanks

I would, but if you are very drastic and take it down to a foot of the ground, it's called coppicing

 

[Moshe Gariani]

Yes, incredibly well informed and generous. I hope thread followers can benefit from the concepts and detail - Premier League quality advice. Unfortunately I have once again demonstrated my own ability to do gardening at more like East Sussex Division 12(S) levels...

As the photo demonstrates I went ahead yesterday morning with what became a well intentioned but flawed “plan” of my own.

It started with my arrival at the garden centre (Hilliers in Hailsham). For future reference would I be better buying online? They didn’t seem to have ANY of the plants on my quite long list of those suggested by Jevs and Weststander...!! In the end I managed to find Cornus Sanguinea which I got two of and I think are the best things I got. Apart from that I had to choose from what they had.

A bloke there (“Jim”) was very helpful and explained which were perennial and annual plants. I ended up with 2 x Dianthus, 2 x Garden Mums, 18 x Violas, 6 x Pansies, 40 x red tulip bulbs and 5 x bulbs I’ve forgotten the name of but they are red and produce a plant with purple flowers.

To be fair to myself I am under a bit of pressure from Mrs G to deliver colour - eg inc. retaining “her” roses - but I don’t think I’ve got it at all right...

I guess I can have another go in the Spring? [emoji3]

(p.s. the label on the Dianthus says “biennial”... is that common? Seems a bit of a shame...)

As predicted the October planting has turned out pretty badly and I basically need to start from scratch again... the pansies and violas are on the way out but still going so I've moved the best ones into pots together. The bulbs haven't really worked - just green leaves have come up. The cornus are a nice colour but they are so spindly and insubstantial they don't really do the job. The other little plants I put in are either completely or partly dead.

So I think I can have essentially a blank canvas apart from the rose at the far end that will have to stay. Everything else is pretty much dead or can be moved elsewhere.

We want colourful flowers with some height. Ideally the finished look will be full enough so there isn't bare soil that needs weeding. Plants that can easily be ordered online and planted at the moment please.

 

[Coldeanseagull]

Moshi, most plants that you want for bedding to go straight in, won't arrive until May onwards. Have a look for some small leaved hebes for shape, add the bedding plants for colour and cover the bare soil with a good quantity of chipped bark. Next year you'll be able to order the plants earlier, like primula and swiss giant pansies-which will last until the weather gets too warm- add pelargoniums and begonia semperflorens for summer long flowers and a mixture of dahlias, which will flower until the frosts. The diy sheds will have the usual petunias and marigolds to bolster the display
I'm actually planning my displays for next year already, but I'm very sad

 

[Jack Straw]

As predicted the October planting has turned out pretty badly and I basically need to start from scratch again... the pansies and violas are on the way out but still going so I've moved the best ones into pots together. The bulbs haven't really worked - just green leaves have come up. The cornus are a nice colour but they are so spindly and insubstantial they don't really do the job. The other little plants I put in are either completely or partly dead.

So I think I can have essentially a blank canvas apart from the rose at the far end that will have to stay. Everything else is pretty much dead or can be moved elsewhere.

We want colourful flowers with some height. Ideally the finished look will be full enough so there isn't bare soil that needs weeding. Plants that can easily be ordered online and planted at the moment please.

This RHS web site will help you. https://www.rhs.org.uk/advice/profile?pid=842
You could have a single row of about ten small different shrubs which will grow to no more than 1m, or perhaps 10 x groups of 3 which will only reach 0.5m. The most important thing is to know how big they will eventually grow.
If your bulbs were planted last autumn, if they are daffs, they could still flower. If the Cornus is "Mid-winter Fire", they aren't very reliable and they take two or three years to look something.

 

[Coldeanseagull]

Sedum spectabile, lavender cosmos and hollyhocks will help the bees and flower reliably

 

[Moshe Gariani]

Successful trip to the garden centre followed by planting today.

I now have...

Convolvulus
Heuchera
Spirea
Euphorbia
Cornus
Penstemon
Polyphyllus
Delphinium
Digitalis
Cytisus
and a rose.

In addition I have some unidentified plants that I will post as a quiz on GQT so I can complete my bed map...

 

[Moshe Gariani]

1. ?

 

[Moshe Gariani]

2. ?

 

[Moshe Gariani]

3. ?

 

[Moshe Gariani]

4. ?

 

[Moshe Gariani]

This is 4. again - bigger plant pictured in another place in the garden...

 

[Weststander]

Sedum spectabile, lavender cosmos and hollyhocks will help the bees and flower reliably

Pulmonaria’s amazing for bees January to April, when there’s little else around for them.

 

[Moshe Gariani]

Successful trip to the garden centre followed by planting today.

I now have...

Convolvulus
Heuchera
Spirea
Euphorbia
Cornus
Penstemon
Polyphyllus
Delphinium
Digitalis
Cytisus
and a rose.

In addition I have some unidentified plants that I will post as a quiz on GQT so I can complete my bed map...

Would it be normal to plant annual (“bedding”?) flowers in the gaps between perennials? Or something else?

 

[Coldeanseagull]

I/ stachys lanata, probably had a name change by now
2/ cistus, without flowers hard to say what variety

 

[Coldeanseagull]

3/ dianthus something
4/ iris, once again without flowers etc

 

[Coldeanseagull]

Would it be normal to plant annual (“bedding”?) flowers in the gaps between perennials? Or something else?

I'd plant up in between with the bedding. One thing to remember with a border that's viewable from all sides, plant tallest in the middle and smallest on the outside...that's mature height I'm talking about, besides that, it's filling out nicely

 

[Stat Brother]

1 Nearly dead silver thing
2 Upside down
3 A mess
4 A Weed
5 One of those things that generates loads of dead leaves but doesn't do much else.


As always happy to help you hobbyists.

 

[Coldeanseagull]

1 Nearly dead silver thing
2 Upside down
3 A mess
4 A Weed
5 One of those things that generates loads of dead leaves but doesn't do much else.


As always happy to help you hobbyists.

Gardening is a serious business, not a hobby!!!!

1/ lambs ears, furry, doesn't like the winter wet
2/ I'd love to say australis, but sadly not
3/ That's why you use a pair of dress makers scissors in the garden, just for such clean ups
4/ I agree, I hate irises
5/ There's a five? Oh, the bigger iris!
Come to think of it, 4/ looks a bit like kniphofia leaves poking up